So I cleaned my sensor. That’s right, I cleaned my digital camera sensor. Reluctantly, I popped the lens off, opened the shutter, and wiped the $600+ sensor clean.
I take very good care of my camera. To some people, $1,000 is just another business expense, but it’s quite a bit of money to me. So I do what I can to make sure that that $1,000 is going to last me as long as possible. I would say my parents use their camera “normally”, while I use mine “cautiously”. The difference in the amount of dirt in the chamber between our two camera was incredible: mine was much cleaner. Yet still, somehow, a tiny hair, or the smallest piece of dust found its way into the chamber, behind the mirror, in back of the shutter, and on to the sensor.
“Competitive Camera”:http://www.competitivecamera.com/ was the only place in town that sold the materials I needed for this operation. If you’re in the DFW area, and you need camera equipment or supplies, once again, I highly recommend these guys.
I had to clean mine twice to get all the dirt off. And it looks as good as new know. My dad’s was really dirty. Yet, after only about 5 attempts (and, we did his first, so, maybe we didn’t do the first 3 or 4 “right”), his also came out very clean with no nasties in the images.
If you want to see just how bad yours is, my dad and I worked out a test that seems to show the most dirt. Put your camera in aperature priority mode. Set your aperture to f/11 or f/16. Direct your camera to overexpose by 2 stops. Set your focus mode to manual. Focus at close to the camera (furthest from infinity) as your lens will allow. Point the camera so that a white piece of paper completely fills the frame. Press the shutter release. Now, examine the image on a pixel to pixel (100% zoom) level and look for dust and hair. That’s it.
If you do find dust or hair and decide that you, too, want to clean your sensor, I followed, roughly, Nicolas R’s “CCD/CMOS Cleaning Instructions”:http://www.pbase.com/copperhill/ccd_cleaning.
Good luck, and happy cleaning.