99% of the time I shoot exposures of 250 (shutter speed) and up. That way very rare see do I see the spots on my scensors.

Today I was experimenting, at low shutter speeds and shot this
photo. When people are shooting say a running creek at 1/2 a second, "how in the heck are there scensors so clean"..??

I mean, when your at that long of an exposure, it's going to show
every piece of dirt.. How are they pulling this off...?

What is the trick here, clean my scensor, minutes before I do this
type of shoot again...? Or pull out the film camera?

Why would shutter speed effect sensor dirt showing? If it's on the sensor it will show on every image. I looks more like water spalshing/ water drops to me.

I don't know why shutter speed would effect it, but it does.

If you look close at all the black spots, those are the ones I hate.
On the usual image I get 1 maybe 2 black blotches. I can deal
with that.. But when we are looking at 20 and more.. You kind
of have to look close to see all the blotches, those aren't water
splashings...

Apeture effects how much dirt you can see and probably when you slow the shutter down you open up the apeture. I always think my sensor is clean at f/4, but at f/11+...ughhhh...

Jack,

The dirt on your sensor becomes more apparent and sharper looking when you use smaller apertures. The fact that you see it more with slow shutter speeds is because your lens is stopped down.

If you're a CPS member you can take your camera body to Irvine and they'll clean it free of charge, but you have to wait 1/2 a day for it. I'm not sure how NPS deals with it.

yes- "stopped down"- that's what I meant

There is a post by Nikon on utube that show the proper way to clean your sensor. You should know it so you can clean it when necessary.

You wrap your wand loosely with a sensor swab and lightly dampen it with eclipse then scrub the sensor just as you would a lens.

The method of wiping one way then turning the swab and wiping the other way does not work.

Go to Utube and key in a search.
Pik

The wet method should really be used sparingly for tough to clean spots, because it's really easy to screw it up and end up with excess gunk on the sensor. For the past year or so I've been using a lenspen (for sensors) and it works great. Just blower bulb the sensor first, then use the lenspen and blower bulb afterwards. Works great and is really safe.

I've used the Sensor Brush from visibledust.com for years on all my cameras. It's not cheap, but very effective. Takes seconds, it's a dry method, and it works like magic. I've had the same one for years. There's a new one, sounds like an adult toy - "The Arctic Butterfly" - but it doesn't require Dust-Off to charge it like my O.G. brush does.

Thanks for all your feedback.. Just wanted to show you this image
I shot today (24 hours after the speed blur shot above). Same
spot, lighting, camera, lens, but of course different exposure.
I did NOT clean the sensor, and look, no spots to be found =)..

Jack,

If you want to test how clean your sensor is just point your camera to the north sky and shoot a few frames at f16. Open them up and add some contrast in PS. Shooting a smooth surface is more likely to reveal any boogers than shooting a wave. And a full size native res file will show much more than a 550 pixel image.

As pointed out several times, you are using a smaller aperture at the faster shutter speed. That is why the dirt is showing up. It has always been there, but becomes more apparent when you stop down. Just restating what other have already said...

I run into this when shooting bands in the studio vs. shooting concerts. The low light of the shows requires me to shoot at 2.8 to 5.6f, but the studio is often at 8f to 16f...

And, I'm surprised leslie hasn't chimed in about your grammar yet. It seems she's always ready to point out a misused "your" (it is you're) or a misspelled "scensor" (it is sensor).

One other thing to consider besides cleaning of the sensor, is the technique you use to change lenses to minimize dust and other debris from getting in the camera cavity and lenses. It's usually recommended to point the camera down when removing a lens and remounting another. I have a hard time seeing the alignment marks when attaching a lens in this manner, so I opt to hold the camera tipped down slightly. The lens that is removed is capped right away and lens that I'm putting on isn't uncapped until the other one is protected. If for some reason a lens isn't mounted immediately I have a body cap handy to put on the camera. I've had pretty good luck not gathering dust on my sensor doing it this way.

Since you're shooting surf images, I suspect you may have a good deal of wind and sand flying around... good luck, sensor spots may just be a fact of life for you!!

Mark....

quote:

Originally posted by janikphoto:
[qb] As pointed out several times, you are using a smaller aperture at the faster shutter speed.[/qb]

Jason,

Didn't you mean to say at the slower shutter speed?

David,

As soon as I run through my huge supply of Sensor Swabs and Eclipse, I'll give the Lens Pen a try. When Lenspen first came out it sounded like an abrasive method to me, but have heard no bad reports about it.

Scotti