
Why the Stranger Things ‘red room’ is confusing younger fans - chunkyslink
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/shortcuts/2019/jul/29/in-the-dark-why-the-stranger-things-red-room-is-confusing-younger-fans
======
VyseofArcadia
Is anyone else struggling with the format of the article?

It starts with the name, age, and appearance of the darkroom? As if it's a
character? And then all of a sudden it's a dialogue with no introduction
whatsoever, where the bold text is one character and the normal text is
another?

This doesn't explain why anything at all. It's just a weirdly formatted snarky
dialog. With a strange do and don't at the end.

~~~
egypturnash
This appears to be a regular column in the Guardian called “Pass Notes”, which
takes this format to discuss... anything, really; the previous installment is
about the emerging practice of stopping teens from congregating in places by
installing lights that highlight their pimples.

~~~
onemoresoop
On a tangent here but seriously, lights that highlight pimples? That is so
cruel. I still remember having pimples like 25 years ago and how humiliating
it felt. Now there's a light that teens need to run away from?

------
nabla9
Imagine some average non-technical young person in his or her mid 20s who time
travels and appears naked before someone like Newton or Maxwell.

It would be interesting to imagine the conversation when they try to decipher
the future science and technology from the "commoner" from the 2019.

"You are Newton, you are famous man. You discovered gravity I think. But you
were wrong and everything is relative. There are black holes that suck even
light. Light has a speed and nothing can be faster than light."

"Maxwell. I have heard that name. Batteries or something. Anyways, there is
this thing called quantum mechanics where everything is either particle and a
wave and nobody knows how it works and its weird. Have you met Schrödinger and
do you know about his experiments with cats?"

~~~
taejo
It's a fun thought experiment to consider what you _would_ be able to
rediscover or reinvent from scratch millennia years ago.

Perhaps the easiest and most likely to promote scientific progress would be
the telescope and microscope: though I don't know how to grind lenses, it
seems there were several centuries where people knew how to make good
spectacles, but hadn't figured out that putting two lenses in front of each
other is really useful.

~~~
rtkwe
They weren't too far apart for their times, it took forever for techniques to
spread back then, the big issue is the level of accuracy they could get in
lens grinding. When you start stacking optical elements and defects in the
primary element get compounded by all the elements after it so you need very
good lenses to build a usable telescope.

~~~
taejo
You're right, and I didn't mean to imply that a few centuries was a
particularly long time (just that this is the time in which my scant knowledge
is useful).

Telescopes and microscopes also provided the _motivation_ for improvements in
lensmaking in the 17th and 18th centuries, but I don't know how much this had
been limited by motivation vs technology before then.

~~~
rtkwe
> but I don't know how much this had been limited by motivation vs technology
> before then.

The answer I've always found has been it's a bit of both. Motivation drives
technological development but motivation is also very heavily driven by the
available technology. You have to conceive that a thing is possible before you
can think about what tech can be developed to do it for example.

------
souterrain
> It has to be dark, because too much light will destroy the negatives.

The author of this piece doesn’t seem to understand the process either. The
light will expose the photographic paper, which will render it useless. The
developed negative film is relatively safe from light-induced damage.

The author also fails to mention that one begins developing film (at least,
the way I did it years ago) by transferring it to a lightproof container in a
completely black room. They tend to not show this part in Hollywood, I
suppose, since black rooms don’t really translate well to the screen. (Unless
there is an alternative process I’m unaware of... I was very much a noob B&W
photographer.)

~~~
joekrill
> The author of this piece doesn’t seem to understand the process either.

I think that's rather the point of the piece. At least that's what I got out
of it.

There's a recurring theme every generation where the older generation thinks
the younger generation is just dumb, or doesn't care about things that matter,
etc. In this case it's the older generation shaming the younger generation for
not knowing how photographs used to be processed. But that doesn't really
matter. It's just some arbitrary piece of nostalgia. And anyway, digging
further, those people doing the shaming only have a very limited understanding
to begin with.

------
taejo
To be fair to the younger fans, I feel like most older fans have never been in
a darkroom, and are only familiar with them as a movie trope. I certainly
would have recognized this scene _before_ I ever developed my own pictures.

It's the retail photo lab that really distinguishes my generation from the
last.

~~~
asark
Ah, it's the darkroom. From the headline I thought there'd been a reference to
the Red Room from Twin Peaks in Stranger Things S2 that'd slipped by me. Which
would be kinda weird since the show takes place before Twin Peaks was made,
but people love referencing that show, so who knows.

~~~
slantyyz
As an older person, I thought it was a reference to the red room in basement
in the Amityville Horror.

~~~
flyingfences
... or the red rum in the Overlook Hotel.

------
jobu
That article made no sense to me, so here's a much better version on People:
[https://people.com/tv/stranger-things-fans-photography-
darkr...](https://people.com/tv/stranger-things-fans-photography-darkroom-
confusion-goes-viral/)

This is the StackExchange question that went viral:
[https://movies.stackexchange.com/questions/102266/what-is-
th...](https://movies.stackexchange.com/questions/102266/what-is-the-purpose-
of-this-red-room-in-stranger-things)

------
YeGoblynQueenne
>> “What is the purpose of the information feather?”

Hey, I think I know that one. The name sounds wrong but it's definitely
referring to a device by which one enters virtual reality:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vurt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vurt)

~~~
dgellow
> Information feather

I'm not familiar with that term. What is an "information feather"? Google
doesn't help. Also english isn't my native language, so I may miss some
context here.

~~~
egypturnash
From the article:

“When I watched someone on TV using a quill, I didn’t go on the internet and
write: “What is the purpose of the information feather?””

(Once upon a time, before pens were manufactured, people would write by taking
a large feather, cutting the hollow tube at its center to a point, and dipping
it in ink.)

~~~
dgellow
So, I know what is a quill. I don't know what is an "information feather" :)
But thank you for answering.

~~~
astine
"Information feather" isn't a typical expression in the English language. The
author is using that as a hypothetical phrase that someone who had never heard
of a quill might think up in order to describe a quill in the same way that
people who have never heard of a darkroom are calling it a "red room," not
understanding its purpose. This is mostly intended as a joke.

------
abruzzi
When the older voice in the article says the dark red light protects the
fragile negatives, it perpetuates a common misunderstanding about film
darkrooms. Most undeveloped film would be destroyed by the red light, except
very uncommon orthochromatic film. Once developed (or technically, once fixed)
the negative is fine in bright light. Maybe that’s the point—older people know
what a darkroom is, but few know the details.

------
Finnucane
I still have a red room, though I have to admit it doesn't get used as much as
in the past. The cost of paper these day is nuts (though it was never really
cheap).

~~~
paulnechifor
Yeah, it's always cheaper to just take pictures with your phone, but using old
and more difficult methods makes the photos seem more important even when they
are objectively worse.

I've been meaning to try wet plate photography[1] because it seems very
intriguing to my closeted-hipster self, but I don't trust myself with the
chemicals needed.

[1]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKtE_j9jmtk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKtE_j9jmtk)

~~~
Finnucane
Use a kit and save yourself some hassle.

[https://uvphotographics.com/](https://uvphotographics.com/)

Personally, I've been satisfied with plain old film, though I would avoid
dageurrotypes, as it involved processing with mercury vapor. I have my limits.

------
a-saleh
I have a project to do with my daughter then :D

I remember I created a small camera-obscura based photo-camera with friends
for a physics project from piece o aluminium, old shoe-box and photo-paper :)

Reloading it was a pain, cause you had to be in a dark-room to put in in the
box :D

Exposition was minutes.

It was awesome!

~~~
taejo
There are several photographic processes that are UV-sensitive, most notably
cyanotypy, so you can work inside with the curtains closed with hardly any
fogging, and then make photograms or contact prints outside. I've never tried
taking photographs with it, but it could be fun too: exposure times in a
pinhole camera are probably on the order of an hour, though.

~~~
a-saleh
To be honest, I don't really remember how long the exposistion times were. I
assume we used less than hour, more than minute and I wonder if I can found
our old lab-notes :)

Photograms-idea sound really fun as well, and probably a bit easier than
trying to get the exposition time correctly.

~~~
taejo
To be clear, my estimate for exposure time was for handmade cyanotype paper,
not "real" photo paper.

------
II2II
If you really want to blow the minds of younger fans, tell them about
photolithography.

"You mean he can make computer chips in the red room?"

"No, the chemicals are different as are some of the steps. What I am trying to
say is that similar concepts are used. Things like the exposure of
photosensitive materials to light and using other chemicals to change the
properties of exposed areas."

"That doesn't make any sense at all. Light can't change chemicals."

"Of course it can. That is how photosynthesis works."

"What do plants have to do with this?"

"Very little. I was just using a common example to prove that chemicals can
changed by light."

"Okay, but plants are different from computer chips and photographs so I still
don't see how it's related."

(The conversation continues in circles for a bit.)

"Look, we used to think about things in very different ways. When your
generation and my generation sees stuff coming off of factory line, we have a
tendency to think of things being made in mechanical ways. So we're the same
in that respect. On the other hand, you see a lot of things being created
digitally so you have a greater tendency to think of things being built up
from bits in computer memory. My generation saw a lot of things being made by
carefully controlled chemical reactions, so it is easier for us to imagine
things being created that way. Just because I have less exposure to the former
doesn't mean that it does not exist. Just because you have less exposure to
the latter doesn't mean that it does not exist. The world changes. Get used to
it. Heck, have some fun in the process and explore the old ways as well as the
up-and-coming ways. It will make your worldview much richer."

~~~
abruzzi
Once upon a time, the mad scientist cliché was surrounded with beakers filled
bubbling fluids. I haven't seen that cliché in a movie in a long time. Now we
have the "mad hacker" cliché where the hacker does similar things, but with
hacked up computers with a thousand wires to servos and cameras and other
mystery devices.

------
harel
The article is bad. Really bad. The point made though is something I took for
granted. I know what a darkroom is. My parents had one in the house. My dad
had one at his work. Not sure my kids will have any idea what it is though. I
have an urge to make sure they do. The now know about Rotary phones and audio
tapes and vinyl - they should be aware of darkrooms.

The problem with modern life, as wonderful and amazing as they are, is that
many people lack the history of how we got there. Obviously younger ones have
not lived through it, but at least a basic knowledge of the progress made will
help them appreciate just how wonderful and amazing our times are.

~~~
mankyd
> I have an urge to make sure they do. The now know about Rotary phones and
> audio tapes and vinyl - they should be aware of darkrooms.

I am curious as to why? I mean, in a historical context, they might be
interesting. And certainly, they will continue to exist for quite some time in
certain professional and hobbyist settings, but I don't imagine they'll
provide much value outside of trivia to the average person.

I used one in high school, but I can't say that it has provided me much
practical knowledge outside of knowing how a negative is actually used.

~~~
harel
Maybe "urge" is too harsh of a word. I find the history of technology
fascinating and when my boys encountered old tech they were interested by it.
We spent some time playing C64 games and it was good fun (in moderation). The
rotary phone and seeing if they can figure it out was funny, vinyl is having a
renaissance anyway and audio tapes were just cool when they were a thing.

~~~
mankyd
I look forward to trying the rotary phone thing on my still young children.
Hell, they might have an issue with a touch tone phone by the time they're old
enough :)

~~~
harel
It's a neat exercise - figuring how that rotary thing works without prior
knowledge. When I think of it in today's context it's a strange interface.
Numbers with zeros and nines took forever to dial :)

------
egypturnash
I like how not once does the author of this explain that the room is dark and
red because you actually have red lights in a darkroom; the photo-reactive
paper you’re printing images onto does not react to red light.

------
nudpiedo
The whole thing is made up by the blogger who wrote this post at the
guardian.com and wants to promote himself at HN, and the format of the article
my suspicion even more clear to me.

Young people with interest by photography will still know about these things
because they will buy an analog camera and become what we call “hypsters”
nowadays (the equivalent of “nerds” back then). And back then also not
everyone knew or could go through the whole negative reveal process, as much
as nowadays not everyone can format a hard disk and install an OS.

------
raverbashing
Now that I remember, the last time I had photographic film developed was in
2003 or 2004. I was a bit late to the digital photography game.

Today my phone (far from a top of the line model) takes better pictures (both
in pixel size and sensitivity) than my first digital camera (which I think had
a whopping 128MB memory card)

(Having read about it a long time ago I'm a bit familiar with how film is
developed - note the red light is only useful for some types of B&W film, your
regular color film will get exposed even with a dim red light)

~~~
jacobush
The red light is useful with almost _no_ B&W film. The red light is useful for
paper.

------
karmakaze
Hey while we're all poking and having fun, has anyone mentioned here why
'red'?

I've never developed film photographs myself and just assumed it was for the
benefit of preserving low-light sensitivity in our eyes rather than anything
related to exposing the paper to different wavelengths of light--just lower
intensities that we can still see.

~~~
simonblack
Early photographic films were not very sensitive to red. (It showed up as
black on the resulting photo.) That's called 'orthochromatic film'. And it's
relatively safe to use a dim red light (often called a 'safe light') with
that.

Photographic _paper_ which is what is used to produce a 'positive' print is
only reacting to black and white, so it can be made from 'orthochromatic
chemicals' without problems, and it is more convenient because you can use a
red safe-light while you are processing it.

Later photographic film was about as sensitive to red as the other colours, so
all colors showed as shades of grey, while black was black. That's called
'panchromatic film'. You must use total darkness when transferring/developing
this film. I learned to do the the entire film-processing sequence solely by
feel umpteen decades ago.

An offshoot to the dim red effect, is the movies where you see submarine
control rooms using dim red lighting. This is supposedly a way of preventing a
loss of night-vision when looking though the periscope at night.

------
sritrisna
Anyone remember the movie: One Hour Photo with the late Robin Williams. That
was the first thing which came to my mind.

------
whoopdedo
Is it confusing anyone? Google trend for "red room" shows only a few brief
spikes, the most recent from February. That seems to be because of the book
"The Haunting of Hill House".

------
WaltPurvis
It seems clear the person who originally asked about the purpose of the "red
room" was just trolling, and boy did it work.

------
pavel_lishin
I wonder how difficult it would be to create photographic film "from scratch".

~~~
petascale
Have a look at dry plate and wet plate photography. Dry plate is silver and
gelatin on a glass plate.

[https://unblinkingeye.com/AAPG/DPlate/dplate.html](https://unblinkingeye.com/AAPG/DPlate/dplate.html)

The primary difference to film is that the glass substrate is replaced with
cellulose acetate.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulose_acetate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulose_acetate)

------
notus
That article format is like someone just vomited on the page, who is speaking?

