I originally brought in several cameras plus parts cameras for those models (one SLR and one rangefinder). Forster's technician called me a few days later and went over everything, and talked me out of fixing one of them-- too many unknowns and a bad investment considering what I'd have to put into it. Wow! When a place won't take your money that says something. The camera they did fix was perfect and the estimate right on the mark, and the work was extremely reasonable. I brought in a second one after that-- same thing. Just dropped off my third. This place is honest, capable and very friendly. No wonder why the specialty photo shops where I buy film and accessories in the area all recommend Forster's. As others have said, it's so much better than sending your 35mm shooters away for service. These local places are hard to find-- we're lucky to have this one! read more

Forster's Camera Service - Photography Stores & Services Near Me - Salt Lake City, Utah

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Good service, cheaper than sending my camera away for repair. Getting the repair quote was free

I asked them to provide an estimate in repairing my Nikon D70 and along with their estimate they told me it was wiser to buy a used D90 than repair my D70. I really appreciate their honesty. read more

Recently sent my NIkon D3S full frame into Forster's. Needed shutter repair, cleaning and a lens cleaned needing new grips. Just got it back and finished two shoots. They did an exceptional job. I am very happy with them. Thank you for your professional service. I will be back!!! :) read more

Look elsewhere for your camera repairs. I was looking to get my old Sony camcorder's tape drive tuned up and got back a camcorder that didn't work. They gave it back to me and charged me a "reassembly fee" without even fixing the problem and yet somehow causing more issues in the camcorder. My camcorder played tapes and recorded with little issue before I took it in and I was just looking to get it tuned up a little. Now it neither record tapes nor plays them and makes a strange buzzing noise it didn't make before I sent it in. The tape drive also has problems opening and closing now but it had no problems before I sent it in. Don't bother coming to this shop. read more

We went there to have a look at my old film camera; the girl was super rude and seemed bothered to be helping me. She said I needed a new battery and charged me $14 for it. The battery ended up dying less than a week later and I went somewhere else to get one, and the same battery was $4.50. What a ripoff, and poor service. read more

Only gave it one star because it's required Had an unfortunate event while vacationing on Oahu Bottom line wave+Nikon= destruction ; as soon as I landed back in SLC I quickly whisked my precious photograph apparatus into Forsters for a repair estimate fearing the absolute worst. The lens on the camera when I turned it over wasn't even a lens I took with me to Hawaii. But 2 days later I received a call from Forsters reporting it would 89$ to fix my saltwater damaged lens. This was puzzling as I was told the lens had severe damage, and it would need to be serviced and then cleaned to use again. Keep in mind this wasn't the lens I had on my camera at the time of the damage. Even though this was concerning I was truly just distraught about my camera body. I was called a day after they gave me the news about my lens and told my camera was unrepairable. This was the news I dread. I was told before I handed my camera over if they couldn't fix it they'd be happy to send the camera to Nikon for 30$. The girl went on to say things like "there's no way to fix this ; it's unrefurbishable" when I asked them to send it to Nikon for possible repair she told me there was no point. (HOW IS ANYTHING UNREFURBISHABLE?) The camera just needed to be "thrown out" and they "were happy to dispose of the camera body" but it was a 25$ fee for them to put the camera back together (THAT THEY TOOK APART) for me to pickup she spent about a minute trying to prevent me from picking the camera up. After sometime I assumed they were only trying to keep my camera and fix it for a small price then re sell it for almost full value (it was a 6month old camera & the serial number revealed this). I picked up my camera after paying 50$ for a "Free Repair Estimate" and additional$$ for putting my camera back together. I had an upcoming wedding to shoot so I sent my camera to Nikon for 7$ two day shipping. After a week I was emailed by Nikon to let me know that if I wanted my camera repaired it would be 235$ plus 15$ for shipping. IT DIDNT EVEN NEED TO BE REFURBISHED. The circuit board inside needed to be replaced. DO NOT TAKE YOUR CAMERAS TO THIS REPAIR SHOP UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. I would not and will Never trust them again. They tried to refurbish my camera on their own, while I was under the impression it was unrepairable, and then sell it for a quick (large) buck. I'm beyond disappointed in this deceitful establishment. Please, please even if it's a homeless man on the side of the street; find somebody else to fix your camera. read more

Great service! I had an aperture break in the middle of a wedding. In the middle of a wedding!! So say I was filled with panic is an understatements I had another shoot immediately after the wedding, was 6 hours from home, and didn't have even 20 minutes to spare. I called Forster's from the car and told them my situation. They had all the paper work out and ready when I walked in. I was in and out and headed to my next session in less than 30 seconds. A week later my 35mm showed up at my front door, 300+ miles away good as new. The bill was not as steep as I had been anticipating either. read more

Being Nikon's only repair center in Utah, I was pretty disappointed. After explaining my problem over email and phone several times, they didn't seem to grasp the problem. Being the quote to repair was over a third of the actual cost of the item, I decided to opt out of the repair and pick it up. Unfortunately, when I got there, I had to wait another 35 minutes as they searched for my lost camera. Poor experience. Get it together @NikonUSA. read more

I read a few bad reviews and was nervous, but I didn't need to be. This place was great, they fixed the pins in my Nikon for a lower price than what I had researched online. I was impressed with their staff as well. read more

Don't waste your time dealing with the front desk woman with a b**** attitude. She obviously hates her job. Plus their "free estimate" will get you a $175 dollar price that has no info about the issue. Look somewhere else. read more

Great service! I dropped my Nikon off for a free estimate and they were extremely friendly and helpful. Would definitely use them again.

When you spend $100 dollars to get your camera DSLR cleaned you would expect them to do a pretty good job. It wasn't. I could still see dust on my focusing screen and a speck on my image sensor. read more

I sent my Canon 300 2.8 IS in for a repair, was told should take about 4 weeks. I had to call them after the 4 week deadline to find out what the problem was. Still didn't have an answer. Finally got a message after another 2 weeks saying it needed a new usm motor. The part was $499 plus shipping. They installed the new motor and said it was defective also, that took another 3 weeks. I told them to reinstall the old usm motor and send the lens back. Make sure it work like it did when I sent it in. It did not. Was in worse condition than when I sent it to them. The repair would have cost more than $800. I sent it to another repair shop and it cost $170 to fix. Didn't need a new usm motor. I do not recommend Forster's Camera. Dishonest. read more

Sent my Panasonic LUMIX DMC SZ7 in to clean a smudge on the interior lens. When I got the camera back, it stopped working. Could not turn it off and on and take pictures. Mailed it back for correction. They charged me for mailing camera back to me, even though camera was under 90 day warranty and they caused the problem. Same camera failure problem occurred while I was in the middle of my travel in Peru---system focus error. End result, I spent over $100 to have the lens on my Panasonic DMC SZ7 camera cleaned and Forsters returned the camera in a broken condition. Waste of money and they returned the camera in worse condition! read more

I've been here a few times and always have a great experience. I don't know what the other reviews are about, I guess no one is really happy when they break something, but I've always been treated well and had a good experience. Grateful to have a local and honest place to do business with. read more

Absolutely horrible service. Took my Nikon camera in to replace a sticky shutter button, got it back a month later with most rear buttons non-functional. I invoked their "warranty" for fix their mess up and after yet another month waiting for another "back ordered" new? part got the camera back with different non-functional buttons and this time missing the eyecup and a cap for a screw. Raised hell about their incompetent service and demanded a full refund so that I could send it in to Nikon, and now just wondering how much more they have damaged my camera. Stay far far away from these people. Note that I had had good service prior on 2 film camera CLAs and one other digital I dropped, but after this fiasco I will never ever trust them again with any of my photographic equipment. Sayonara Forster's. read more

Wow, what can I say. I've never had such atrocious service in my life. I brought two Ipods in to Forsters to have fixed. This was in January of 2011. I was told that they both needed either a replacement battery or logic board. We settled on changing the batteries first as they had the items in stock and didn't need to order any parts. I waited months to hear about my ipods. I stopped in on occasion to find out what was going on. After over a year, finally, on a stop in, one of the ipods is ready! I grab it and take it home only to find out that it is not fixed. At no time during my visits did anyone tell me that the other ipod was fixed or ready. I immediately took the ipod back and notified them that it was not fixed. after a few more stops in to check on my items, I was recently notified that they couldn't find them. I was told by the very friendly girl at the counter that she would look and give me a call later that day. about two weeks later I get a call from the owner, John Forster. He basically told me that because it was after 90 days from when the ipods were done, (remember that nobody told me the other one was done at any time and I was never notified that the original one was done), there was nothing that he could do. He had disposed of them. There was no follow up before any item was disposed of. As someone who owns a business myself, I will ALWAYS attempt to make things right, especially when we have been in the wrong. Please I implore you, if you have any item that needs to be fixed, be it an ipod or camera, avoid this shop. They have no sense when it comes to customer service or customer appreciation. read more

I've had them work on my old film cameras and lenses. Not the fastest (since the main dude who does film cameras is semi-retired), but they do great work. And they do estimates for free. read more

Horrible customer service. I do not recommend Forsters for camera repairs. They had my lens for 9 months, slated it to be thrown away without asking me, took 8 months to return my phone calls, and in the end did not fix my lens or offer any kind of help. Stay away from Forsters Camera. read more

These guys did a perfect job repairing my broken L-series lens. The price was fair and the lens was repaired in a reasonable amount of time. Thanks. read more

Great repair service. Forster's has worked on our (University lab) film cameras, digital cameras, med. format and 4x5. All great work, done when promised. read more

Sent in my Panasonic Lumix point and shoot to have them clean a smudge on the interior lens. Seemed like a good plan and the camera was returned promptly. I didn't get around to using the camera again for a couple of months and when I did, it ceased working in short order---indicating a system focus error. I returned camera to Forsters because there were about two days left on the 90 day warranty. They sent it back (charging me $15 bucks for return shipping even tho it required a repair while under warranty) and the camera worked for about two weeks before the same system focus error occurred right in the middle of my trip to Peru. This error prevents camera from taking any pictures. Camera worked fine before I sent it in to Forsters. Bottom line, I spent over $100 bucks for repair and shipping to have a smudge removed from the lens and got a broken, now useless, camera in return. Definitely not going to recommend their service. read more

Unfortunately, my experience here was awful. I was having issues with back focusing, and at the time didn't know if it was a viewfinder problem or a lens problem. I brought all my gear in and it sat in there store for days and days. I actually had to call them since they never got back to me. When I called, they said that they couldn't find any problems, but I was 100% sure of the problem. It was like they hadn't ever heard of a problem like this before and couldn't grasp it. Finally, after doing more research myself since they weren't, I decided I wanted my lens calibrated to the camera to see if that would help. They told me that 1) I had to send my gear to sigma to even have it done and 2) calibrating one lens to my camera would mess up all the other lenses to my camera. That didn't sound right to me. So I called Acme Camera and they said to bring in my gear to have my lenses calibrated to me camera. He explained that the data is in each individual lens, not the camera body, and calibrating one lens would not affect the others. I brought my stuff in and 2 hours later the problem was fixed and I picked my stuff back up. I wasted way too much time with Fosters and was very disappointed in the service and lack of knowledge. How they are a Nikon recommended shop is beyond me. read more