A new downtown business, “Art off the Wall,” sounds like an art gallery, but it’s a distinctive business that creates home movies, and anyone can be a star when they bring in their own pictures or videos.

“You can bring us your photos that were stashed away, and we’ll turn them into something beautiful,” owner Drea Solan said. “We’ll create photo collages or artsy, creative things. Bring us your art off the wall.”

When Solan created a photo collage of his late father, he found it a fitting memorial to the man’s life. It was a lasting tribute, and Solan realized there was a need for this type of venue to capture life’s events.

“It’s like a video time capsule,” he said. “This is not something you can get at a kiosk at Wal-Mart. I’m not just grabbing a picture. It’s about putting things together and putting time into it.”

Solan started to work with Photoshop before most people knew what it was. He worked for a stock photography company after college and dealt with “thousands of images,” he said.

Another career path involved working with an Apple retailer, where he had access to the latest computer graphics programs. While he worked with creative software, he developed a passion for photo and video editing.

“I have a good eye for composition and picking out frames,” Solan said. “Collages can be fun but tend to be for an event like anniversaries, memorials, weddings, graduations or christenings.”

Solan doesn’t want to tout himself as a photographer; he prefers to create his pieces from photos that people bring in, but he will shoot photos if it’s required. And he’s happy to show off his work to anyone who wants to see what he does.

Solan shared a story about how he turned an ordinary afternoon girls soccer game into a professional-looking feature film. By combining still photos and video clips and adding music, the event comes back to life and makes near-movie stars or sports heroes out of the players.

Clients can provide music clips, but Solan generally comes up with the different soundtracks himself.

“People don’t realize how important audio is,” he said. “It’s like going to a beautiful movie theater and watching a silent film. The music is what makes a picture.”

Solan is looking forward to offering personalized Christmas cards this season. His creations go above and beyond shopping for a gift — they are lasting memories and very personal. It also gives people a chance to preserve the images they have.

Film and photos have a shelf life, Solan said, so it’s important to update them in a modern format.

“A guy came in here with a stack of 8 millimeter tapes that I put onto DVDs,” he said. “I’ve been told this is very unique what I do. It’s a reminder that there’s a lot of work to be done. It’s a reminder to capture images while you still can.”

Solan said his business gives people a nudge in that direction, and once people get started, they have a lot of fun gathering up photos and film for him to update.

“Whether it’s just getting them scanned or creating collages or digitizing videos,” he said. “What I’m offering is preserving memories.”

Art Off The Wall is located in Neptune’s Court at 7805, Suite A, Pioneer Way in Gig Harbor. For more information, call 253-7777-0182 or email info@artoffthewall.com.