Revathi smiles coyly from the confines of a monochrome image plunked down on an ultra wide computer screen. The image serves as a mnemomic prop for recollecting a celluloid success of the 1980s, Bharathiraja-directed Manvasanai. While the movie camera was rolling, this image had been captured from the sidelines, still photographer Lakshmikanthan pressing the shutter.
In the minutes that follow, the monitor is busy hosting other black-and-white images shot by Lakshmikanthan during the making of other movies from that day and age, displaying popular actors such as Karthik and Rathi Agnihotri in the flush of youth.
Drawn from negatives, these images have been through a process of digitisation. An enlarger has increased their girth. They are now being touched up, mildly corrected to weed out the effects of cankerous time placing a clammy palm across the negatives. This process is unfolding at the Darkroom of Chennai Photo Biennale Foundation in Kottivakkam.
Images of this ilk are being readied for a grand display curated by Nirmal Rajagopalan at the Thiruvanmiyur MRTS Station Park as part of the third phase of CPB Edition 4.
Working on an image from a film of the 1980s.
| Photo Credit:
PRINCE FREDERICK
A member of the Darkroom, Ajay has the lowdown about this project. Lakshmikanthan, who lives in Director’s Colony Kodambakkam, his life enriched by memories of celluloid past plastered on 10,000 negatives, had allowed access to a part of his tranche for a day. Fifteen hundred images in negatives from ten films were paraded for scrutiny: 76 images in negatives were herded into the Darkroom, quickly digitised and returned to the owner.
In a knowledge sharing exercise, much like a student sliding an answer sheet to the edge of the table for a pal seated at the next table, Ajay offers a sneak peek into the display-to-be. Expect slices of Billa, Alaigal Oivathilai, Pudiya Varpugal and Manvasanai, he reels off and stops short of a total revelation, and goes back to being hunched over an enlarger fashioned by Darkroom team.
Working with an enlarger
| Photo Credit:
PRINCE FREDERICK
This project is not vastly differentiable from this team’s regular engagements. As the name implies, the Darkroom team is engaged with analog and alternative photography.
“All of us who work here (in the Darkroom) are artists ourselves; we come from different backgrounds. For example, my colleague Anshul has more of a science background. He is the one who knows the chemicals and can make the tweaks to the chemistry to get the results,” says Ayuj, who manages the Darkroom.
A roll call of the 9to5 team: Ayuj, Ajay, Anshul and Chiranjeevi, which of course is headed by Varun Gupta, the brain behind the concept of thrusting a darkroom in the face of a massively digitised world .
The team
| Photo Credit:
PRINCE FREDERICK
In a pat on the back for the team, Ayuj notes they are among the largest sellers of film and film cameras in the country. Every month, they get an order of 200 to 300 film rolls and film cameras. Beyond nostalgia and the novelty of going analog in ridiculously digital-defined world, the idea of undertaking the journey of life at an unhurried pace and doing things under the influence of a speed governor, is amping up the attraction of film cameras.
“And there are many photographers who practise film photography commercially. We have a few plans for commercial fashion and product photographers who when it matches the subject would like to shoot on film or on medium or large format. You cannot even shoot formats that large digitally. We work with 6.5 by 8.5, 8 by 10, really really old large format cameras,” explains Ayuj.
The Darkroom sources used film cameras and unsold stocks of cameras (true of point-and-shoots made, say 30 years ago, but never got sold) for those keen on having them.
Film is sourced from old suppliers still lingering around the corner. “We buy film initially meant for motion pictures — bulk film, basically — 100 foot or 400-foot rolls meant for movies, cut them and roll them into canisters. It is like a cotton factory when we do this: now we have a machine that makes the job much easier, says Ayuj adding that they also source 36-frame canisters.
A piece of large-format camera history occupies a corner of the room: an evidently anachronistic large format camera with massive billows made by Vageeswari Camera Works.
“We still use this camera once a month or once in two months, taking it outside and shooting with it,” says Ajuj.
The Darkroom has many walls, heterogenous and lending multi-facetedness to the analog exercise. Ajuy elaborates: besides the side of selling film cameras and rolls, the Darkroom provides a space for discussions about analog photography enabled through workshops for students and adults, most notable workshops are Darkroom 101 and Darkroom 102.
The experience is not just about shooting on film, but also developing film; and about using the enlarger.
There is also that “wall” that gives people the keys to the dark room to develop their film. “One of our regulars drives from Vijayawada once in two months just to use the darkroom to develop his rolls. And then there are other people from around Chennai who come once in two weeks to use the darkroom.”
CPB Darkroom is located at 2/342 A, 1st Cross St, AGS Colony, Kottivakkam.
For more details, visit @cpbdarkroom
Published – February 08, 2025 08:56 am IST