[pentaxbling]

lol why do you care so much? are you on a mission to convert everyone's sensor cleaning method to caned air? its a common known fact, or as you would say, belief, that its not smart to use caned air to clean your cameras sensor... i don't think your going to change anyone's mind here and i doubt anyone is dumb enough to risk there cameras sensor by shooting a burst of air from a can of compressed air into there camera for the hell of it lol...

[bdery]

Yup. A regurgitation of a few urban myths, and a couple of parables that are meaningless to the discussion, but no factual evidence supporting the argument against canned air.

You seem to be a nice fellow whose dearest wish is to avoid antagonzing anyone, but I'll have a second go at it, put differently.

I'm doing a PhD in optics, have been working in an optics lab for more than seven years, have collaborated with engineers, technicians, students with hundreds of years of experience betweeen them. I KNOW optics, coatings, mirrors, lenses, all that jazz. I have had CLASSES in optical care and cleaning. I work in an environment where the air is thousands of times cleaner than in any house. And I still clean optics often. Optics that cost more than your mortage.

That's the credentials, they seemed necessary.

The best way to get your behind kicked out of our lab is to use canned air to clean optics. Fair enough?

With the amount of evidence put forward in this thread, from multiple credible resources who are not on a mission to sell you anything, I believe you should accept that your cleaning method is not the best. That's not an insult to your intelligence, your competence, or anything. your way simply is not the best, it's not even the simplest nor the cheapest.

If you don't like that, or find yourself incapable of agreeing to that, I think this thread has no purpose at all. If you wanted advice, you got it, and then some.

I don't really care how you clean your stuff, really, I won't be using it. Me and others were trying to help, answering your question. I supposed that was what you wanted.

Good day to you. And no disrespect meant (as I'm sure you would say too...)

[Wheatfield]

lol why do you care so much? are you on a mission to convert everyone's sensor cleaning method to canned air? its a common known fact, or as you would say, belief, that its not smart to use caned air to clean your cameras sensor... i don't think your going to change anyone's mind here and i doubt anyone is dumb enough to risk there cameras sensor by shooting a burst of air from a can of compressed air into there camera for the hell of it lol...

Personally, I don't give a damn, I was just wondering if anyone had any evidence to support the urban myth that an aerosol product designed specifically to blow dust off of delicate equipment would do harm to said equipment.
So far, no one has come up with anything to support the myth, other than an anecdote about one person who apparently had all the finesse of a marine using a machine gun for crowd control in Baghdad, and one person who quoted a liability disclaimer designed to prevent themselves from being sued by the aforementioned marine when he shoots off into his camera the same way he uses his machine gun..
Even Mr. PhD boy didn't come up with any factual evidence.
And no, I'm not trying to sell anyone anything either, I was just looking for evidence to support what is more and more looking like a story designed to scare hapless children into going to bed when they are told to.

[emalvick]

Personally, I don't give a damn, I was just wondering if anyone had any evidence to support the urban myth that an aerosol product designed specifically to blow dust off of delicate equipment would do harm to said equipment.
So far, no one has come up with anything to support the myth, other than an anecdote about one person who apparently had all the finesse of a marine using a machine gun for crowd control in Baghdad, and one person who quoted a liability disclaimer designed to prevent themselves from being sued by the aforementioned marine when he shoots off into his camera the same way he uses his machine gun..
Even Mr. PhD boy didn't come up with any factual evidence.
And no, I'm not trying to sell anyone anything either, I was just looking for evidence to support what is more and more looking like a story designed to scare hapless children into going to bed when they are told to.

Here's a thought.... Why don't you submit your "myth" to Mythbusters? (I'm serious here).

The rest of us here, myth or not, aren't going to test it ourselves. As mentioned earlier in the thread, you are the test pilot. It is working for you, which is fine, but right now you are only one person... Me, I am one of those that would rather be safe than sorry. I don't want to be that person who finds out that the myth is in fact true.

[Tom S.]

OK, here's some real posts from other sites:

-- Ramin

It's never a good idea to use canned air to clean CCDs. The canned air contains a propellant that sometimes comes out in the stream (sort of a chalky, icy substance). Also, Tony is correct - putting the shutter on Bulb charges the CCD and electrostatically attracts dust to the sensor (like hair to a balloon).

The best way to have your CCD cleaned is to take it to a technician. The second best way is to plug in the camera, put it into cleaning mode, and use a blower so that nothing actually touches the CCD. Check out the "rocket blower" - it looks like some sort of kinky sex toy, but it works well for cleaning lenses and CCDs. I like to clean my cameras upside down (held over my head so that the lens mount faces the ground) so that any dust coming out is likely to fall away from the camera.

Canned air is a bad idea though. I once cleaned the mirror of one of my film cameras with canned air, and was left with a nice splatter pattern that stayed there until a Canon tech could clean it the right way. I'd hate to see that happen to a CCD!

--Dan

MY little contribution for what it's worth. I used to have the Nikon D1X and have switched to Canon and now shoot with a 1DS. Although I haven't used the 1DS for as long as the Nikon, it certainly doesn't seem to collect as much dust however, it still collects enough to be annoying (in fact right now I have a lump the size of Alaska sitting on the Sensor).

By the way, I was one of those idiots who managed to get propellant from a can of air onto his CCD in the Nikon D1X. An expensive mistake and not one you make twice!

[iamweasel]

Personally, I don't give a damn, I was just wondering if anyone had any evidence to support the urban myth that an aerosol product designed specifically to blow dust off of delicate equipment would do harm to said equipment.
So far, no one has come up with anything to support the myth,

Send me your DSLR camera I will be very happy to spray it for you and send you the results.

[Jodokast96]

It seems pretty apparent that no reason, story, or explanation will convince him that it might not be a good idea. If you tell of an instance that isn't your own, it's just an urban legend and probably isn't a true story. If you give one where it was you, well your just an idiot for screwing it up and that could never happen to him. And who really cares if it's been shown in an optics lab to not be an effective way of cleaning? What do they know?

[janosh]

Oh yes, and f*ck you too.

Now we have arrived at the core issue.

[bdery]

It seems pretty apparent that no reason, story, or explanation will convince him that it might not be a good idea. If you tell of an instance that isn't your own, it's just an urban legend and probably isn't a true story. If you give one where it was you, well your just an idiot for screwing it up and that could never happen to him. And who really cares if it's been shown in an optics lab to not be an effective way of cleaning? What do they know?

My thoughts exactly. There is no one as blind s the one who will not see.

I'm out of here.

[sewebster]

It seems to me, that the two potential "problems" with using canned air are:

1. Getting propellant on the sensor.
2. Having the stream of gas be to strong that it physically damages something.

Most places that tell you not to use the can quote reason 1, with some also adding reason 2.

You can probably decide for yourself whether or not you are worried about these. It seems that you've used the canned air a lot, so you should know how much the propellant comes out. If you're happy with taking the chance, then thats fine.

Problem 2 might be harder to figure out, but you can likely mitigate that by keeping the can further from the sensor, as the stream with dissipate with distance.

I don't think there is any magic bullet answer, and there should be no voodoo to worry about, you just need to decide for yourself whether you think there is a problem.

Personally I'd say that the risk of mechanical damage is likely quite low, especially if you aren't really getting in close, and that the propellant could likely be cleaned off using wet methods if necessary. However, I don't think I'll used canned air myself. Alternative methods seem fine for me, but maybe the can will seem easier in a few years when my camera is older and I am less protective. It also matters how "important" your camera is to you. Let's not get too overprotective here, I mean, no-one has their life on the line, it isn't a $500000 house we are talking about, but clearly a $1000 camera is quite pricy for some people (me included) so there is a worry of damage.

[pentaxbling]

Here's a thought.... Why don't you submit your "myth" to Mythbusters? (I'm serious here).

The rest of us here, myth or not, aren't going to test it ourselves. As mentioned earlier in the thread, you are the test pilot. It is working for you, which is fine, but right now you are only one person... Me, I am one of those that would rather be safe than sorry. I don't want to be that person who finds out that the myth is in fact true.

Brilliant! I may submit it myself!!!! (I doubt he will)

[Wheatfield]

Now we have arrived at the core issue.

That being that after 50 years on this planet, 35 of which I have been a working photographer, I don't take well to being called names by people who haven't earned my respect to the point that I think they have license to insult me.

OTOH, we did manage to come up with a couple of real incidents, so there is likely some truth to the myth (for lack of a better term), though in these instances there could be made an argument that the product was misused.
What I was hoping to avoid (and didn't) was a broken record regurgitation of all the potential disasters that could befall a person using canned air on a sensor.
So it goes.

One could just as easily say that because there is potential for being killed in a car accident, we should all ride bikes, except for the possibility of having a heart attack from the exercise, so we should just sit in our easy chairs watching Seinfeld reruns.

Anyway, this thread is probably best closed. After 3 1/2 decades of using Dust-off to clean everything from negatives to large format lenses worth thousands of dollars without damaging anything, I will probably just carry on, though i might check out one of these Rocket blowers to see if I think that it might be more effective as a dust blower.
And thank you Sewebster for coming up with the only reasoned response in the thread.
I always do a couple of test blows before cleaning the sensor to make sure that any propellant is cleaned out of the stream, and I NEVER use a brand new can for sensor cleaning. What I like about canned air is, as you mentioned, I am not sticking anything into the mirror box, the tip of the tube stays outside the camera.
I am more afraid of damaging something by physically touching the innards of the camera than I am by puffing a bit of dry gas at the sensor from a few inches away, which is why I don't use wet cleaners.
Thankfully, I've never had a lump of anything stuck to a sensor that couldn't be blown off.

[Jewelltrail]

Has anyone actually got certifiable evidence that careful use of an aerosol duster has ever harmed a DSLR sensor?

Wheatfield

I want actual citations of cameras that have been destroyed by gentle and careful use of an aerosol cleaner. Wheatfield

I thought the intentions of your thread were clear, and summed up in the above two sentences. I am not sure why so many posts missed what you were clearly asking for, but they did. The digressions of many of the posts reacting to this thread are a great example of what can be wrong in forums.

You simply asked for firsthand evidence of "gentle and careful use" causing damage to a DSLR sensor. You did not ask for the following:

1) the best way to clean a DSLR sensor
2) the easiest way to clean a DSLR sensor
3) the safest way to clean a DSLR sensor
4) the most popular way to clean a DSLR sensor
5) a person listing their credentials for answering the post on cleaning DSLR sensors
6) a metaphoric story comparing cleaning a sensor to risking one's life
7) quotations from photography magazines & sites explaining how not to clean a sensor

You asked for something new--actual firsthand evidence. I could go on, but what is the point of doing so when it is clear that few people actually read the thread & addressed its objective. Instead, many took this as an opportunity to post their own personal beliefs (supported or not) surrounding the use of compressed air in cleaning DSLR sensors.

And still worse, some took it as an opportunity to provoke, instigate and goad--Why?

When someone starts a post with a clear objective, this should not happen--but it does, all over this and other forums.

Okay, let me answer your question. No, I have no evidence that using compressed air can damage a DSLR sensor. And finally, kudos to barondla for responding accurately to the thread's objective.


Regards,

Ernest

[Wheatfield]

And finally, kudos to barondla for responding accurately to the thread's objective.


Regards,

Ernest

Yes, of course. Thank you for reminding me. He was back on page one of what should have been about a four reply thread.
And thank you, Jeweltrail for your reasoned response as well.

[pentkon52]

Well said Jewelltrail.

I think in most instances, people only read the last or second last postings in most threads and go for it.

Wheatfield asked for specific instances, and only one i beleive had one, the rest of the postings were of the i heard, i think i saw once, found this one the net, so its true,etc etc.

He asked a simple question and was chastised in so doing ,and responded in kind,.



Dave