Dirt!

It's a bit scary to leave a system that you have got to grips with (film) and take up with another so my change over to digital has left me trying to anticipate problems and therefore asking a lot of questions. I asked one of my old contemporaries 9an advertsing photographer) if he had gone from film to digital and he told me that although he has a camera that writes huge files the big problem he has is dirt getting on the sensor.

He says now he has got a sensor perfectly clean he has decided not to interchange lenses and let any more dirt in. He intends to dedicate a separate body to each lens. This problem never arose with film. Any dirt on it got there after processing.

Now he works in a studio but I intend to use my (SLR) cameras in the harsh conditions associated with diving.

Have any of you encountered this problem and is it simply swab, swab, swab? Can it be avoided?

Dust can be an issue with a DSLR. I'm on my second camera (started with a D60, now shooting with a 20D) and have cleaned the CMOS sensor on my D60. I haven't had dust show up on the 20D yet, but I am sure that eventually it will.

Because the CCD/CMOS sensor is electrically charged, it will inevitably pick up dust from in the air, typically when lenses are changed. To see if there is dust on your sensor, set your camera to aperture priority, close the aperture on your lens as far as it goes (f/22 or smaller) and shoot a photo of a blank white sheet of paper - don't worry about vibration when you do this, because the dust spots won't blur, since they're on the sensor. When you look at the photo, you'll see dark round blobs - those are dust spots. Now how do you get rid of them? It's not as bad as you would think.

Blowing the dust off the sensor is ineffective - I've tried. I haven't used a compressed air canister (like for computer cleaning) but i wouldn't want to on something an fragile as a CCD/CMOS sensor. That means your best option is to wipe it off. I found reference to the following web page in a photography magazine, and have used their product to clean the sensor successfully on several occasions.

http://www.pbase.com/copperhill/ccd_cleaning

There is a wealth on information on this site, and their product works extremely well. It's a somewhat scary prospect at first, but it's really quite simple and the results are great. It's a minor annoyance, but if you do it every few months the buildup never becomes a major problem.

Hope this helps.

Brian

Hi John, keeping sensors clean must be a priority, so good judgement must be used when changing lenses....I've never been overly protective about this and have had very little trouble.

I bought the sensor cleaning kit detailed below and it works very well and very easily....just be very, very careful

http://www.pbase.com/image/15473243

Karl

Hi John,

I've cleaned the sensor on the S2 a handful of times, and on the 1DmkII once. It's really not ver hard and is just a regular part of camera maintenance (like changing film, LOL!).

There are MANY products available to do the job - just do a search using "clean camera sensor" and you'll find some.

Basically, you're just brushing or wiping off the sensor's covering filter - not the actual sensor. So jeebus-forbid, someone bumps your elbow and you scratch it - it's not as costly a repair as you'd think.

Not that that will ever happen.

Good luck and welcome to the digital world!

James

I have successfully removed dust from my sensor using an air can. The manufactur wisely suggests that you not do this, but as long as you are careful how you do it it isn't a problem.

I don't give it a full blast and don't tip the can too far over so that liquid is allowed to escape.

The tech in the camera store showed me how to do this.

For a quick clean up it is much faster than using the swabs. Eventually I will have to do a thorough cleaning with the swabs. There are lots of kits out there to do this.

The dirt spots don't show up as much as you would think in real world photographs. You have to have the right composition, subject matter and aperture to see them. And if it ruins an important photo its usually very easy to fix in photoshop. You are most likely to see them on blue water or sky backgrounds which is the easiest place to clone out.

If you are really worried about it perhaps the Olympus supersonic wave filter would be right up your alley. This unique solution vibrates the sensor each time the camera is started thus shaking any potential dust into a special sticky dust trap.

Dust will stick to the sensor due to the charge. It can be blown off, but will eventually get back on there, so the camera should be tilted down when you blow on the sensor. Canned air works but don't tilt it upside down. A scuba tank works too. The Visible Dust brush works too.

Other stickies may actually adhere to the sensor and they will take a volatile fluid and a pad/swab to remove.

Cheers

James

Dirt (dust) on the image sensor shows up more as you stop down. Beyond f/11 (probably a pretty 'optimum' aperture as far as image quality goes on digital camera) dust becomes very apparent. Whether dust is a huge issue to you depends on your shooting style - I suspect that we will see an increase in the use of wider apertures with digital cameras - it is certainly something that I feel aware of. But for macro photos dust really can be a problem as can degredation of image quality due to smaller aperture use. There is only one solution - change lenses as carefully as possible. Using an SLR and not wanting to change lenses is about as counterproductive as you can get! My camera is currently filthy but I cannot afford to be without it long enough to get it cleaned really well - affording a spare which is hardly used, depreciates heavily and is high cost to start with doesn't appeal either.

Paul,

You can clean your sensor in 10 minutes and be back to shooting.

Cheers

James

I recently bought a used D100 as a backup (having seen firsthand the advantage of having a backup body... right Karl? :-). I took an F22 out of focus shot of blue sky, and was amazed to see at least 30 dust bunnies. I don't think it had ever been cleaned by it's previous owner. Anyway, a couple of swipes with a kit similar to to the one that Karl mentioned above, and shazaam they are all gone.

Off topic, but interesting, I then sent the body to Nikon for a firmware upgrade. Not only did they upgrade it, but they cleaned and tested it. It came back looking like a new camera, and they didn't even charge me.

Cp

Hey Chris.....clean living pays off again?

Karl

Hey Chris.....clean living pays off again? 

Ah, I knew there was a reason for my good luck, and yours....

Actually, in your case it good planning. I'm sold on the having an extra body on a trip idea. Insurance is fine, but it doesn't help one bit when you are on the trip.

Cp

"Just say no to dust bunnies"

Run, don't walk, to buy a sensor brush from www.visibledust.com

I've used sensor swabs and compressed air from scuba tank. Messy and not totally reliable. But then I bought the Sensor Brush product, actually followed the instructions, minimal as they may be, and found it to be a miracle product.

Every photographer with a D-SLR needs this in their travel kit, in my opinion anyway.

I'll second that!

I used to really struggle with dust. I've tried the bulbs, canned air, scuba tanks, etc... Sensor Swabs are too expensive to use as anything except a last resort.

The Visible Dust Sensor Brush is amazing. I haven't had to swab my sensor in over a month.

I agree. I used one on the Wetpixel Bahamas trip and it worked well.

Before:

After:

Cheers

James

Hi,

The sensor is protected by a IR filter. So it's not so fragile !

Look at those folks who do astro removing the filter to capture all the red spectrum.

http://ghonis2.ho8.com/rebelmod4.html

So you can sweep dust on it without concern !

The only real problem is about eletrostatic charge that stuck dust on the filter.

A trick I red on a french mailing list use a piezo electric lighter to create a suffisent

amount a charge to anilate the attraction made by the sensor.

You have to remove the metal part of the lighter to just keep the needle on the center.

Now the only thing to do is to approach the lighter 10cm to the sensor and activate it.

The charge created is just suffisent to unstuck the spot.

A brush will remove it !

Stéphane

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/sandon/

Steph:

You go ahead and zap! your sensor. I'll do it to mine right after you zap yours...;-)

Cheers

James

;-)

when the metal part of the lighter is removed it doesn't produce etincelle anymore. Charge will appear on the needle. 10cm is very far away from the sensor. No etincelle will happend as air is a great isolent.

:-)

"piezo electric lighter" - sounds pretty frightening to me!!

But maybe I'm just a luddite.

I'll stick to the sensor brush for the moment I think.

We aren't allowed to fly with lighters anymore, so the lighter trick is out.

I used to use the striking element of those lighters to shock my friends.

Got any friends left Eric?