Camera and Photography Stores in Seoul Korea

Living in a foreign country can be tough and language barriers are always an issue. Here’s a quick post to relate some information I learned today that may be of some help to expat photographers living in Seoul in the future.

Seoul is a great place to live as a photographer. Everywhere you go people are carrying DSLRs and professional lenses. I have no idea if they know how to use them, but they definitely know how to swag. So where do they get all this shiny gear? Online perhaps, but buying online has always been impossible for me. My Foreign ID number and English name never seem to pass any online registration points (in Korea it’s mandatory to register at every online forum and store with the Korean equivalent of your social security number… “in order to prevent libel”. It’s actually been used by the government and corporations to heavily restrict freedom of speech… but that’s another issue. back to photography…)

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So where to get this stuff? I ran into a huge photography store mecca today and wanted to share its whereabouts. The particular store I went to is 창신카메라 where I picked up some lighting gear. On the bottom floor are cameras, lenses, and accessories but to get the lighting gear you have to go upstairs. It’s not on display and I actually walked out the first time I walked in, but they’ll show you everything on their computer inventory. Also a very nice woman assisted me that spoke perfect English. They had everything I needed in stock except for a large softbox which they promised would be shipped for free within 1-2 days. Around 창신카메라 were at least another dozen camera stores with similar wares and I walked into several before finding a Nikon SU800.