Dave, when i mentioned about developing the film myself, i actually took the image on my desired film/slide, and used the chemicals in a controlled enviornment, (dark room,) to go through the whole process.
This way, depending on the Film, one could develop for longer, or shorter times to get the results they wanted.
Once that was established, I went on to printing the negatives to the desired effect i wanted, it was quite an involved process.
The whole process, has to do with temp of the chemicals, and the time the film was in the chemicals, which can be changed when one gets more experienced.
The local photo shop dose not do this, and each film is just put through the machine, and automatically processed and printed.
When i was doing certain films, i would use fresh chemicals each time, they also don't do this, but change it every now and then when a certain number of films have been put through the machine.
Although i don't do this any more, it was quite an experience.
Hope this helps.
Leon
