If memory serves

[Thunderhawk]

Years ago, I saw ads for developing slide film at home in what looked like a plastic cat food can. Can you still get that kind of stuff. And is it realy as easy as they were saying to develop?

Thanks.

[blumesan]

Don't know about the cat food can, but developing slide film at home is not rocket science. It requires only a minimum of equipment, a good bit of time, patience and attention to detail. Considering both time and expense (chemicals) it's probably more economical to send it to a good lab, especially if you want mounted slides.

[Mr. Pickles]

Latinbob used to develop his own stuff at home in the kitchen or laundry room. Did pretty well with it too. I know he doesn't anymore because he is allergic to one of the chemicals.

If he don't reply, PM him and tell him too....

[Thunderhawk]

Originally Posted by blumesan

Don't know about the cat food can, but developing slide film at home is not rocket science. It requires only a minimum of equipment, a good bit of time, patience and attention to detail. Considering both time and expense (chemicals) it's probably more economical to send it to a good lab, especially if you want mounted slides.

Maybe I`ll just stick to the labs...

[Thunderhawk]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pickles

Latinbob used to develop his own stuff at home in the kitchen or laundry room. Did pretty well with it too. I know he doesn't anymore because he is allergic to one of the chemicals.

If he don't reply, PM him and tell him too....

Thanks, I`ll keep that in mind.

[dougsmit]

Kodak made Kodachrome film which required a very complex processor and could not be processed at home. They later came out with Ektachrome which could be done quite easily at home as long as you paid attention to temperature controls and time for the first developer (the rest of the process was quite forgiving). Many of us did Ektachrome at home because it was cheaper than commercial labs, because we wanted to push process the film or because we wanted to do something that commercial labs would not do (like run E6 film in C41 chemicals to get a line copy negative). Some processed because they shot stereo or square format film which some commercial labs insisted on ruining while mounting.

Color slides usually got processed pretty well no matter who did them while color printing was a completely different matter. Doing color prints at home was a lot harder to control so many of us 'home lab types' shot color slides and did our prints in black and white. I doubt this has changed but digital/photoshop has made it so much easier to do good color prints that the only people who shoot slides are those who actually want that format. I worked for years for a lab that did slides from color negatives on a special color print film stock that really looked nice and was color correctable with ease as long as you did not mind paying personal attention to each image. This service was not available at every lab (and usually was not cheap). Today, I wonder if anyone even offers 35mm slides from digital files?

[Thunderhawk]

Thanks for the info dougsmit

[Archer182]

Dark bag
Film tank (aka catfood can) Go stainless steal stay away from plastic
film spool for tank
thermometer
shallow pan for temp bath to keep chemicals at the proper tamp
A box of the proper chemicals for the film you are using (I used Besler E6 for what I was shooting)

Start out small use 24 frame film shoot two or three roles and have fun, don't shoot anything to important for your first few roles you will most likely mess up once or twice.

There is nothing better than shooting in the morning and going home at night to develop your own slides.

Me and some friends would shoot all day and go back to my place and develop the film have a BBQ and brag on what each other shot, I kinda miss that.