Pre-wedding camera cleaning

[marcsaint]

This is slightly off-topic but important nonetheless.

 

Prior to today's wedding, I checked my D70 for dust on the sensor by

photographing some sky at f/22 -- the included picture is the result.

I had to clean the sensor twice using a Sensor Brush until all the

dust was gone.

 

I bought the brush a year or so ago -- is anything better on the

market for cleaning sensors? Does anybody have a better way to keep

the sensor clean? Do you worry about dust getting on the sensor in

the middle of a wedding and not knowing about it?

 

Marc St.Onge<div></div>

[michael_juiliano1]

I use a rubber medical syringe. the perfect blower! one or two squeezes and viola!

[fotografz]

The most accidents I've encountered has been during cleaning gear ; -)

 

I do it when nothing is impending so I can fix or replace something before I need it.

[lb-]

I clean my sensors before jobs as needed. I also clean my sensors during jobs as needed.

Often have to clean them every day. I work on the beach and they can get pretty dirty.

 

I use a bulb blower and a brush. I've never had any problems and I must have cleaned

them each 50-60 times at least.

 

I have a few brushes. 2 are from Visible Dust and one is from the art store. The art brush

was much cheaper (about $4 I think) and works just as well.

 

One of the brushes I have from VD has a funny looking handle with a little motor that

spins it. Works great and no more scrambling to find compressed air when I travel.

 

cheers

[picturesque]

Actually the best tool I've found is the SpeckGrabber. I understand that your environment makes some difference in the kind of dust that gets onto your sensor. I get sticky dust sometimes, and a blower doesn't get that but a SpeckGrabber will. So I use a blower and the Speckgrabber when needed. I have a sensor brush but don't like to use it if I don't have to. If you get actual wet spots on the sensor, you'll have to use a wet method such as the Copperhill--I haven't done that yet and won't until necessary. I rarely shoot at smaller apertures than f11 anyway at a wedding. f11 still doesn't show dust.

[ben_rubinstein___mancheste]

Use the biggest blower you have when you're in a rush, but if you don't close down further than f5.6 as most wedding photogs, you're not going to see this level of dust.

 

I clean when I'm going on a landscape shoot, I never bother with wedding stuff as the likely hood of seeing dust is far less than the likely hood of smearing some grease from the shutter all over the sensor with your VD brush a couple of hours before the wedding.

[rich_dutchman1]

I use a $10 rubber-tip speck grabber for big pieces and compressed air.

 

Yes, I know Nikon warns against it, but I found that *very* short spurts of air works wonderfully. You don't want the air bottle to shoot liquid, so I generally stop when the bottle starts feeling cold. Anyways, I've cleaned my sensors weekly for five years that way without indcident.

[rdkirk]

If there is one reason people should be required to do film printing before being allowed to do digital, it would be to learn thaat dust on a digital image is not a big deal.

 

Try spotting a few hundred hardcopy prints with a #000 brush and Spotone to see what trouble with dust really is, and then when you zap out dust with the Clone brush, you'll just laugh.

 

Cleaning sensors is one of the most dangerous things people regularly do with cameras (right ahead of cleaning lenses). I would never clean a sensor immediately before a significant shoot--dust isn't enough of a problem to be worth any risk of screwing up the sensor, for pete's sake, just before a major job.

 

For the same reason, I would never clean a sensor during a job. Dust is just not that much of a problem on a digital image.

 

I shoot portraits, generally low key, so for sure dust is almost never an issue for me (I've seen a dust spot once in the last year and a half), but it's just not a serious problem anyway.

[ben_rubinstein___mancheste]

oh i don't know, I just came back from Scotland, I shot this image at f18 and there were 150 spots that needed cloning out and on a picture like this with so much white is was very necessary....

 

http://www.bphotography.co.uk/fineart/bightml/beinn.htm

[lb-]

"For the same reason, I would never clean a sensor during a job."

 

try shooting on the beach every day, you'll change your tune.

 

I've had images that took 3-4 mintues each to spot the dust in PS. I don't have that kind

of time and at the $50/hr I charge to sit in front of a computer my clients might not want

to spend that kind of money.

 

and while I understand the risk of sensor filter cleaning etc, does anyone here actually

know anyone who's damaged their camera from cleaning the sensor? Damn near everyone

I know is a working photographer and other than the occasional internet story I've never

heard of anyone doing any damage to their sensor. I know someone who didn't clean their

brush well enough ( art store brush) and smeared some gunk on there but it came right off

with eclipse and a pad.

 

but hey, I've also met people who think cleaning the front element of their lenses is a no

go so I guess to each their own.

 

cheers

[KenPapai]

Certainly the Visible Dust brush is better than anything out there, IMO. It works well all the time (every 2-4 months?).

[verdellnazgul]

Just wipe it off! I'd heard all the horror stories but visited a commercial photographer friend and gasped as he blasted his with an air compressor and then wiped it with a cut off popsicle stick wrapped with a lens cloth. Says he does it several times a week so now I use the cheapest popsicle stick I can find. He does it on his d1x's and d2x's and I do it with my 2 d1x's and my d100. Narry a problem.

 

Steve