How to Develop Film With Coffee and Washing Soda

Common black and white film is made with silver halide, a chemical that can be developed with an alkaline solution in order to bring out the images one has captured with a camera. Many substances can work as "developers," but the hard part is getting the alkalinity right so that the developer can bring out the image: most developers on their own will only give cloudy, indistinct images. One easy way to develop film at home is to use coffee, vitamin C, and washing soda. The first two ingredients bind together to form an effective developer; the washing soda adds alkalinity to the solution and, when film is deposited into the mixture, images are developed. The coffee and washing soda method is less exact than what you might be used to with commercial developing agents; try experimenting with different ingredient ratios and tweaking your camera's exposure to get the look you want for your photographs. This technique requires a developing tank, a simple piece of home photography equipment in which you load your undeveloped film onto reels and close them within a tank with developing fluid. Developing tanks are available at any local photography supplier.