You might think it’s not the same as printing in a darkroom, but it is in that they are both tactile experiences, compared to the digital version. They require a certain technical skill quite different from tapping at a keyboard. If you’ve ever been in a darkroom, you know there’s something a bit magical about first watching an image develop from nothing in a pan of chemicals under a red light. If you’ve ever cleared a developed print in stop bath, you know there’s a certain “stickiness” to the texture of the paper that tells you the developer is fully neutralized (or lacking it, that your stop bath is exhausted). And, yes, if you’ve spent much time in the darkroom, you probably feel that tongs are preferred, but there simply are times your fingers have to dip in the chemistry. Like I said, it’s a tactile experience.

- Reid Stott

I jettisoned my enlargers, my trays, my canisters, my tongs, my chemicals, my red lights — long ago; before this marriage, even. But they were ditched only in the firm knowledge that they could always be replaced and I could spend days inside the atmospheric chemical soup making my crappy dodged and burnt pictures show up on paper in my hand. I despair, though, that I will never, ever set up the bathroom darkroom again. Something inside me balks, severely, at that. Thus proving that I am so far over the hill as to be a speck in the distance.

Man, what’s next up for making me obsolete? The only thing I can think of would be Marlboros. Or boots.. Hopefully, pickups will hang on for a while longer.