Useful Photography Tip

Useful Photography Tip #122: Always Protect Your Camera’s Sensor

Chris Gampat
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11/27/2014
2 Mins read

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Panasonic GM5 first impressions images (4 of 5)ISO 4001-60 sec at f - 5.0

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While this tip may seem completely obvious to those of us that have been shooting for years, we encourage you to pay it forward and share this with those that are newer to interchangeable lens photography.

This is the story of two different people who took the lens off of their camera and put the camera in their one pocket and the lens in their other pocket.

Again: I’m going to repeat that.

This is the story of two different people who took the lens off of their camera and put the camera in their one pocket and the lens in their other pocket.

If you’re a veteran shooter, you know much better than to do this–or at least you know to use a body cap and a lens back cap. But for the less initiated, doing this makes cloth, debris and dust get right onto your camera sensor and at the back of the lens. In both cases, the camera was taking photos with spots in the image and the lens wasn’t working. Why?

Imagine a person putting little bits of dust in your eyes. Would you be able to see? Probably not–and neither can your camera since the sensor is very much like the eye. Then also imagine putting on dirty glasses. Obviously, seeing wouldn’t be the easiest thing to do. That’s what happens when you put a dirty lens on your camera.

But even further, the second person got so much dust on the contacts that the lens couldn’t autofocus. If you want to fix a problem like this, use Isopropyl alcohol or use a special brush to clean the sensor.

And make sure that you maintain your camera. But whatever you do, always protect your camera’s sensor.

camera dust lens Protect Your Camera's Sensor sensor
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Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.