hey, well since i had some time this weekend i went through all my camera lenses, eyepieces, and various bits and pieces of optical equipment and gave it all a good clean, in anticipation of the new moon next weekend, and decided to do a few test shots to see how the bunnies are on my 400D sensor...
and well...
you know what a bucket of sand looks like?
that's my sensor, completely covered. i love the sensor cleaning gizmo that canon have put into the 400D and am sure that things would be alot worse off should it not be there, but well, see for yourself...
oh, and how would i go about cleaning the sensor? should i even attempt such a risky endeavour?
oh yeah, i did mess with the highlights and shadows to really bring out the dust bunnies. in the original you can see some of the bigger ones.
i would be willing to bet that most of the forum users' DSLR sensors look like that, it's just a matter of being able to see it! i've attached the above pic without the adjustments, so it's straight out of the camera, not too noticeable, but you know what, I KNOW the dust is there, and that's enough to annoy me.
Yes Josh, you may be right that most sensors have dust and some may look like yours, but i know that mine is nearly spotless, i do as Andrew suggests, and give it a quick air blow each time it is fitted to the scope, and than when put away.
Makes a hell of a difference, and the camera is never open for more than a second or two, and never when switch on, these things are real dust attractors, and these little precautions make all the difference,
cheers guys, i've got two (one for me, and a b'day pressie for my bro) medium Giotto rocket blowers on order off the net. unfortunately because of chinese new year or some such, i prolly won't get it till the end of feb. oh well, fun times anyway
I work in a commercial photo studio and we have several PRO digital cameras which we clean ourselves. From my experience every time we have used a blower on a sensor it ADDS more dust to the chip.
We've even experimented with filtered air blowers with no luck. Blowing seems to just add more dust.
Blowing can be good to do around the lens mount before removing/attaching a lens.
The best place in Brisbane for sensor cleaning is Anderson's Camera repairs. In our experience they are the most professional group around by far.
They charge around $100 plus depending on how dirty it is. They also do the job in a few hours if you need.
Once you have it clean its easier to keep it clean.
Hope this helps!
Dave.
PS. The best way to check for dust is to photograph a light box or plain wall and then use auto-levels in PS to see all the nasties. Good luck.
We've tried them all.... But what we like to use (for many reasons) is a combo of sensor brushes and wet sensor swaps.
The brushes are statically charged and when gently wiped across the surface they pick up the loose dust. If anything remains then we do a wet wipe. This involves sensor swaps and sensor cleaning fluid. Basically you wipe all over the sensor with a wet swap, then use a dry one to dry it off.
We've been doing this procedure for years now (our studio was the first in Australia to use digital cameras commercially) and we find that as long as your very careful the sensor is never damaged. Afterall it is just a piece of MC glass in front of the sensor which you are cleaning.
If you do a search for "sensor brush" you will find lots of info on the web.
What we tend to do mainly now is to skip the brush step and go straight to the wet wipe. This is because most canon cameras use a oil/grease inside the sensor chamber. It is all to easy for this oil to get on your sensor brush and then onto your sensor. Once your brush has the oil on it its almost a bin job. Sensor brush sell fluid for cleaning the brushes but it didn't work for us. The wet swabs easily get the oil off the sensor though.
Even with all this cleaning procedure we still like to get all our cameras cleaned at Andersons once a year, and then we find it easy to keep them clean.
It really is the worst part about digital cameras.
mm most definitely i hate the ugly little critters, i've had a few shots ruined by dust bunnies, surely they'd think to maybe put some kind of permanent or difficult to remove filter/ cover system over the sensor chamber?
that's been awesomely useful, i'll have ot look into the wet swabs and brushes, any advice on brands and retailers for such products?
we have gotten ours from a wholesale dealer and the swabs are a medical brand. We have recently run out and will be sourcing new ones. So when we sort ourselves out I'll let you know what we find to be the best.
But in the mean time you getting a professional clean could really be worthwhile. Most cameras come from the factory with significant amounts of dust on them already, and this dust can be hard to remove.
Oh I should also mention that I have no affiliation with Andersons... I'm just a happy customer.
ok, well teh next chapter in the saga of my growing dust bunnies, is that i still can't get rid of them. i've purchased a medium Giottos rocket blower and that hasn't removed much, if any. and there is the appearance of a new and forbidding piece of dust on my sensor. it's rather large and seems to find it's way into most of my photos these days.
stupid dust bunny.
i might have to bite the bullet and get a professional clean.