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Have fun neutral

Quick word on safety, remember you are dealing with chemicals. Be safe. Don't be stupid, run around the darkroom or be reckless. The last thing you want is some of the developer or fixer or whatever somehow getting on or into your eyes. Safety glasses or goggles are useful but you won't need them if you just treat everything with respect and be mature about it.

I remember when I was in a film class a very very long time ago and some kid got some stuff in his eyes and it was just a really long and painful ordeal for him. That being said... gloves are also useful, but you probably wont need them. That's what tongs and stirrers and things like that are useful for.

Personally, I hate film because of having to deal with processing it.

As for mixing chemicals it's easy. You're not actually mixing chemicals, you have different chemicals in different trays. So one tray for the fixxer, one for the developer, a stop bath and then one to clean it off... I'm not 100% sure, it's been like 10 years since I've even touched film.

You don't have to mix anything. Once you get your film and process it you're going to make a print, then you're going to put that print into the different trays. So you'll put it in the developer, then the fixer, stop and then wash it off with water.

BUT my best advice would be to just buy some of the things you need, you might spend a little but if you're serious about doing film photography it's worth spending it now and getting used to pulling out the film from the camera, taking the film out of the canister and putting it on the reels. So when you're actually in the darkroom you're not fumbling around and risk damaging your film or whatever.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/71022-REG/Kalt_NP10109_35mm_Stainless_Steel_Reel.html

Usually the hardest thing is just getting the film out and onto the reels! So just grab a roll of film.. Load it into your camera, like you're ready to shoot it, then wind it up, open it up and take the film out then pop the cap off and take the film out and put the film on the reel. So do that a few hundred times and you're golden! Try doing it with your eyes closed once you get more confident with it all. I know there's more things you'll be doing with the negatives (Or positives) but if you can do those things the rest should be cake.

lol.

You could ask your teacher (or get one yourself) if they have changing bags. This allows you to take the film out of your canister and load it on the developing real and place it in the canister all while being in broad daylight. What it is is a bag that has two layers that cause it to be light tight. Then there are two holes with elastic to them that you put your hands through. It makes the whole system light-tight.

The only difficulty is you can't see what you're doing, you have to learn to load your film on the real by feel, not sight. It's not that difficult though.

As for chemicals, if the darkroom or classroom is properly set up you will have eye-washing stations in the event that it gets into your eye. Your teacher should be filling you in on both how to use these and how long to was your eye for and what not. (If they don't, where I was at you washed your eyes for 15 minutes at the stations, CONTINUOUSLY!!!)

The person above has mentioned tongs and stirrers. These are useful. I'm kind-of bad in that I will place my hands directly into the chemical. I don't suggest this though. Also, WASH your hands when your done, just in case there is some chemical on them, you don't want to be eating them.

You probably won't be mixing your own chemicals unless you're dealing with special papers such as Ortho-paper that requires it's own developing chemicals, or if you're a teachers pet.

Advice for making prints:

Learn to see black.

This sounds odd, but, it's insanely important to making good prints in the darkroom. Because the way the darkroom will be lit is different from what you're used to you need to get used to seeing black in this sort of light. As you watch your print develop you will see it appear black to you, however, it may just be dark, dark gray and not actually black. You will see this difference when you go into the classroom's normal light and see all the blacks are just a dark gray. Black on a print is STARK black in the darkroom. It's something you'll learn to see when you've made enough prints.

Pay attention to the light meter in your camera's viewfinder and pay attention to where the majority of the light is in your photo (whilst composing it and taking the picture, not in the darkroom!). You can have an amazing picture set up, but if there's too much light on one side and the other is tremendously dark your light-meter may still say your shutter speed is correct, however, you'll still have bad lighting in the photo because one side is so bright and the other so dark.

Make sure you're using the right speed of film. I believe this is technically called your ISO speed. You're going to hear numbers like "100, 125, 400, etc." speed film. This refers to the number/ fineness of grains in a negative. The lower the number the finer the grains, if I remember correctly. If you're doing large prints (such as 20x30) size prints and NOT working with a medium-format camera and 120-film or something similar, you're going to want a lower number for your ISO speed.

Also, keep the developing instructions for your film. Not all films are the same and many have varying developing times for developer, stop bath, fixer, wash, etc.

Choose the right paper! You're probably going to have a choice between glossy and matte finish RC paper. I can't remember what the RC stands for, something about the coating I believe. I prefer matte finish RC paper because it doesn't have the glare that glossy does. It's a personal choice, generally, but, it can effect the overall impression of the photograph as well.

Be patient. It takes time both to learn how to develop and print well, and it just takes time after that because the processes can be so involved.

Most of all, and at the risk of sounding like a tv-show, HAVE FUN!!!

Film photography is an amazingly fun style of photography. I prefer it far beyond digital photography. In my opinion it is so much interactive in the creative aspects. Hopefully your teacher will teach you how to distort negatives and photographs at some point. You can recreate just about any effect in the darkroom as you can on Photoshop (where do you think they got their ideas from?), it's just a matter of patience and practice.

It seems daunting, but, it will come to you.

Have fun with film photography! You're doing yourself a favor!

Feel free to PM me or check the film sub-thread if you have further questions.

I am also in film photography class! I love it! I wanted to take digital photography, but sadly they are not offering the class anymore! crying

Are you guys just doing B&W or do you have the chemicals to process colored film?