Orange Darkroom Walls, Why not?

[aduncanson]

Hi All,

I am new to this forum and have been extremely impressed by the wisdom and generosity of the participants.

After piddling with large format photography for many years occasionally trying to process film and prints in the unplumbed "dark space" of my dusty unfinished basement, I have finally taken the plunge and am building a darkroom. A major inspiration for this move was finding an 8x10 Elwood enlarger in very good shape available nearby for little more than the scrap cost of the cast iron. There will also be an Omega D2 for printing medium format and 4x5 negs. Accordingly the darkroom is relatively large, 10 x 17 feet.

I have gone back and forth on the question of black walls vs. white walls and was about to compromise on painting the dry side and short walls black, and the wet side white. Then it occurred to me that I could have the best of both if I made all of the walls a safe orange. I figure that white light spilling out of the enlarger will be substantially filtered to only orange by the orange walls. I cannot find anything on this idea and so I am looking for the collective wisdom of the group.

The greatest drawback that I am able to think of, is that the orange walls might be pretty disturbing with the white lights on. On the other hand, what do I really need white room lights for? I plan to include white work lights for the print inspection and negative filing spaces.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Alan Duncanson

[Greg Lockrey]

I'd go with a neutral gray.

[Eric Woodbury]

One side of mine is white and the other a deep purple. The line between is an ellipse. It's a darkroom, do anything you want to make it comfortable.

[Sylvester Graham]

My walls are tiger print velour, naturally.

[Ole Tjugen]

I can't remember what mine are!

But I do know that the wall immediately behind the enlarger is fire-engine red. I painted that myself - the rest is as they were. Off-white? Pale blue? Gungy brown? Hospital-corridor green? I truly can't remember.

[Tracy Storer]

When I was art school years ago the gang-darkroom walls were deep yellow for the same reasons you're thinking of(bounced light = safe?). Nicer, IMO, than all black.

[photographs42]

If you plan on doing color, you should go white or off white. A bright color will not only reflect off of the prints but will effect your perception of colors. If you only do B&W, I would still stay away from vibrant dark colors. Dark rooms are generally small rooms and dark colored walls will make them seam smaller. Of course, you can (as others have said) paint it any color you like. I have bright colors in my house, so I don’t need that in the dark room and stray light reflections simply aren’t a problem.

Jerome

[Vaughn]

A black and white darkroom can have white walls -- the safe lights emit safe light, thus safe light is what is reflected off the walls. The area around the enlarger, including the ceiling should be flat black to reduce reflections fogging the photo paper during exposure. Most enlargers seem to bleed some light.

Vaughn

[Brian Ellis]

"I figure that white light spilling out of the enlarger will be substantially filtered to only orange by the orange walls."

There shouldn't be any light spilling out of the enlarger. Do a simple test. Put a lens cap on your enlarger lens and turn off all the lights in the darkroom except the enlarger light. Then inspect the enlarger to see where the leaks are coming from. In particular, look up into the area around the enlarger lens board from the baseboard and see if light is spilling out from around the lens board. Figure out a way to seal any leaks.

Most leaks can be fixed with tape. One that can't be is light coming from the negative stage of the enlarger (since you have to raise and lower that stage to get the negative holder in and out of the enlarger). For that leak I cut up an old shoe box (cardboard) to fit over the enlarger head with sides long enough to cover the area where the holder is inserted. It was easy to take it on and off as needed.

I fixed my enlarger leaks after attending one of John Sexton's workshops after he talked about the need to do it and saw that he had tape all over his Saunders enlarger. If you fix the light leaks - and I'd guess that it took maybe a half hour for me to do not counting the time to adapt the shoe box - you can paint the darkroom any color you want. I hated gray or black walls in a darkroom, it always looked depressing and you spend much more time in the darkroom with the lights on than in the dark.

[John Kasaian]

While I've never had a dedicated dark room, the bathrooms I've used for dark rooms have had yellow walls, pink walls (the infamous "Barbie" dark room,) and currently something called "raffia." I don't think it has made a difference one way or the other, but if I were going to have a dedicated dark room I think I'd want the envirement to be sootheing. I recall one famous photographer even had wood paneling in his dark room! Not much help I know, but my 2-cents. Have fun with that Elwood!