Bushwick Community Darkroom

I rented the darkroom at BCD this weekend as was very, very impressed.
The darkroom is well equipped with great quality enlargers and large developing trays, an awesome drying station with a drying machine for RC prints, paper cutter, and dry mounting press.
Though a hike to get there from Manhattan, the trip is well worth the facilities and I will definitely be returning!

The women that runs it is very sweet and fair with her prices! I go to get my film developed here once a week! Great place, good prices! Also I recently got my pictures blown up to an 11“14 and they did a great job!
Highly recommended.

The Bushwick darkroom is a great place to print. Glad I found it and have been able to go regularly. They have color & B&W darkrooms and they process film.

Keith and Kaleb are incredibly helpful. The dark room and developing equipment is all here and super easy to use. What you don’t know they will help you figure out. They have all the chemicals you need to sort out our developing need. The best part is the large developing tanks that allow you to develop 5 – 10 rolls at once.
they also have a new machine to develop C-​41 film with so while you develop your black and white stuff they will take care of the color for you.

Thugs place is a straight joke. I’ve been burned here to many times with ditzy careless processing but today takes the cake. All we wanted was processing of a few 35 mm rolls, cut. It was picked up UN cut and held together with PAPER CLIPS which bent the negatives. See photo. Not only that, but they are smeared with drip residue, fingerprints AND scratches. The customer in front of us was complaining about the exact same handling.
I’m really disappointed that they are running their business this way. Until they learn how to handle film, they should close their doors.
We called to speak to the owner and she stated that the film was messed up do to our camera, causing leaks (the leaks were intentional) Whether the camera is malfunctioning or the film is bunk or not, the negatives should still be treated properly. We’re paying for it.
We’ll be taking our future processing back to Luster in the east village, they handle our film with integrity and high quality. It’s worth the trip.

I wanted to check this place and gave them a roll to process. It took two days instead of promised — one. Plus long weekend made it 5 days. When I got the film back, there were stains of chemicals on it. I washed it myself, but I could not get rid of some small stains, which seem to be film damages. Yes, it’s very close and convenient, but I wouldn’t take a risk.

I brought film in from a recent trip to Austin only to have it returned to me completely destroyed. I was told that an intern was allowed to process it and severely botched it. The owner was apologetic and obviously didn’t charge me for the processing, but I was still upset a couple days later so I contacted her again. She offered to let me come in and use their scanners free of charge to try to salvage any images digitally. Unfortunately the roll was shot, but she handled the mistake very courteously and professionally. Probably just a fluke, but be sure you request that interns don’t handle your film if it’s important!

These people are great! After several attempts over several weeks to find an hourly-​rental darkroom in NYC that actually answered their phone or was in existence, I finally found BCD. Lucia and Caleb have been incredibly helpful. Prices are really reasonable — fantastic local resource!!!

It’s really wonderful to have such an amazing resource right down the street. Without it, myself and so many others wouldn’t have any darkroom access whatsoever.
After a few years away from film photography I was pretty rusty but Lucia and the other volunteers create a supportive and helpful atmosphere that makes beginners and newcomers feel welcome.
The BCD is totally a not-​for-​profit labor of love dedicated to keeping the spirit of traditional photography alive through education and by providing an affordable space for artists to work in a cooperative environment.

The girl that operates the darkroom is a walking encyclopedia of photographic knowledge! I took a few old rolls of film there last week, after having not been in a darkroom in almost a decade. Lucia was super helpful, and made my developing go smoothly. I would definitely recommend the BCD to anyone who shoots film.

The person who works here is too cool & busy to process your film. She will take it and will be really unhappy when you return because she is too cool & busy to get to it on her list of cool things to do that day. I had heard this information from a friend who needed to process some 120 film but I recently decided to experience this waste of time firsthand. I live closeby so I thought it would be fun to support local business and better the community but I guess I learned my lesson!!!

Processed my first roll of film here today in ages. Staff was really wonderful, and I’m very happy with the price ($ 12 an hour which included all the chemicals and equipment). Can’t wait to get some paper and make some prints!

A great little darkroom, if you need help Lucia is very thorough, and for those that have experience it’s a good place to get some printing done in a relaxed space. Its also well set up and organized, which makes the process nice and simple.

When I first went, I wasn’t sure where to start — I had processed bw film but not printed in the darkroom — but Lucia was such a great teacher she got me up and running in like 10 minutes. I was really thrilled with the results; seeing these gorgeous prints of my pictures was such a thrill, plus I had made them myself! So much better than a computer screen, and it’s way easier to do than I ever imagined.