Darkroom

A darkroom is a room that can be made completely dark to allow the processing of light sensitive photographic materials, including photographic film and photographic paper. Darkrooms have been created and used since the inception of photography in the early 19th century. Darkrooms have many various manifestations, from the elaborate space used by Ansel Adams to a retooled ambulance wagon used by Timothy H. O'Sullivan. From the initial development to the creation of prints, the darkroom process allows complete control over the medium.

Due to the popularity of color photography and complexity of processing color film (see C-41 process) and printing color photographs and also to the rise, first of Polaroid technology and later digital photography, darkrooms are decreasing in popularity, though are still commonplace on college campuses, schools and in the studios of many professional photographers.

Other applications of darkrooms include the use in nondestructive testing, such as magnetic particle inspection.

Darkroom (TV series)

Darkroom is an American television thriller anthology produced by Universal Television which aired on ABC from November 27, 1981 to January 15, 1982. As an anthology horror/thriller series it was similar in style to Rod Serling's Night Gallery. Each 60-minute episode featured two or more stories of varying length with a new story and a new cast, but each of the episode wraparound segments was hosted by James Coburn. Among the performers who appeared on the series were Steve Allen, Esther Rolle, Helen Hunt, Claude Akins, Richard Anderson, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, Carole Cook, David Carradine, Billy Crystal, Pat Buttram, Brian Dennehy, Lawrence Pressman, Dub Taylor, Rue McClanahan, Lloyd Bochner, Ronny Cox, R. G. Armstrong, and June Lockhart.

Opening narration

The title sequence featured a dolly-in through the corridors of a house to a safe-lighted darkroom in a crawlspace under the stairs. James Coburn's voice could be heard over this dolly-in, narrating it as follows:

As Coburn's voiceover reached the point with "no escape...nowhere to turn," the camera turned toward various walls and closed doors.

Darkroom (electronic music project)

Darkroom is a British electronic music project created by Andrew "Os" Ostler (synthesizers, loops, processing and bass clarinet) and Michael Bearpark (guitars, bass guitar and loops). Other contributors to the project have been Tim Bowness (voice and voiceloops) and Peter Chilvers (space bass).

The project performs live in the UK and has released several albums, mainly available via the independent record label Burning Shed.

History

Darkroom originally formed in 1996 under the name Collective. The project featured three musicians who had been working together since the early 1990s: synthesizer player Andrew "Os" Ostler, guitarist Michael Bearpark and vocalist Tim Bowness (the latter being the singer for No-Man, an art-pop band who had by then released six albums on One Little Indian Records, 3rd Stone Ltd. and Voiceprint). Collective was formed in order to provide a live soundtrack at the Nevers Film Festival in France, working via extensive looping of synthesizers, electric guitar and abstract vocals.