Teach me how to clean my sensor!

Wail

Wail

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I’ve never had any issues with my sensors getting dirty, in over 4 years with dSLRs, and today I seem to have gotten myself a whole army of them attacking!

I’ve tried to find them, dust them off with a blower but they seem the stubborn types .. they don’t show up in my pictures unless I am using f9 or above, and only on very bright objects (e.g. sky, white / grey walls etc.). Still, I don’t want them there.

Would someone please tell me where on God’s Earth is my sensor (please don’t laugh; I know it’s under the mirror, but when I move the mirror up I don’t see the sensor .. there is a rectangular “pit” with a “grid” on it, but I just don’t see a sensor) and how do I clean these stubborn particles.

It’s my D200 that I am struggling with. Do Jessops stock a good cleaning kit (swabs and liquid)?

Thanks for any help.
 
There is a good guide here:

http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=9766

If you lock up your mirror and look down you will be looking at your sensor. They have a piece of glass (i guess it's glass) over the actual sensor; so when you clean your sensor you are actually cleaning the glass covering it.

I generally find locking the mirror up and using a good quality air blower (not canned gas or one of those cheap blowers with a brush on) such as:

http://www.warehouseexpress.com/product/default.aspx?sku=1013222

will get rid of most things. I also have an Arctic Butterfly which works well.

Mike
 
Thank you for the quick reply.

I did a search and a lot of threads came up. I have done a lot of reading on this subject ever since my first D70 (back in 2004). The thing is, I don't know if that's the sensor I am looking at or not, when the mirror is up, as it doesn't look like a sensor (or a glass for that matter). Also, it is very very very hard to see the whole of it ... that's why I am asking specifically about the D200!

Again, thank you so much for the reply and pointing me to this tutorial thread which seems to cover most of what I need to know, with the exception of telling me my concern on the sensor / screen on the D200.
 
Can't help you with the D200 sorry, I have the 400D. I just use the manual sensor cleaning mode to lock the mirror up.
 
It's ok, you've been most helpful with the links you've provided :)

It's for this reason, mainly, that I wish I would upgrade to the D300!

Can someone please help me with the D200 issue :shrug:
 
Well, with the help on the other question I've posted (Mirror Lock Up), I've managed to see the sensor. Putting my mirror lock-up while in Manual mode on Bulb means I have to keep pressing the shutter release to ensure that both the mirror and shutter are out of the way for me to see the sensor. Once that was done, I was better able to blow out the dust particles.

The sad part is that there are still a few particles on the sensor which needs to be removed. I figure these are the very very stubborn ones. I will give my local camera store a visit to see what swabs they have so that I can give my sensor a propper clean.

Again, thank you for the replies here. This has been very helpful :)

Tomorrow is going to be a very busy day for me :)
 
I use a rocket blower and an Arctic Butterfly to get the worst of the crud off. If I get any dust bunnies that show up below f16 I'm gonna take the camera to Lehmanns in Stoke and let them wet clean it . . . . They were the guys who replaced the sensor on my 5D after I wrecked it by wet cleaning it . . . :'(
 
I've managed to get most of the dirt off, thanks to all the help here. There are a very few that remain which aren't visible under f16 so I am not too concerned. Still, I am planning to drop by Jessops tomorrow to get myself a cleaning kit to keep handy.

Funny as it may seem, but I've managed to get by for 4 years on dSLRs without needed to once clean a sensor, and yesterday I get bombarded by 10s of these things at the same time. I guess my luck had just runout :shrug:
 
It's advised not to use cotton buds, but I found that if you get yourself some baby cotton buds (they're a lot smaller than normal ones) and LIGHTLY just touch the spots of dirt on the sensor, when I say touch I mean just beyond hovering above the sensor, it pulled all the dirt of the sensor of my 400D.

Hope this helps :thumbs:
 
Thanks Little Man, but I am sure that I'm not brave enough to try the baby cotton buds just yet.
 
There is a video from Nikon in Japan showing how to do this if you google it (I could probably send you the files if you need but they are big)

Its in Japanese and is an official Nikon training video for service centres, and shows you how they make swabs and how to clean the sensor.
 
Andy,

Thanks for the heads-up on this; I will surely google this as I need to aoid messing up my sensor, the more I learn the better.
 
Go HERE

Once purchased follow instructions and swipe swab across sensor, turn over then back across...DONE

2 minutes of a job
 
Anorakus said:
Going by the number of threads on sensor cleaning, self-cleaning sensors wouldn't appear to work very well :thinking:

A.
Click to expand...

They don't - its just a marketing thing... keeping up with the Joneses (actually Olympus)
 
Giottos Rocket blowers are great for blowing the sensor. Jessops sell them for £8 and they are currently doing 10% off! Bargain!!
 
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