Terminology used around darkrooms

Burning; A darkroom technique that singles out a specific piece of photograph to add more light to the exposure of the photographic paper.

C-41; The most common colour film processing created by kodak. Most modern films are processed in C-41

Colour negative; When shooting in colour film the negative will show exact opposites of the original colour. When printed to photographic paper, the negative becomes positive and shows in full colour on the print.

Colour Reversal; Colour film that shows the actual colour on film, this film cannot be printed through a common darkroom techniques as it requires a negative to positive, but can be shown on a slide projector

Contact sheet; Placing a sheet of negatives on top of a sheet of photographic paper and exposing it to view the positive images of each negative.

Developer; The chemical that removes the first layer of emulsion from film or photographic paper and allows it to be seen.

Developing Tank; A special light tight tank used to develop film. It has a special pouring area that allows the developer to be added and removed without exposing any light to the film.

Diffraction; When light becomes modulated when passing through the camera lens and redistributes the light unevenly. Edges will have a fuzzy appearance and shadows will have visible bands of light.

Dodging; Blocking light from an area of the photographic print to lessen the amount of exposure and lighten that particular spot.

Double Exposure; Exposing film twice allowing two or similar or different images to overlap on a single negative.

Emulsion; A light sensitive layer on film that contains one or more silver halides and captures an image when exposed to light.

Enlargement; Printing a film negative to a larger size on photographic paper.

Enlarger; A system used in the darkroom that exposes the negative to photographic paper to create a positive image. Enlargers can be moved up and down to make images larger and smaller and focused to provide maximum detail.

Exposure; The amount of light that is allowed to hit photo film or photo paper, creating an image on the respective source.

Filter; Tinted glass, gelatine, or plastic discs that fit onto a camera lens or under the lens of an enlarger to emphasise, eliminate or change colour, contrast and density.

Grain; Fine filter crystals in the light sensitive emulsion of film that react when exposed to light and turn black. The slower the film speed the finer the grain and the faster the film speed the more present the grain. Larger film formats can be enlarged without much grain is noticed whereas 35mm formats may see noticeable grain beyond a 8 x 10 inch print.

Multiple exposure; Exposing a single frame more than once to create layers of images.

Slide film; film that when processed shows a positive image. Also known as reversal film or transparency film.