Into the Darkroom of Annandale High School

Zully, an IB Photography student develops her contact sheet

The process and practice of darkroom photography dates all the way back to the early 1800s, where photographs took hours to produce and had to be developed almost immediately. More recently, photography has become a hobby and pastime for virtually anybody with access to a camera. Rather than the good old family camera, kids and parents alike now own cameras of their own, whether they are camera phones, handheld digital cameras, or even fully manual film cameras. While most of the mainstream use of photography is purely documentary, such as Facebook pictures, vacation photographs and the like, the art of photography is alive and well, especially within the walls of AHS.

Through classes like Photography 1-3 and IB Visual Art, students are given the opportunity to explore the art of darkroom photography.

“I think the biggest benefit of working in the darkroom is that every time you work on a print, you give a little bit of yourself, much like any other artist in mediums like painting or drawing,” said photography teacher Meredith Stevens.

The process of darkroom photography is an intricate method combining math, chemistry and an artistic eye to develop photos with rich contrast and a full range of tonal values.

One of the tricks of this process is finding the perfect balance between dark and light values, as well as ensuring proper exposure and focus within the image.

“The best thing about working in the darkroom is that you do everything yourself from start to finish. Digital is so common now that it is really cool to learn how to make photos by hand,” said senior Yaritza Pacheco.

A feature of darkroom processes that is not widely known is that all the editing that can be done in Photoshop or any other photo-editing program, such as brightness/contrast manipulation, cropping and image size, can be done by hand in the darkroom.  Each photograph can be printed to any size, although most commonly, 8”x10” prints are used. The only limit when processing photographs in the darkroom is the size of the enlarger and the imagination of the photographer.

“In learning how to work in the darkroom, you learn a greater appreciation for the work and craft of photography, whether it is film or digital.

A handful of students have made darkroom photography either a feature or the focus of their IB Art portfolio. Junior Kelly Dwyer has been working in the darkroom for two years and is making photography the focal medium of her portfolio. The freedom given through classes such as IB Visual Art really allows photography to become an experimental process, where art students can explore their interests in photography, after completing the basic Photography 1 course, and learning all the essential skills.  Other students like senior Yaritza Pacheco and junior Becca Sponga have used darkroom photography as a small but important piece of their body of work, as they now shoot in both film and digital.

Darkroom photography continues to be beneficial to students and teaches students both the process of developing a photographic print as well as the basic mechanics and artistic aspects of shooting a photograph, whether it is film or digital.