catherine96821:
so.....on further exploration, it seems the D-100 sensor needs an electric adapter or you can't clean a fixed target.
seems I cannot do it myself, some camera guru is telling me here.
Rubbish. They all said the same about the D1x, and it's pure...mmmm bull!
Set the shutter to 1 minute. Make DAMN sure you have a full battery. Mount it to a tripod if possible, or just set it somewhere that you are able to focus on cleaning without knocking the camera off a counter or something silly. Remove the lens. Press the shutter. Now you have 1 minute, or 2 minutes or however long to do a cleaning pass on the sensor. I think it takes more like 5 seconds, but leave plenty of time.
Do ONE pass. Take a sample photo, download, review, and the repeat as necessary.
Ironically if you lost power while using the AC adapter to *clean* the sensor the mirror would come down, and wham, who knows what damage could be done.
The entire AC adapter thing was dismissed long ago. Static charge of the sensor is NOT going to Hoover dust into the camera, pure bunk. Yes, you CAN clean your sensor without an AC adapter. If you don't believe it, well, I've been doing exactly that for 4 years or so with my D1x.
In the field people have been doing exactly as I describe for YEARS!
I'm sure there are those who will deny this until their hands shake, and they go into spasms! In fact I ran across more than a few back in the day. However most were just repeating what they had been told, and were NOT actually cleaning their sensors. I OTOH was happily removing offensive dust while attempting to tell people, no, you don't NEED an AC adapter.
So much for that GURU! :11:
Cath, if this is something you need done, have you talked with the local camera shops? Wolf camera in Denver offers routine DSLR sensor cleaning for $25. If you have NEVER had yours done, it might be a VERY good Idea to let someone else do it as it maybe very dirty. It also would give you some time to decide if you want to attempt to clean in yourself in the future.
I wish I could just blink and be there, as if I was, we would have this puppy cleaned and be diving in LESS time that it takes me to write-up these responses.
I should add that when one cleans a sensor they are not actually cleaning the sensor. What is getting cleaned is the anti-aliasing filter in Front of the sensor. The filter is made of a plastic that while not hard, is not going to scratch that easily. The anti-aliasing filter prevents the charged sensor from being the dust magnet that many feel it should be, and prevents contact with the actual sensor which is more delicate than the filter.
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