Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hi chaps

I'm on a shoot in Singa, my sensor fogged over with humidity and revealed dirt. Any tips on how to clean it on the fly? I got Tokyo in a few days so I would greatly appreciate any ideas.

;)

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hi Dave

Jody's issues are here. I would say you need the wipes plus the fluid if there is dirt there as well.

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/sony-nex...-cleaning.html

In Singapore there are many cam shops and they would stock the cleaners surely?

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

These are brilliant:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Solutions-Se...s=sensor+swabs

Unfortunately not cheap considering they are single use, but they do the job.

You'll need some sort of cleaning solution also:
Photographic Solutions Eclipse Lens and CCD Cleaning: Amazon.co.uk: Camera & Photo

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Jody I use the same - they are good - for some reason the sensor on the EA50 does attract dust - I have to clean it before each wedding (once a week at the moment)

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

I use the same swabs & fluid.

Peter, are you cleaning it routinely just for maintenance or checking it first? Once a week seems excessive to me? And I change lenses a lot. I know it is supposed to be safe but I still do it as little as possible. That means when I can see contamination by shooting the blue sky test etc.

Steve

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hi Steve

I was wondering if it would affect the sensor surface if one cleaned it weekly?? I have yet to clean either sensor with swabs and fluids ..I give the sensors a puff of air now and again and always point the body down when changing lenses and haven't spotted anything untoward yet and both cams have been running for 14 months now!

What I really want to know however is how on earth would you know if your sensor has "fogged over" ..Can that occur where it becomes sorta "cloudy" ... Dave said his was fogged over with humidity but is that visible even with a loupe? Maybe a clean now and again is worth doing??

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Thanks guys

Tellin ya, mine got a film of humidity over it in Singapore and it dried dirty. I've had no time at all to get to shops. The focus is really tough and it's lost done vibrancy. Peaking is inaccurate too. I'm in Tokyo now so if I see a shop I'll sign language some fluid! Thanks again.

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Thanks Dave

Maybe this is a time to give my sensors a clean? Funnily enough my A-Cam was struggling a bit with focus on Saturday and it was very wet and cold!! With a loupe and some light can you actually see if your sensor has fogged over and dried dirty?? I guess a monthly clean wouldn't hurt the sensor ?

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

I check it first Steve - Point up at the sky so it fills the frame and move it around a little - can always guarantee a spot or two after a wedding. I think maybe I'm cleaning the sensor when I should really be blowing the dust off instead!

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

I must admit I have yet to see any dots on a sky shot and that's after 14 months without a clean but always giving a puff with the rocket blower.

At my last wedding I suffered the same problems as Dave and only really thought about it when I read his post. It was a rainy, dull day but yes the footage is very lack lustre and I did notice that AF was struggling on CamA too (I shoot MF but let the camera find focus in auto then trim and lock it there) I was actually quite surprised when the display told me it had focussed at 50metres!!! I was probably 5 metres from the altar and 8 metres max from the front of the Church so something went wrong.

The camera still give a good image and sky shots don't show any dust particles BUT I still think the sensor has become clouded over from the wet weather or just time ...???

Anyway I ordered a cleaning kit from Visible Dust with the solution too so I'll try that out at the end of the week when it arrives.

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Chris,

I am with you. If I can't see it I don't touch it. Mine has only been swabbed once. I think some guys might be swabbing dust that can be blown off much easier.

Your lackluster image was much more likely to be the weather than a film on the sensor. Please let us know? I am only guessing.

But it sounds like Dave took a bad hit. It is amazing what CAN stay behind after evaporation of a fluid. Especially in Singapore.

Steve

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Thanks Steve

At LAST we have had a short period of blue sky this morning which didn't last very long but it did allow me to do a shot of the sky and voila I have nine black dots on the screen. The point here of course is that it probably would never be seen in video even with blue skies in the background. I have examined footage with blue sky and cannot see any defects in the sky at all yet the test does show I have dust so I will give it a wipe.

It's Dave's situation that concerns me more and that is simply how do you know if the sensor is fogged/smeared or such like ??? Dave only raised alarm bells in my head because my focus was playing stupid games showing wrong readings and my initial AF and focus peaking was not as perky as it usually is and that was inside the Church with reasonably good lighting. The overall image to me looked a bit lack lustre as well.

My cleaning kit will be here tomorrow so what I'll do is shoot a few minutes of similar footage before and after cleaning and compare them.

I still would like to know if there is any simple way you can look at the sensor and say "Yep, that looks pretty clean" I see you can get 7X loupes with LED lights built in from Visible Dust ....Using one of those does anyone know whether you can look at the magnified surface of the sensor and be able to tell if it has smudges/a dirty film or similar. It would be very reassuring to be able to give the sensor a quick look (like your lenses) and confirm that no problem exists.

Who here has actually looked at the sensor surface with a loupe????

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Chris, I took my EA50 into my local camera shop a couple of months ago and borrowed their sensor loupe. It had a very handy light on it which made it easy to see the sensor surface in great detail. I was able to spot several specs of dust that I couldn't see with my naked eye.
However I'm not sure that I would buy one. Pointing the camera at a white wall or a blue sky and closing down the aperture makes it easy to spot any dust.

It's becoming apparent that the EA50's sensor is prone to holding onto dust. I never had this issue with any of my Canon DSLRs that have the sensor cleaning feature. I wish Sony had thought to implement a similar cleaning system.

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Thanks Jody

I have a 3X Hoodman loupe but it has no built-in lights so you see nothing!! With the loupe can you also see smears and suchlike?? Yeah, I can get one for $149 but that's a lot of money to check your sensor surface. It is a shame that the Sony doesn't have an in-built cleaner like my Nikons also.

I always give the sensor a good few puffs before a wedding shoot but I'm not really worried about a few specks of dust as I have never seen anything on the footage. I just want to be able to check for stuff like what Dave encountered ...humidity and then gunk getting onto the sensor.

When you accidentally blew the French chalk out of your puffer onto the sensor could you see the stuff on there with the naked eye or did you have to do a sky test?? Before a wedding I normally just shoot a test clip of 6 seconds to make sure that everything is working but not really a sky test.

I guess the 9 dust specks over 14 months does indicate that one doesn't really need to clean every week but I cannot see any harm in doing a wet clean once a month and still giving the sensor a good puff of air before each shoot to dislodge any tiny specks?

BTW Jody ..what happened about the metabones adapter? did you get it working eventually???

Thanks for all the input!!

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Chris,

Everything is fine. You are not running around with a layer of gunk you were not aware of. This thread is going to spread hysteria faster than small pox and the price of Eclipse is going to triple by next week ;)

Steve

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hey Steve

As Asterix would say, the sky is not going to fall on our head.

Nope I have a dusty sensor but no-one knows except me as the footage doesn't show it up at all. I was just simply asking about Dave's situation as he was in Singapore in high humidity and when it dried off there was revealed dirt. On the move like that must be a little scary when you cannot clean it and it would be nice to be able to recognise that sort of situation. That's all.

I think they are pretty tough cookies anyway and doubt whether the thread is likely to cause hysteria (even concern) I'm sure Dave will give us some feedback once he returns on what happens and I do appreciate him pointing it out. It is a tad worrying when your once perfect AF decides to throw up bum figures on where it has locked onto and Dave's camera did that too. Exactly what was on the sensor face we can only surmise at this stage but once the stupid sun comes out here (if ever!) I'll do a sky shot on camera 1 and see what it looks like.

Bear in mind that I have never cleaned my sensors since new which is 14 months and the cameras go everywhere and have lens changes even in the trunk of my car.

Hmmm maybe we need little service reminder stickers on the cameras ... my car says "Next Oil Change 155,000" on the windshield so I remember when to toss out the filter and drain the sump.

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hi Guys

Ok, my sensors look clean now. Funnily the A-Cam which seldom has any lens changes gave me the most grief and I had to use two swabs to get rid of shifted gunk. The B-Cam which always has changes was clear with just a LtoR and RtoL wipe (using each side of the swab obviously.

I don't think one needs to clean every shoot like Pete does but I reckon a healthy puff of air beforehand wouldn't go amiss. Even with a fair volume of dust on the sensors I doubt whether it would show unless you are into landscapes. My B-Cam also showed up a little "worm" on the left hand top corner of gunk which cleared after one wipe.

I got the Visible Dust kit with 4 wipes and 1ml of fluid so I still have plenty of fluid so for the next clean all I need to buy is some wipes only. I ended up using 3 out of 4 as on the A-Camera I have to use two wipes since you cannot use them twice.

Focus peaking is now also fast and accurate!

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hey Chris,

I think you know me well enough to know I was just kidding around with you. I hope I did not offend. In reality I am curious to find out if your sensor IS dirty enough to throw off your AF? I have only swabbed mine once. Please do let us know.

This thread is actually going to change something for me. My Eclipse and swabs are getting moved from a maintenance cabinet to a gig bag I take with me. To try and help Dave out right after he made the first post I Goggled all kinds of field remedies for his situation. I did not find a single one I would be comfortable with.

So, what do you do, there you are changing lenses on location and bam, something nasty happens and you have crap on your sensor! My cleaning stuff is going on sets with me now. Thank you Dave!

And like his situation, I have never had time on a road gig to go running around to camera shops for a hard to find item.. A long time ago I called B&H once to resupply me with some stuff when I was on the road. They told me they would not ship ANYTHING to a hotel address.

Lesson to be learned here. Don't listen to my smart a** jokes about small pox.

Steve

Edit: This should be above your last one Chris. They hit at the same time.

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Hey Steve

I know that! Hence the quip about Asterix!!

I'm not sure about focus and peaking but it certainly was not normal and it was showing me that I was 50m away and I was only 5 metres!! I guess if the camera "sees" gunk it could quite easily throw out the focus. Some feedback from Dave after his trip could also confirm what his issues were.

I have dropped in the before and after sky shots. I don't know whether this bad gunk or normal gunk ..but that was the gunk on my A-Cam ...the one I seldom do lens changes on ... weird. Bear in mind this is after 14 months so a clean camera would not display as much!! Just one dusty day could easily do that too! The peaking works perfectly now so it's quite likely that gunk was affecting it.

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

I'm going to start using my blower more than cleaning after reading this thread - I think I became a little paranoid, as at weddings I always get lots of shots of the buildings used during the day and quite often this includes a lot of sky where any spot stands out a mile to me. If I noticed a spot or two I freaked and made sure it was spotless before every wedding but I'm guessing the B&G would not notice!

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Many years ago I used to toss the cameras in the car and the batteries and tapes (still wrapped) in a bag, before heading off until one day the bride was arriving, the 2nd cam was set up in the Church and the bag was in the car! That was blind panic!

After that episode I started doing "pre-flight" setups and tests and when my cameras are loaded in their trays in the boot, I can literally grab and shoot if I have to.

Now, as I tend to use the stock lens first, the cameras sit at home with batteries and cards out but the stock lens intact and they are simply set up, cleaned and tested prior to a wedding first thing in the morning. Because the lenses are already on, I haven't bothered to puff the sensors out because it just gets skipped! What I was thinking is after a wedding it might be good to add lens clean and pack away to my list so the stock lens/manual lens is removed, the sensor given a good puff of air and then the cameras sit in their space as bodies only like my still cameras??

This way, when it's time to set up for a shoot, you physically have to attach the lens and take the body cap off so this action should prompt my feeble brain to check and give the sensor a pre-shoot puff of air before the lens goes on.

I think this addition to my pre-flight set up routine might just entice me to keep the sensor as free as possible from dust. Al I have to remember is to take the air puffer with me OR buy a second one so I have one in my video room and one in my gear case.

Do you store your EA-50 with or without the lens?

Chris

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

I store it with the kit lens on Chris as that's how I use it first off on the wedding day (exteriors of church etc) i like to get up and running quickly. I also have my Samyang 14mm on my VG20 ready for slider shots - and my slider assembled on the car parcel shelf!

Pete

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

Once mine are in the car (I have custom aluminium/foam trays for the cameras) yes, they are ready to shoot in seconds.

I was actually talking about storing at home and the camera condition before set up ...I figured if I have to get off my butt and attach the lens prior to set up and test a few hours before I pack the car, I just MIGHT remember to give the sensor compartment a puff of air prior to putting on the lens!

I have taken over our third bedroom as a video room (apart from the home office) so everything is kept in there and that's also where I set up my cameras (still and video) prior to a shoot. The funny thing is that I keep my Nikons in an open case with all the lenses, flash units and bodies individual but the video cameras are sitting fully assembled but without cards or batteries

Re: Sensor cleaning urgent
 

HI Folks

sorry I went offline for a bit. I couldn't do anything about the sensor on the road so I waited until I got home and bought a throw-away swab kit. It worked a treat and things have eased up on the focusing front. I think humidity is bad for all sensors, the photographer had the same issue with his 5D. Solution in extreme conditions - if possible change lenses in an aircon room or don't change lenses. It's orrible when the condensation dries, but not fatal. I'd say to anyone - take a cleaning kit away with you! essential. No disaster though and all is okay now. Thanks for all the comments and suggestions