DSLR dust cleaning technique

Our techniques for minimising and eliminating dust essentially follows the manufacturer's own advice. Clearly the most vulnerable time is when the lens is removed from the body, so beyond being careful about the environment in which you change lenses, try and also apply the following.

First switch the camera off to reduce the static charge on the sensor which could attract particles.

Secondly, hold the camera facing down to minimise particles in the air from entering - see photo right.

Third, use a body cap to prevent any dust from entering the camera, although ensure it's clean and dust-free first.

And fourth, before you attach the new lens, ensure its rear surface is also free from dust.

While the techniques above will minimise the amount of dust entering the camera body, you'll still almost certainly suffer from it at some point. The most effective technique we've found for removing dust is simply blowing a few gushes of air into the body using a blower brush, with the brush itself removed - see left.

Once again hold the camera body facing down and remove the lens. Then select the option in your camera menu to clean the sensor. This simply flips open the mirror and opens the shutter, revealing the sensor filter's surface; most cameras demand you do this with a fully-charged battery or even a mains adapter to prevent the mirror from flipping down unexpectedly.

Now use the blower portion of a blower brush to blow a few gushes of air into the body. It's advisable to position the blower just outside the camera body, again in case the mirror were to flip shut unexpectedly - see photo right. We've found three or four bursts of air are normally sufficient before switching the camera off again to close the shutter and flip the mirror down.

If you already have dust on an image, the consolation is it is at least reasonably easy to remove using standard cloning tools. The dust patches are most visible on areas of blue sky or skin, which are generally easy to retouch. We'll have a video demonstrating this entire cleaning process soon.

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