How to Keep Your Camera and Lens Clean?
Have you ever wondered what causes those mysterious spots that appear in your photos? For photographers, particularly those who use interchangeable lens cameras, this is a common problem. But there’s a way to solve it.
These mysterious spots are caused by dust or dirt on your sensor, which is completely normal and virtually unavoidable. To combat this problem, most camera makers have included a sensor cleaning function in newer camera models. However, sometimes this handy little feature just isn’t enough, which is why cleaning the camera sensor is a chore that every photographer has to deal with every so often.
What is Sensor Dust?
The term “sensor dust” is used to describe the particles or elements that enter a camera and stick to its sensor. This usually happens when the camera user exposes the sensor by removing the body cap or switching lenses. Camera sensors are dust magnets, prone to dust. If you’re not careful enough, you’ll inevitably have to clean your camera’s sensor quite often.
How Does Dust Get into Camera Sensor in Mirrorless and DSLR cameras?
It’s rather easy to sustain sensor dust on a mirrorless camera, such as Sony Alpha A7 III, Nikon Z7, or Canon EOS R as the sensor becomes exposed during any lens changes. With regular DSLR cameras, the mirror provides some form of protection, though you can still end up getting dust on the sensor. However, one of the main causes of dust is actually the camera itself, which explains why photographers who rarely change their lenses still struggle with dust getting on the sensor.
Apart from getting dust and other dirt from the surrounding environment blown onto your sensor during lens changes, there are two other significant ways that dust may be generated:
- Every time that you take a photo, the shutter fires. When it does, the friction between the components of the shutter can create dust.
- The other way that dust is generated is during the moments that you attach or remove the plastic body cap. When you do so, friction between the metal mounts and the plastic cap may generate dust. This is also true for when you change your lens.
Let’s summarise some facts:
- Dirty optics and dirty sensors can and will affect your image quality.
- There are correct methods and tools to clean lens and filter optics.
- There are incorrect methods and tools to clean lens and filter optics.
- There’s a great deal of information available on the topic of lens cleaning—some of it conflicting.
So, let’s try to keep things simple, and find the best and safest way to get your lenses and sensors clean so that you can spend more time making photographs, and less time on cleaning.
So what will you learn while watching our lesson?
- What equipment should you use to clean your camera and lens successfully?
- A blower and a loupe are necessary?
- Cleaning by yourself or leaving it to professionals?
- Cleaning your flash and lens: steps
- How to use a liquid and a cloth while cleaning the surface of your lens?
- Cleaning your camera: steps
- Cleaning your sensor: how to take care of this fragile part?