More about cleaning sensors and Canon Canada (long)

Hi everyone!

As you know, cleaning sensors has been a hot topic in this NG.
I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's Rebel XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.
Below, starting from my initial e-mail is the correspondence we exchanged.
Although I have changed the order for clarity, I haven't altered anything (I
still have the "originals").
Perhaps if many of us were to write to Canon to express their concern, Canon
might consider something.
In the meantime, as stated, I have a lot of addresses for products, but I
wish I knew WHAT CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.
Best regards to all!

Marcel

----------------------------------------------------
*Initial querry*

Hi! I bought my Rebel XT with a 17-85mm lens as well as a 70-300 mm Is
USM recently. This cost me a lot of money. I find I have dust that I
can't get rid of on my sensor. Canon only supports the fact that I
should use a blower. I did. However, the dust won't go away. I cant
afford to send the camera out to you every time this happens. It would
cost me an arm and a leg since it seems I would have to do it often I
would also be without my camera for long periods of time. Since these
cameras are made to change lenses, surely there must be a safe way for
me to clean the sensors. Please advise and please do NOT tell me to
use a blower. It doesn't work! Thanks for any help you can give me. I
was thrilled to have such a camera, but now, with such poor results,
with big blobs on my photos, I'm less than ecstatic, believe me.
Please advise. Marcel.
_______________________________________________

*Initial answer*

----- Original Message -----
From: "Customer Support"
To:
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2005 12:01 PM
Subject: Digital Camera / Digital Rebel XT - General Questions


Dear Mr. Marcel Cossais

Thank you for your allowing us to address your concerns regarding your
Digital Rebel XT.

Unfortunately, dust particles attracting to the surface of the imaging
sensor is unique to all digital SLR cameras. Inevitably, dust will
settle
on the CMOS sensor and cleaning will be necessary. Such dust particles
are
usually only noticeably when shooting at small apertures i.e f/16,
f/20,
f/22, f/28, f/32. The amount of dust attracted to the sensor for the
most
part depends on the environment in which the camera is utilized and when
lenses are interchanged. Most dust particles can be removed by using a
blower brush following the instructions as provided in the instruction
manual on a regular basis. However, more stubborn dust particles
require
professional cleaning at one our factory offices.

For liability reasons, Canon does not recommend nor endorse any
third-party
cleaning accessories or procedures be used to clean the CMOS sensor, as
this may lead to damages, rendering your camera unusable. It is
recommended your Canon EOS camera be forwarded directly to our Factory
Service facility to have the CMOS sensor professionally cleaned.
Standard
sensor cleaning is provided as a courtesy to customers and no charge
applies for the cleaning of the imaging sensor.

At your earliest convenience, you may forward your EOS camera to the
nearest Factory location listed below. As you are not required to send
any
accessories; when forwarding your camera body, please be sure to remove
the
memory card, batteries and any other items from the camera. Be sure to
include your name, street address (no P.O. boxes, please), daytime
telephone number, copy of your bill of sale and a note requesting sensor
cleaning be performed.

As we do not provide RMA numbers, we suggest using a trackable and
insurable service (i.e. UPS, Purolator, Priority Mail) to ship your
equipment. Please package the camera very securely in a sturdy shipping
box
to prevent damage during shipment.

CANON CANADA INC.
1400 Courtneypark Dr E
Mississauga, ON, L5T1H1
Tel.: 905/795-2005
Fax: 905-795-2079

CANON CANADA INC.
2828 16 ST NE
CALGARY, AB, T2E7K7
Tel.: 403/219-5900
Fax: 403/291-3586

Sincerely,

Kirk M.
Technical Support Representative
Customer Information Centre
Canon Canada Inc.
http://www.canon.ca/digitalphotography


__________________________________________

*my second e-mail to Canon's answer*

Thank you for answering promptly, Kirk.

I know about dust particles, etc. and I was aware that this might
happen.
However, the fact that "dust particles are usually only noticeably when
shooting at small apertures i.e f/16, f/20, f/22, f/28, f/32" doesn't
hold
water. If you go to:
http://celestart.com/images/publiques/spots-cloudy.jpg and
http://celestart.com/images/publiques/spots-wall.jpg
Look on the left on each photo, you will find that these spots are very
noticeable at wide apertures. Check their exif's. These were taken on Av
at
f/5.0, 1/500 sec. The first one shows the spots even though it's very
cloudy. The second is a wall at home and incandescent lighting.

I have read the book as well as Canon's advice on the web and it simply
doesn't do the trick. Those spots are staying where they are and won't
go
away. I'm not a newbie and I've had Canon lenses and cameras for a long
time. I also do not reside in a dump full of dust. Finally, I'm very
careful
about my equipment. Yet, look at the sensor!

I know Canon doesn't endorse cleaning the sensor for liability reasons.
However, you must recognise that sensors will get dirty and blowers not
be
sufficient. No one can afford to send his/her camera to Canon every time
the
sensore resist cleaning, even though it's free. You have to pay for
sending
and getting back the camera along with insurance and be without the
camera
for a while. The "while" can be a few weeks. We do not all live in
Toronto
or Calgary.

Please ask your bosses or Canon authorities to consider training people
in
various stores (such as Henry's where I bought many of my cameras) to
clean
sensors. We buy these cameras in order to change lenses. If every time
we
change a lens, dust gets onto the sensors (and believe me it will),
we're
not out of the woods. I believe other manufacturers give their customers
a
way do do so. It seems you're the only company to refuse helping out.
You
could at least indicate what you're using to clean sensors even though
you
may refuse to take liability for it. As it is, I have lots of leads, yet
I'm
not sure what I can use most safely. Recently, I talked with a
photographer-journalist who's using 3 EOS of various models with L
lenses.
I
asked him what he did. He answered he didn't know because his son was
doing
it for him on a regular basis.

Finally, if your people can do it, we can learn Please, why don't you
think
about it? Perhaps you could run classes at different times in big stores
which sell your products. I would gladly pay some money to learn. Think
about it. Share this idea. You might even get noticed at Canon for
introducing novel ideas.

Regards,

Marcel

__________________________________________________ ______

*Canon's answer to my second e-mail*

----- Original Message -----
From: "Customer Support"
To:
Sent: Wednesday, November 30, 2005 5:37 PM
Subject: Digital Camera / Digital Rebel XT -


Dear Mr. Marcel Cossais

Thank you for your additonal feedback on this issue.

We have forwarded your concerns with respect to the cleaning of the CMOS
sensor to the appropriate for their review.

Your feedback and concerns on this issue are duely noted.

Sincerely,

Kirk M.
Technical Support Representative
Customer Information Centre
Canon Canada Inc.


________________________________________________

*My parting words*

----- Original Message -----
From: "Marcel"
To: "Customer Support"
Sent: Thursday, December 01, 2005 7:12 AM
Subject: Digital Camera / Digital Rebel XT -


Dear Mr. Kirk:
Thank you for everything.
I only hope I didn't get the proverbial "we'll call you..."
If you follow the threads on cleaning the sensors in "rec.photo.digital",
you will see that this is everyone's concern and Canon isn't winning great
respect on that matter. Doing something would give you extra leverage on
publicity: "Canon now makes it easier to get you sensor cleaned" or
something like this. I'll bet you would sell even more DSLR's
Best regards,
Marcel
PS This doesn't take care of my problems. We could say, as we used to with
Allstate: "You're in good hands with Canon" ;-(

_________________________________

Marcel writes ...

I have a lot of addresses for products, but I wish I knew WHAT
CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.

Whatever they are using it's not all that great and you can quickly
learn how to do a better job yourself ... my wife just sent in a 1 D
Mark II for some repair work (Irvine facility) and they also said they
"cleaned the sensor" on the return form but the sensor has five small
dust specs on it. I can do better than that with a brush for dry loose
particles or Pec Pads with Eclipse for anything. It's not feasible to
send in the camera for this so my advice is to just learn how to do it
yourself. First time or two you're pretty nervous but after a while it
becomes routine.

Bill

On 12/1/05 6:31 AM, in article , "Celcius"
wrote:

Hi everyone!

As you know, cleaning sensors has been a hot topic in this NG.
I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's Rebel XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.
Below, starting from my initial e-mail is the correspondence we exchanged.
Although I have changed the order for clarity, I haven't altered anything (I
still have the "originals").
Perhaps if many of us were to write to Canon to express their concern, Canon
might consider something.
In the meantime, as stated, I have a lot of addresses for products, but I
wish I knew WHAT CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.
Best regards to all!

Marcel
Snip

Glad to see you are pursuing this; maybe if more of us did this we would get
some better answers from the manufacturers. Let us know if you ever do get
a satisfactory response.
Related to this issue, this place -
http://www.cleaningdigitalcameras.com/
- claims to know what the manufacturers repair sites actually do.
Excerpting some of their write-up, this is what they say:

€ Canon - Blower and a Kimwipe, held by tweezers. They do not like to
use fluid but when necessary they use either 90% isopropyl alcohol or a
50/50 mixture of isopropyl alcohol and Windex.
€ Fuji - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
€ Kodak - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
€ Leica - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
€ Nikon - A commercial grade lens tissue wrapped around a chopstick
style piece of wood with medical grade methanol. Several forums have posts
where readers have been to Nikon Service outside the USA and reported seeing
the technicians using SensorsSwabs and Eclipse.
€ Olympus - A Kimwipe held by tweezers and Olympus Proprietary
Solution (dries quickly without streaks and is bio-degradeable).
€ Pentax - A special lint free cloth (provided from Japan) folded
into a small square and held with a pair of tweezers as a swab moistened
with a freon derivative.
€ Sigma - Uses a special vacuum cleaner that was provided by Japan.

Chuck

"C Wright" wrote in message
. ..
On 12/1/05 6:31 AM, in article ,
"Celcius"
wrote:

Hi everyone!

As you know, cleaning sensors has been a hot topic in this NG.
I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's Rebel
XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.
Below, starting from my initial e-mail is the correspondence we
exchanged.
Although I have changed the order for clarity, I haven't altered
anything (I
still have the "originals").
Perhaps if many of us were to write to Canon to express their concern,
Canon
might consider something.
In the meantime, as stated, I have a lot of addresses for products, but
I
wish I knew WHAT CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.
Best regards to all!

Marcel
Snip

Glad to see you are pursuing this; maybe if more of us did this we would
get
some better answers from the manufacturers. Let us know if you ever do
get
a satisfactory response.
Related to this issue, this place -
http://www.cleaningdigitalcameras.com/
- claims to know what the manufacturers repair sites actually do.
Excerpting some of their write-up, this is what they say:

? Canon - Blower and a Kimwipe, held by tweezers. They do not like
to
use fluid but when necessary they use either 90% isopropyl alcohol or a
50/50 mixture of isopropyl alcohol and Windex.
? Fuji - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Kodak - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Leica - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Nikon - A commercial grade lens tissue wrapped around a chopstick
style piece of wood with medical grade methanol. Several forums have posts
where readers have been to Nikon Service outside the USA and reported
seeing
the technicians using SensorsSwabs and Eclipse.
? Olympus - A Kimwipe held by tweezers and Olympus Proprietary
Solution (dries quickly without streaks and is bio-degradeable).
? Pentax - A special lint free cloth (provided from Japan) folded
into a small square and held with a pair of tweezers as a swab moistened
with a freon derivative.
? Sigma - Uses a special vacuum cleaner that was provided by Japan.

Chuck

Thanks Chuck!
I've made a copy of this.
I'll try indeed to pursue this thing. Next step is to write to Canon USA
Cheers,
Marcel

"Bill Hilton" wrote in message
ups.com...
Marcel writes ...

I have a lot of addresses for products, but I wish I knew WHAT
CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.

Whatever they are using it's not all that great and you can quickly
learn how to do a better job yourself ... my wife just sent in a 1 D
Mark II for some repair work (Irvine facility) and they also said they
"cleaned the sensor" on the return form but the sensor has five small
dust specs on it. I can do better than that with a brush for dry loose
particles or Pec Pads with Eclipse for anything. It's not feasible to
send in the camera for this so my advice is to just learn how to do it
yourself. First time or two you're pretty nervous but after a while it
becomes routine.

Bill


Bill,
Thank you for the encouragement.
If I only knew how it's made and what pressure it can take...
There those swabs that seem to be about the width of the sensor and you
swipe once...
Ideally, there should be pre-wet swabs that come in a cellophane. You would
open it, use the swab and throw it away.
The problem with just the blower is that apparently the sensor when "on"
either is charged electrostatically (?) or is heated up. This seems to
"seal" the dust in.
Regards,
Marcel

"Celcius" wrote in message
...

"C Wright" wrote in message
. ..
On 12/1/05 6:31 AM, in article ,
"Celcius"
wrote:

Hi everyone!

As you know, cleaning sensors has been a hot topic in this NG.
I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's
Rebel
XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.
Below, starting from my initial e-mail is the correspondence we
exchanged.
Although I have changed the order for clarity, I haven't altered
anything (I
still have the "originals").
Perhaps if many of us were to write to Canon to express their concern,
Canon
might consider something.
In the meantime, as stated, I have a lot of addresses for products,
but
I
wish I knew WHAT CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.
Best regards to all!

Marcel
Snip

Glad to see you are pursuing this; maybe if more of us did this we would
get
some better answers from the manufacturers. Let us know if you ever do
get
a satisfactory response.
Related to this issue, this place -
http://www.cleaningdigitalcameras.com/
- claims to know what the manufacturers repair sites actually do.
Excerpting some of their write-up, this is what they say:

? Canon - Blower and a Kimwipe, held by tweezers. They do not
like
to
use fluid but when necessary they use either 90% isopropyl alcohol or a
50/50 mixture of isopropyl alcohol and Windex.
? Fuji - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Kodak - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Leica - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Nikon - A commercial grade lens tissue wrapped around a
chopstick
style piece of wood with medical grade methanol. Several forums have
posts
where readers have been to Nikon Service outside the USA and reported
seeing
the technicians using SensorsSwabs and Eclipse.
? Olympus - A Kimwipe held by tweezers and Olympus Proprietary
Solution (dries quickly without streaks and is bio-degradeable).
? Pentax - A special lint free cloth (provided from Japan) folded
into a small square and held with a pair of tweezers as a swab moistened
with a freon derivative.
? Sigma - Uses a special vacuum cleaner that was provided by
Japan.

Chuck

Thanks Chuck!
I've made a copy of this.
I'll try indeed to pursue this thing. Next step is to write to Canon USA
Cheers,
Marcel



This is also a very informative site:
http://www.pbase.com/copperhill/image/15473243

Chris

"c" wrote in message
...

"Celcius" wrote in message
...

"C Wright" wrote in message
. ..
On 12/1/05 6:31 AM, in article ,
"Celcius"
wrote:

Hi everyone!

As you know, cleaning sensors has been a hot topic in this NG.
I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's
Rebel
XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.
Below, starting from my initial e-mail is the correspondence we
exchanged.
Although I have changed the order for clarity, I haven't altered
anything (I
still have the "originals").
Perhaps if many of us were to write to Canon to express their
concern,
Canon
might consider something.
In the meantime, as stated, I have a lot of addresses for products,
but
I
wish I knew WHAT CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.
Best regards to all!

Marcel
Snip

Glad to see you are pursuing this; maybe if more of us did this we
would
get
some better answers from the manufacturers. Let us know if you ever
do
get
a satisfactory response.
Related to this issue, this place -
http://www.cleaningdigitalcameras.com/
- claims to know what the manufacturers repair sites actually do.
Excerpting some of their write-up, this is what they say:

? Canon - Blower and a Kimwipe, held by tweezers. They do not
like
to
use fluid but when necessary they use either 90% isopropyl alcohol or
a
50/50 mixture of isopropyl alcohol and Windex.
? Fuji - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Kodak - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Leica - Photographic Solutions SensorSwabs and Eclipse
? Nikon - A commercial grade lens tissue wrapped around a
chopstick
style piece of wood with medical grade methanol. Several forums have
posts
where readers have been to Nikon Service outside the USA and reported
seeing
the technicians using SensorsSwabs and Eclipse.
? Olympus - A Kimwipe held by tweezers and Olympus Proprietary
Solution (dries quickly without streaks and is bio-degradeable).
? Pentax - A special lint free cloth (provided from Japan)
folded
into a small square and held with a pair of tweezers as a swab
moistened
with a freon derivative.
? Sigma - Uses a special vacuum cleaner that was provided by
Japan.

Chuck

Thanks Chuck!
I've made a copy of this.
I'll try indeed to pursue this thing. Next step is to write to Canon USA
Cheers,
Marcel



This is also a very informative site:
http://www.pbase.com/copperhill/image/15473243

Chris


Thanks Chris!

I conducted a search on Internet and got the sites below. I haven't had time
to study all of those carefully. Even then, I don't know who to believe ;-)
The problem is that most of those sell their products, and of course they're
great!

Regards,

Marcel

http://www.bythom.com/cleaning.htm
http://www.livingroom.org.au/photolo...ge_sensors.php
http://www.pbase.com/tim32225/sensor_cleaning
http://cleaningdigitalcameras.com/
http://www.ultimateslr.com/clean-image-sensor.php
http://www.impulseadventure.com/phot...ust-clean.html
http://www.intemos.com/home.asp
http://www.photosafari.com/Articles/...gTheSensor.asp
http://www.photosol.com/
http://www.pictureline.com/newslette...dslrclean.html
http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/con...296&print=true
http://www.visibledust.com/
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/es...cleaning.shtml
http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-...?msg_id=00CvVS
http://www.dphoto.us/news/node/22
http://www.earthboundlight.com/photo...that-dust.html
http://www.pictureline.com/newsletter/article.php?id=96
http://www.prime-junta.net/pont/How_...ur_Sensor.html
http://www.hoothollow.com/Visibledust.html

"Celcius" wrote in message
...
Hi everyone!

I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's Rebel
XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.

Much of your problem here is likely to be airborne spores that have settled
on your sensor. You will get this if you use the camera in moist air even
if you do not ever remove the lens. I use my cameras outside often in rain
etc and the condensation inside the camera leaves these fine marks. You
must clean these off yourself - blowing is useless - but cleaning is easy
and a simple. Canon dropped a right bollock when they first said that
cleaning sensors was a pro job - it isn't and it needs doing daily in some
circumstances.

"RustY©" wrote in message
...

"Celcius" wrote in message
...
Hi everyone!

I finally got a lot of trash that I can't get rid of on my Canon's Rebel
XT
CMOS sensor and decided to write to Canon Canada.

Much of your problem here is likely to be airborne spores that have
settled
on your sensor. You will get this if you use the camera in moist air even
if you do not ever remove the lens. I use my cameras outside often in
rain
etc and the condensation inside the camera leaves these fine marks. You
must clean these off yourself - blowing is useless - but cleaning is easy
and a simple. Canon dropped a right bollock when they first said that
cleaning sensors was a pro job - it isn't and it needs doing daily in some
circumstances.


Thanks Rust.

So far, I've seen that there are two ways of doing it.
1- Copper Hill method (Swabs + Eclipse)
2- The "Visible Dust" method (http://www.visibledust.com/)
Both also seem to have a special dry brush to get at the dust.

I'm still not to the point of getting what I need and doing the thing
myself.

Cheers,

Marcel

"Celcius" wrote in message
...

"Bill Hilton" wrote in message
ups.com...
Marcel writes ...

I have a lot of addresses for products, but I wish I knew WHAT
CANON IS USING to clean their sensors safely.

Whatever they are using it's not all that great and you can quickly
learn how to do a better job yourself ... my wife just sent in a 1 D
Mark II for some repair work (Irvine facility) and they also said they
"cleaned the sensor" on the return form but the sensor has five small
dust specs on it. I can do better than that with a brush for dry loose
particles or Pec Pads with Eclipse for anything. It's not feasible to
send in the camera for this so my advice is to just learn how to do it
yourself. First time or two you're pretty nervous but after a while it
becomes routine.

Bill


Bill,
Thank you for the encouragement.
If I only knew how it's made and what pressure it can take...
There those swabs that seem to be about the width of the sensor and you
swipe once...
Ideally, there should be pre-wet swabs that come in a cellophane. You
would
open it, use the swab and throw it away.
The problem with just the blower is that apparently the sensor when "on"
either is charged electrostatically (?) or is heated up. This seems to
"seal" the dust in.

Not so. And you usually do not need wet wipes. A good brush, a quick swipe
or two and you're done. You do NOT need to know how much pressure the sensor
will take. First, you're cleaning a filter, not the sensor. Second, if you
have to scrub, there's something seriously wrong with the
filter/sensor/camera and it has to go to the factory.

Get a nylon brush. Cosmetics counter brushes work fine. Wash and rinse very
well, using distilled water. Dry well. Blow air through the *brush* and then
use the brush to swipe off the filter. Cost is whatever the can of air is,
and the brush, probably a total of under 10 bucks, and enough to last for a
year or more.

If things get really out of hand, I use (so far, once, and it wasn't really
needed) Sensor Swabs and Eclipse liquid, but the package is way, way
overpriced...a common event in sensor cleaning.