Do I have to take a class to use the facilities?

Not at all! We encourage everyone to take a class or workshop, but we recognize that many people may have some previous photography experience and need a refresher in the darkroom or digital lab. Our staff is also always happy to help introduce you to the space, and help to give you an overview of the processes we run, depending on how busy we are. We’re also excited to help with any kind of photography-related questions, so don’t be shy about asking!

How does your pricing work?

We know that photography is expensive, and we’ve done our best to keep our prices as low as we can. However, we recognize that there’s a high cost of entry to photography, and we offer sliding scale payments and scholarships to anyone who needs it. We don’t want anyone to feel like they can’t be part of the community, or work in the space due to financial reasons. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions or concerns, as we are always more than happy to help in any way we can!

Is this a photographers-only space?

Despite the name, the Tacoma Photo Center is open to everyone! In addition to hosting life drawing nights and art markets, we love to work with artists of all kinds, and to practice any artistic medium you’re interested in in our space (provided we have the space and tools to help). Our founder’s background is in analog and digital photography, as well as analog and digital film production, which are the most substantial areas we can help. However, our community includes artists of all sorts of mediums, and we’re excited to see anything you’re working on!

What’s the best way to contact you if I have questions about film processing times or donation drop off?

We’re happy to help in any way we can! Feel free to reach us any way you like but for purposes of response times, we tend to respond to phone calls within about 24 hours. Please leave a voicemail, as we are frequently away from the phone. We check our email often, and if you have a specific question for Drew, you should feel free to email him directly. If you choose to text us, we’ll do our best to respond within an hour or so, provided you’re texting during our regular hours of operation. When texting, please introduce yourself so that we know you are a customer, as the modern world comes with too many spam texts. We also respond to our DMs on our Instagram page within about a day.