Sensor cleaning
Discussion
This may suprise you to hear but I have never cleaned the sensor on either of my cameras. I change lenses alot, at least 10 times during a shoot with a model for example. I alway forget to point it down and always forget to turn it off when changing lenses. I've had the 300D for over 3 years and the 5D for nearly 18 months and shot about 70000 shots between them. My saving grace has been that I nearly always shoot at the wide end of the aperture but when I was shooting landscapes at Christmas I end up doing a hell of a lot of cloning out to get rid of dust. I finally thought I'd better do something about it! So I had a look at the state of play tonight...
300D...
5D...
...looking better now after a good brushing but I need to get some swabs or something to remove the last of it. Don't know why I've never done it before really it wasn't as scarey as I thought.
300D...
5D...
...looking better now after a good brushing but I need to get some swabs or something to remove the last of it. Don't know why I've never done it before really it wasn't as scarey as I thought.
There is a school of thought that suggests that leaving it alone keeps the dust to a minimum, whereas constantly cleaning it attracts more.
Personally I think that's bo
ocks, but each to their own 
I've got some of those ripoff swabs and fluid in a bag from Calumet. 50 bloody quid (needed some in a hurry so didn't get it online)
Personally I think that's bo
ocks, but each to their own I've got some of those ripoff swabs and fluid in a bag from Calumet. 50 bloody quid (needed some in a hurry so didn't get it online)
I did an architectural shot last summer, stopped right down and there was so much crap visible I nearly did a re-shoot! My local Calumet have a sensor cleaning day in March so I'll be getting mine cleaned for the first time in four years 
£35+vat is a bargain when I think of the time I've wasted spotting dust over the years. My Giotto hurricane blower has been doing a good job.
£35+vat is a bargain when I think of the time I've wasted spotting dust over the years. My Giotto hurricane blower has been doing a good job.I use the swabs & fluid from 'Eclipse' - I can't remember the price, but it certainly wasn't £50! I'm sure you could Google up an online supplier. Fixation do a good professional clean for £50 & VAT although I did have to return a camera to them as they just seemed to have moved the dirt around on the sensor. They claimed it was 'within Canon's permissable limits' or something, but they re-cleaned it reasoanably well. Once you have a nice clean sensor, there are a few thing that you can do to prevent dirt getting back in there :
Put double sided sticky tape on the inside surfaces of your back-caps and body-caps ( only the surfaces that won't touch any camera parts obviously ) . If there is any dust knocking around it will ( hopefully ) stick to the tape, and not find it's way later onto your sensor.
Dust off the body of the camera and the back of the lens ( with cap still attached ) just before you change lenses. The best way I have found of doing this is with an acrylic 2" brush from an art shop. Blow some 'Kenair' through it to clean it & 'energise' it with static, then when you do your cleaning, the dust jumps onto it ( dust that might have got into the camera body heading for you-know-where) .
Just doing these 2 simple things changed the amount of times I needed to clean the sesnsor ( which you don't want to be doing too often ) massively.
...or you could just buy a 1DSMk3 with self-cleaning - I gather you can get one for £5k now!
Put double sided sticky tape on the inside surfaces of your back-caps and body-caps ( only the surfaces that won't touch any camera parts obviously ) . If there is any dust knocking around it will ( hopefully ) stick to the tape, and not find it's way later onto your sensor.
Dust off the body of the camera and the back of the lens ( with cap still attached ) just before you change lenses. The best way I have found of doing this is with an acrylic 2" brush from an art shop. Blow some 'Kenair' through it to clean it & 'energise' it with static, then when you do your cleaning, the dust jumps onto it ( dust that might have got into the camera body heading for you-know-where) .
Just doing these 2 simple things changed the amount of times I needed to clean the sesnsor ( which you don't want to be doing too often ) massively.
...or you could just buy a 1DSMk3 with self-cleaning - I gather you can get one for £5k now!
EmmaP said:
My local Calumet have a sensor cleaning day in March so I'll be getting mine cleaned for the first time in four years £35+vat is a bargain when I think of the time I've wasted spotting dust over the years. My Giotto hurricane blower has been doing a good job.
snap. £35+vat is a bargain when I think of the time I've wasted spotting dust over the years. My Giotto hurricane blower has been doing a good job.i get mine cleaned every few months.
to minimise the amount of dust i've heard you should:
-allways turn the camera off when changing lenses to avoid atracting dust in the air to the charge it produces.
-hold the camera with the lens mount towards the floor to avoid crap dropping into he body.
I've aslo heard of people keeping their lenses inside baggies inside the kit bag...sounds like a right faff!
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