Contamination in my XTi

nobody

There is some hair, piece of fiber, etc. inside my XTi and I don't know where it is or how to get rid of it. Look for the kind of blurry dark outline over the sky to the left of the bird's wing and above its nest:

http://enturner.smugmug.com/gallery/5104318_gis9N#338591328_sHK8f

I know it's not on any lense because I get the same result with two different lenses. I can't see anything when I look inside the camera when no lense is installed. Any suggestions? Thanks.

Moogle Pepper

You should use a lit magnifying glass to scope the sensor. You probably have something on the sensor, which means it's time to clean it!

nobody

Moogle Pepper wrote:

You should use a lit magnifying glass to scope the sensor. You probably have something on the sensor, which means it's time to clean it!

Thanks. It is fixed now because I found the hair and used some canned air to get rid of it. I put the camera into a long exposure and the hair was visible on the sensor plain as day. I don't know how it got that far back into the camera, since it's always covered by a lense when the shutter is open. It could have gotten dragged into place by the shutter mechanism. Otherwise, the sensor was competely spotlessly clean. I did not want to take the risk of contaminating it further or damaging it, so I used the air to clean it.

CWSkopec

nobody wrote:

Thanks. It is fixed now because I found the hair and used some canned air to get rid of it. I put the camera into a long exposure and the hair was visible on the sensor plain as day. I don't know how it got that far back into the camera, since it's always covered by a lense when the shutter is open. It could have gotten dragged into place by the shutter mechanism. Otherwise, the sensor was competely spotlessly clean. I did not want to take the risk of contaminating it further or damaging it, so I used the air to clean it.

Ethan,
I've got the XTi also, and there's a Manuar Sensor Cleaning mode that'll open the shutter up for you. I don't have the camera here with me at work, but it's under one of the two tools menus, down near the bottom. Once you click on it, it'll ask if you really want to do it, just hit yes, and you'll hear the shutter go up. Then you can take the lens off and shoot some air in there.
I would also recommend a little hand squeeze blower. I picked mine up for about $6 at the local camera shop. I only say that because those compressed air cans are under pressure and will "freeze" if you give too long of a burst. With the squeeze blower you don't run the risk.

P.S. If I remember right, you need to have a full or almost full battery or the camera won't raise the shutter to make sure it doesn't run out of battery while the shutter's open.

Scott_Quier

In addition to the possibility of "freeze", you also run the risk of spraying lubricant all over your sensor and that's very difficult to remove. Very clean squeeze bulbs are the only thing you should be using to force air onto the sensor.

nobody

Scott_Quier wrote:

In addition to the possibility of "freeze", you also run the risk of spraying lubricant all over your sensor and that's very difficult to remove. Very clean squeeze bulbs are the only thing you should be using to force air onto the sensor.

I kept the can upright, but that possibility certainly entered my mind. One thing I noticed is that it took a lot of force to remove the single hair. Apparently, having the shutter slam over it many times mashed it in a way that made it stick. I wonder if something that is hand-squeezed could deliver air with a enough force to be effective most of the time. Probably the best thing would be a cylinder full of clean, dry, compressed air. I believe what I was using was mainly hydro-chloroflourocarbons (not the now-illegal dichlorodiflouromethane a.k.a R-12).