Photography Chemicals

Photography chemicals bring your film and photos to life
By Nikki Davis Photography chemicals are a key ingredient to developing prints whether you are creating them yourself in a darkroom on your own and/or operate the commercial print lab machines at the nearest development location. Traditional style photographic chemicals will give you or your clients a permanent record of your image for archive or distribution.
 

Chemicals used in photography vary based on what spectrum of the photography world you are tapping into. Developing black and white film differs from developing color film, which differs from the chemicals used to put digital prints to paper, and purchasing the chemicals needed for photography can be a costly endeavor if you are ill prepared.

To find the right photographic chemicals for you:

1. Determine what type of photography you develop. Is it film? Is it digital prints? If it's film, is it black and white film? Is it color film? Is it some sort of specialty film like a sepia tone?

2. Have a basic knowledge of the chemicals you are looking to purchase.

3. Purchase your photo developing chemicals in bulk for your business to help save on costs.

4. Make sure your photographic imaging chemicals are compatible with your darkroom or processing set-up.

Buy film developer photographic chemicals

Purchase concentrated film developer photographic chemicals. The developer is the chemical that turns your latent image to metallic silver on the film.
Try: Purchase concentrated developer from Adorama. Look for Kodak developer products from Calumet Photographic, Inc. Discover discount photo chemicals from Camcor, Inc.

Follow-up with wash aids and fixer photo chemicals

Purchase your additional chemicals in photography from reputable suppliers to complete your dark room film processing needs. The stop bath halts the action of developer, and your fixer makes the image permanent as well as light-resistant by dissolving any remaining silver halides on the film.
Try: Purchase Ilford and Kodak brand developing products from Ritz Camera. Find even more photography chemical supply choices from WolfCamera.com. Look for Ilford Universal Wash Aid products from PhotoAlley.com.

Purchase bulk photo chemicals

Purchase your photo chemicals for greater cost savings. Bulk stocking up is a cost effective commercial way of watching your budget.
Try: Purchase chemicals in bulk, and receive a 25% discount on single batch quantities of 10 pounds or more from Photographers' Formulary. Buy bulk black and white raw photographic chemicals from Tech Chem.

• Make sure that you provide you and your employees proper ventilation when working with photographic chemicals. Chemicals used in photography are hazardous materials that should be transported and utilized with caution.
• Color film processing is slightly different from that of black and white processing. The key difference is the combining of your bleach with the fixer for a bleach-fix mixture (blix).