Sunday Support Group for that Rare Darkroom Rat: Enlarger Dealz

You're not looking to buy a brand new B&W enlarger.

Know how I know? Because no one is looking to buy a brand new B&W enlarger.

But consider this. For people who want to practice old-fashioned, obsolescent film / analog / traditional / opto-chemical B&W photography (whatever you want to call it) from soup to nuts, start to finish, it's not the film or the chemicals or the cameras but the enlarger that might well be the bottleneck going forward.

The reason is that an enlarger is one of those devices that need to be serviced and supported by the company that made it. You might need different accessories as your needs change (different lamphouses, negative carriers, lensboards, etc.); parts might break and need replacing; bits that wear out or age (bulbs, electronic components) might wear out or age and require service. It might seem simple to buy a disused enlarger on the secondary market, but you'll probably have to choose among dinged-up, dusty devices more or less in pieces in a box, which could turn out to be missing who knows what part or accessory that you will end up needing to get the danged thing up and working. 

So why not just buy new then? Several companies are still selling new enlargers. One—one of the best (I've always been a fan)—is LPL of Tokyo, which here in the United States always sold its products rebranded by importers. Saunders or Omega, principally. You can buy one new.

...But there's a hitch. They've become shockingly expensive. In 1983, the condenser version and the dichroic (color head) version of LPL's mid-line 670 model, a.k.a. the 7700, sold for $289 and $459 respectively. (Source? A page that includes a review by none other than Ctein!) B&H's current prices (and these aren't much higher than the factory-direct prices from Tokyo) are $2,473.95 for the condenser model and a rather eye-widening $5,595.99 for the colorhead model, without lenses (the significance of that last comment will become apparent below). That's not for LPL's best enlarger, mind you. That's for its mid-line good-enuff everyday meat-and-potatoes medium-format / 35mm model. I don't know about you, but in my area pretty decent used cars fetch those prices. Unless you're rich—not wealthy, not well-off, but rich—it would be silly to pay that, considering those enlargers will very soon have a residual value of a few hundred dollars or pounds if you're lucky.

So if you're not rich, you're pretty much forced into buying used. New is out.

Easter egg
Or is it? Maybe not absolutely, at the present moment at least. Should you happen to fall in that fraction of a fraction of a fraction of Photo Dawgs who might actually consider buying a new B&W enlarger, here are two opportunities for you.

One is that Freestyle is closing out the Kaiser VP 9005 condenser enlarger. That one's for printing B&W with manually-inserted gelatin VC filters, but it's made in Germany, it's beautiful, and if you're a home hobbyist you won't be the least bit inconvenienced by having to use gelatin filters. And you can get it right now for only $759.99. That's without a lens. How great a deal is that? Great enough that I'd write this post on TOP about it even though none of you are in the market for it! Just on the off chance of making one fellow Dektol-breather out there blissfully happy. Fingers crossed.

And if you want one of those highly inflated LPLs? There's something for you too. An overstock outfit in Brooklyn has nine LPL 670 enlargers—again, the plain-jane condenser version—brand new in sealed boxes, for $849 or best offer.

That sounds maybe a tad dear compared to a used one (remember, new they cost $2,474), but there's an Easter egg in the box. These are kits—each of the nine enlargers comes bundled—packaged—with a lens. What might be easy for anyone but darkroom rats to miss is that the lens is no ordinary lens. It's Rodenstock's very best lens for 35mm, the Apo-Rodagon-N 50mm ƒ/2.8, a lens that alone sells for $671.99 new (and can be used on your digital camera too, by the way). Even on eBay they go for $300–400. You might have heard of legendary enlarging lenses for 35mm such as the Apo-El-Nikkor 105mm and the Leitz Focotar 40mm, but I know people who have compared them directly who say that the Apo-Rodagon-N 50mm can stand shoulder-to-shoulder with those legendary paragons of yore. It's the 35mm enlarging lens that graced my last darkroom. I chose it by buying three top enlarging 35mm enlarging lenses and pitting them directly against each other in careful tests. With those nine enlargers now on eBay, it's in the box.

Enough of this now, this fine Sunday. You might think this post is off-topic (!) since so few people do their own darkroom work now, and even fewer don't already have their own schtuff. But while it might not be of practical value, it's fun, for me anyway, even if in a nostalgic sort of way.

Mike

"Sunday Support Group" is an eclectic series of discursive digressions on topics random and sundry, offered in the hope they might help various subsets of our readership in their work and their ambitions, or that they might contribute to our mental, spiritual, psychic or physical contentment. It appears, as the title suggests, on Sundays.

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Patrick Medd: "Eccentric as it may seem I'm currently in the process of building my own darkroom. This will be the fourth time that I have had access to a darkroom but the first time that it will be a dedicated room in my house. I have more than one enlarger lying around in bits but this time I need to be able to print 4x5 and so I'm looking for an enlarger that can do that.

"Here in the UK the original manufacturers of De Vere enlargers are still active in some form (www.deveresecondhanddarkroom.com) and will supply you with a refurbished enlarger which they can still service (for the moment—I don't know how many young people starting out in life these days are thinking 'I know, I'll train to be an enlarger engineer—a job for life if ever I saw one'). So that's the route I'm heading down. Obviously it all costs money, but it's a sound investment and there's no doubt in my mind I'll always be able to get my cash back out of the project  ;-)  ."

adamct: "The interesting thing for me is that unlike others who may have wanted an enlarger in the past but don't want one now, I don't want one now, but am likely to want one in the future (when, of course, a new one in good condition will be impossible to find)! I got started in film photography, but I got in just as digital was taking off. I was a young lawyer, working long hours at a law firm. I never did my own printing—after using labs for a while, I eventually bought a film scanner and did the hybrid thing for a while. But I've always wanted to try analog printing myself, and it is exactly the kind of thing I can see myself getting into...when I retire. At that point I will have the time and space to do whatever I want. But now? Even I can't justify buying one now (and I can justify just about any foolhardy purchase related to my hobbies!). As a certain photo-blogger is prone to say: 'Oh well...'"

A certain photo blogger replies: At the various darkroom magazines I worked for, I always identified a healthy subset of the audience as what I dubbed "re-entry photographers," borrowing the term from what used to be called the women's liberation movement—a re-entry woman was a woman who re-entered the workforce after her children were grown and had left home. Re-entry photographers were just what you're talking about: people (mostly guys of course, but a significant number of women) who had maybe taken a photo course in high school or college and had always appreciated it and wanted to do more of it, but had to wait until retirement to do so. The magazines always fretted about the average age of their subscribers—it was very high, in the 50s age range—but that was because advertisers have a knee-jerk preference for younger audiences. I never worried about it because I understood that darkroom work as a home hobby was much more viable for people who had both money and time (not to mention homes!), and that meant retirees to a large extent.

It's fair to say most people didn't like darkroom work. From my own audience here, my rough estimate is that one out of ten photographers who had to do darkroom work in the past enjoyed the experience and the craft of it, and the other nine thought it was a chore and are glad not to have to do it any more. But I was one of the 10%. For people like me, it was enjoyable, relaxing, and rewarding. But we were always a minority, and now very much more so. Still, I continue to think it's a viable hobby for the few people it suits. The fact that it's difficult and involved isn't a drawback if you enjoy it and are satisfied by it; my brother facets gemstones, for heaven's sake—he taught himself to do it when he was 14—and I know a guy who makes fine knives. Neither of those things are easy or convenient, and neither are necessary in order to end up with jewelry or a knife!

Bill Bresler: "Buying a new enlarger? It's tough to give them away. Nothing sadder than the sight of a 23C with color head sitting at the curb on garbage day. The college where I taught a photo class or two for 16 years shut down their darkroom. Fifteen Beselers and a couple of 4x5 Omegas went into the dumpster."

Curtis: "Dear Mike, If I remember correctly, you first recommended the Kaiser enlarger a couple of years ago. And, you are right, it is indeed a wonderful piece of kit. I bought one earlier this year and set up a tiny darkroom in the back of my wife's studio space. It's just for fun—really, I just play around trying to channel my inner James Fee and enjoy having the chance to make art in the same space as my wife. So, thank you for these niche recommendations!"

Mike adds: Interview with the late James Fee by Dean Brierly. (Note that in the picture of James he's standing in front of a Beseler 23C as mentioned by Bill above.)

Steve: "Mike, I’ve been reading your blog for years. I loved the Leica challenge and ended up with an M3 with a 5cm Summicron Dual Range lens. My situation has changed after several years of digital and I’m ready to get back in the game. I bought the LPL enlarger. I’m looking forward to a long Wisconsin winter in the darkroom. Do you have any suggestions for a darkroom instruction book? I’m that 50 something year old guy who took a few college photography classes. Thanks for all your posts."

Mike replies: Big question! I learned from David Vestal's The Craft of Photography, and was pleased to get to know David personally in later years and to enlist him as a columnist for Photo Techniques magazine. The standard (and simplest) instruction book back in the day was Henry Horenstein's Black and White Photography: A Basic Manual (third edition); Henry was at Harvard back then and is now at RISD (pronounced "RIZZ-dee," the Rhode Island School of Design). A personal favorite was Jack Coote's book for Ilford, Ilford Monochrome Darkroom Practice: A Manual of Black & White Processing & Printing (third edition). I used Ilford's fixing technique (and Ilford papers) and found Jack's discussions of variable-contrast paper and practices helpful. There are books that take you much deeper into the arcana, but save those for later. Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter There.

By the way, you didn't ask, but I'd recommend starting out with Ilford RC papers. They're very good, they have excellent permanence, and they're much easier to use than fiber base papers that you have to run a washing routine on and that really need to be flattened in an expensive drymount press after drying. After washing you can immerse RC prints briefly in a bath of distilled water and a few drops of Edwal LFN (four ounces will last you till about 2050) and hang them from their corners with wooden clothespins to dry. I'd also recommend liquid film and paper developers...saves you the chore having to mix powdered chemicals. Aside from that, the best advice with B&W film is something John Szarkowski himself once said in my hearing: "expose enough and don't develop too much."

Comments

[Dave Stewart]

I'm very patiently waiting and hoping for a new enlarger and various bits-n-bobs (but no lens) to arrive, via a Kickstart project. It can be used for 35mm; 120; and 4x5. Oh, and it can also be used as a 4x5 camera. But the main thing I want to use some of those bits-n-bobs for is, the light source and frames for digitising 35mm and 120 films, in conjunction with a digital camera (DSLR - remember those?) and macro lens. I've had enough of scanning and colossal TIFF files, and the whole lot was relatively cheap, with the possibility of playing about with enlarging/printing and lightweight and 'inexpensive' (cheap) entry to large format photography, someday.

https://intrepidcamera.co.uk

[Richard]

Wow! I have a lightly used 670D (dichroic) and a 50 f4 El-Nikkor in the back of a wardrobe, that I've thought worth nothing, but cannot bring myself to throw out.

I'll now make an effort to find it a home, although there'll be a pretty small audience here in NZ.

Regards,

Richard

[Alan]

I bought my Beseler 45MX from Fred Picker in 1979 that included an Aristo coldlight head. I replaced that head with an Aristo CL4500 (requires VC gels) for VC printing around 1990. Timer, enlarging lenses, neg carriers, etc all purchased long, long ago. The only piece I had trouble obtaining fairly recently was a 6x4.5 neg carrier. Everything still functioning perfectly to this day. Matter of fact, I just used it several days ago. I love B&W silver gelatin prints and find working in the darkroom to be very relaxing.

[Paul Van]

It was probably 10 to 15 years ago that I went on an eBay enlarging lens buying spree. My intent was to try out various enlarging lenses and keep the one(s) I liked best. Alas, I never did any testing of them, and used a few casually only.

But, one of those was an APO Rodagon 50mm. There was just something magical about that lens, even just looking at the image on the baseboard. At the time I wished my abilities were better matched to that lens. Sadly, shortly after getting the lens was the end of my darkroom work - I still have the enlarger and lens, but I may be fooling myself at this point thinking I will set up another darkroom.

[Stan B.]

I'm (kinda) glad I got to partake in "the darkroom experience-" even if the "fun" quickly dissipated...

In the end, I had a Mint Cond Omega C760 I had to literally give away with the rest of my darkroom inventory. What really hurt was giving up the Time-O-Lite Master- loved that toggle switch!

[William Lewis]

I must admit that after I gave away my 4x5 enlarger, I doubt I'll ever want one again. I do find myself tempted by film (I really miss 6x6 rangefinders :) ) but if I do it, I'll do the hybrid route because good scanners (Say a Nikon Coolscan III or IV) are cheap enough on E-Prey these days.

[Bob Johnston]

I am glad I still have my (mothballed) enlarger in my darkroom, which has of course become a junk room. I intend to clear it out so that my grandchildren can have a go. They are unlikely to see the magic of the image appearing in the dev tray ever again. The enlarger is a Meopta Opemus 5a with Meochrom colour head. Built like a tank and easy to maintain. One of these would be a good secondhand buy. For 35mm I used a Minolta 50mm CLE and for 6x6 I have a 75mm Schneider (can't remember what the model is).

[Steve Renwick]

Could there be anything more quixotic than buying a NEW enlarger in this time period? I'm about to find out. I sure hope you're right.

[c.d.embrey]

Here's something of interest for Darkroom Dawgs. Heiland Electronic has a LED cold light source for many enlargers, including Kaiser and Omega. Replace the current light source of your enlarger with a long-term stable modern LED panel light. Individual adaptation is supplied by Heiland electronic.
Using LEDs with the primary colors red, green, and blue allows controlling white light for focusing, as well as controlling any color separately.. https://heilandelectronic.de/led_kaltlicht/lang:en

I'm not a Dawg, so I prefer Platinum/Palladium prints. Bostick and Sullivan Na2 Platinum/Palladium Kit For Digital Negatives. I'd like to make some 12x16 Platinum/Palladium prints from iPhone files.

[Bill Pearce]

GEntlemen,

Let me tell you, get the one with the Apo-Rodagon. It is worth every penny. I got mine for a song when a pro lab went out of business, but those days are over (lost it in a divorce. The decree specified that I got all photo equipment, but she categorized darkroom as something else, and by then it was almost done and I was sick of her BS.) It is a magnificent lens, although the El-Nikkors I had were good too.

[Nigel]

My jaw dropped when I read what an LPL 7700 will cost you new.

I bought one more than 30 years ago in London with a condenser head and a colour head. I went to the photo shop to buy the more popular Durst that everybody bought, but the salesman convinced me the LPL was better value. It is built like a tank.

It was a good buy and served me well, even when I did theatrical photography professionally for a few years. It now sits unused the attic room I had built as a darkroom.

Enlargers seem to be worthless here in Italy right now, just like those super Kindermann stainless steel reels and developing tanks that cost me a fortune.

But I wonder if we might see a return to analogue photography and wet printing, just like the Vinyl LP seems to have returned from the technological graveyard.

[JH]

In the early 60s when I started doing 35mm darkroom work, I bought a used Leitz VALOY II enlarger with Leitz Focotar lens for about $200. I used it for 30+ years, until I quit B&W processing and sold it for maybe twice that. I also used it as a copy stand with the head removed and adapted the Leitz lens to my Nikons. The lens was great for copying.
Just looked on eBay and I can buy one back for the same $200! What a bargain.

[Tim]

I've had my eye on the Kaiser enlarger for a long time... But I kind of wanted the multigrade B&W one. I've obviously not pulled the trigger yet.

[Dogman]

I guess the young lady to whom I gave my LPL got a pretty good deal.

[Yiorgos]

Mike, Another related issue that I hope you might take up is the dearth of film processing labs. Even in NYC where I live it's now difficult to find a good lab that will develop and scan film well and affordably. I've tried mailing my film to labs, but that adds many days and additional costs to the process. Perhaps TOP readers can come together to identify and support the good surviving labs. Perhaps, too, TOP can develop relationships with these labs and earn some extra revenue when TOP readers patronize them. Just a thought. - Yiorgos

[Kodachromeguy]

Mike, you may recall: for photographers years ago who did not want to buy a full enlarger, a few companies made accessory devices to convert their cameras into enlargers. Rollei made such a device, but I think it projected via the top viewing lens of their TLR cameras (probably clumsy and not too effective). Linhof had a stand and light source to convert their Technica camera into an enlarger. I would not be surprised if Graflex made a similar conversion enlarger.

[Arne Croell]

To add a few enlarger companies that are still around, even though not necessarily readily available in the US, for 35mm to 120 the German company Dunco still offers enlargers ( sorry, the web site is only in German), as well as parts for their models: https://www.dunco.de/apparatebau/produkte/vergroesserungen/
Also in Germany, Kienzle makes enlargers for up to 12x15” negatives, as well as parts and heads for certain Leitz/Leica and Durst enlargers: http://www.kienzle-phototechnik.de/home_english/home_english.html
Heiland LED heads, mentioned above, can be had for both Dunco as retrofit and for Kienzle.
I have three enlargers set up in my darkroom, a Zone VI v. 2 with LED head, a Dunco 67 with retrofitted LED head and a Beseler 45MXT with Zone VI cold light head.

[Rob de Loe]

I had a full darkroom in my basement up until 2002: dry side with an Omega D5 XL for enlarging 4x5, huge drymount press, etc.; and wet side with a proper sink, archival washer, drying rack. By 2002 it had turned into a storage closet. Every time I went into it (to dump more junk) it made me sad. So I took it apart and converted the space.

It would have broken my heart to throw all that stuff in the garbage, but I couldn't sell it (except for the 75lb drymount press which I actually mailed to someone!) Thankfully, I found a kid who said he'd take it all for his university camera club. He probably sold it for beer money, which would have been fine too.

Fast forward to 2019 and I'm using enlarger lenses again, but this time as taking lenses on a digital camera. Yes, some enlarger lenses make outstanding lenses on a digital tilt-shift camera. So if you're looking for a good quality enlarger lens and you were outbid in an auction, you may well have lost it to someone giving it a new life on a camera.

[Paul Judice]

I too have begun to (re)build a darkroom after many years away. Maybe the best part of this process has been the darkroom porn aspect. I've spent an unhealthy amount of time on Ebay, Craig's List and (best of all) Glennview.com ogling all the Dursts and Focomats I could never afford as a young man.

Probably the best place for any lab rat to get a cheap thrill is here http://www.richardnicholson.com/projects/last-one-out/

[Rob L]

What's great about darkroom work now, is that it's entirely optional. Being able to worth through digitized contact sheets(with searchable metadata!) to help refine your print list is a godsend, and while negative scanners are thinner on the ground than enlargers, there's a lot of options using digital cameras for capture out there.Cheaper that neg scanners, to boot.

But you never HAVE to print just to see your work - takes the pressure and the immediacy out of the picture.

[hugh crawford]

Yiorgos
Accurate Photo Shop on 5th Ave in the South Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn has a great reputation for developing and scanning. Brooklyn is crawling with photo labs these days.
Also check out Gowanus Darkroom. It's sort of a co-op / darkroom rental / custom lab mashup

[hugh crawford]

I gave away my Durst L1200 years ago, but still have an army Speed Graphic kit in the Halliburton case, all in olive drab with an Aristo cold light attachment that turns it into an enlarger. Just in case.
For some reason on impulse I bought a bunch of 4x5 and 8x10 film developing racks a few months ago. I have no idea why.

I always wanted one of these, with modern digital technology you could make a modern version using a lcd screen as a light source.

[hugh crawford]

Here Is a picture of that analogue electronic HDR enlarger

[David Comdico]

I just picked up a Rolleiflex 3.5F and if I had anywhere in my house to install a darkroom I would have been all over that eBay auction. BTW: enjoying the recent film-related posts. There is knowledge here that you can't find in too many places.

[Arne Croell]

I forgot to mention that in my other post, for the ultimate lab rat, Heiland now makes a 20x24" enlarger: https://www.heilandelectronic.de/enlarger/lang:en

A video of the setup process is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2s5WACD-K8Y&feature=youtu.be

[Mike Reyburn]

I still have an operational B&W Darkroom, although is now seldom used since I acquired an Epson P800 printer which can produce excellent B&W prints, much to my astonishment. However, I've discovered I can greatly reduce my darkroom time by first scanning my B&W negatives and making various "What If" prints with various cropping, etc. using PS. After I've made my best digital proof, I then make a final darkroom enlargement, thus saving the time and expense of several trial darkroom prints.

[Gary Nylander]

When I started my newspaper career in 1976 I worked in various darkrooms. I also pursued my own personal work shooting large format 4 x 5 and 8 x 10 film on my time off. I used the darkroom at the paper for a while but really needed my own space. At one point I a darkroom stuffed into my 600 square foot apartment. Then I moved into a house and converted one of the spare bedrooms into a darkroom. I did that until 2004 or so when I went to a hybrid film/scan system. I found that I could pull detail from the shadows and highlights that I could not achieve making darkroom prints at least for me it was better.

By 2005 my darkroom was downsized, most it was sold although I kept most of my film developing equipment, some trays, and my drymount press. Professionally I was glad to leave behind the darkroom, especially processing C-41 colour film. For my personal photographic artwork, I mostly enjoyed it but I found it a bit tedious after trying to get just one print to look good from a difficult negative after going through up to a dozen sheets of print paper.

I have always wanted to try Platinum/Palladium prints, but I don't need a huge space or even an enlarger for that.