Keeping your digital camera's parts clean is imperative to getting the best performance out of your equipment. Sensor cleaning offers its own amount of stress as it is one of the most fragile parts of your camera and whenever possible, it should be carried out by professionals. For those times when sending the camera for service isn't an option, Blake Steed of Lens Rentals has posted a guide to sensor cleaning writing that "cleaning camera sensors is not as delicate of an operation as it seems."

Lens Rentals suggests to first examine your sensor with a sensor loop in order to identify the dust on the sensor. "There are also liquid spots that closely resemble dust without a closer look. These occur under several conditions including humidity, factory defaults, and human error. Fingerprints and smudges can also occur, more often with mirrorless cameras..."

The next step is to blow the dust off of your sensor with a rocket blower. On using a blower Steed states, "For the first few blasts, hold the camera up with the mount facing down, so the flying dust doesn’t immediately fall back into the sensor chamber."

For the particles that may still be on the sensor after the blowing phase, a sensor brush is your next best option. If the sensor is not clean after these two steps, the next option is using a sensor pen.

On cleaning sensors for mirrorless cameras, Steed makes note that, "mirrorless cameras have the sensor closer to the lens mount and seem to get dusty a bit more frequently. On the other hand, the fact that the sensor is so accessible makes cleaning it much easier."

Blake Steed concludes his guide to sensor cleaning with some encouraging words, "with clean utensils and a clear understanding of what the problem is, it truly is a breeze to keep the sensor immaculate. It may seem a daunting task at first, but it will become obvious that most sensors themselves are rather resilient."

To read Blake Steed's full guide to sensor cleaning visit LensRentals.com