D600 sensor dust problem

FYI - LensRentals Notices The Nikon D600 Sensor Collecting Dust | Popular Photography

i saw this article. It made me aware, but I haven't noticed any dust-accumulation issues.

The day after I bought mine I went back to the dealer and tested two more to get a clean one. There is the occasional normal dust now, only noticeable at f13 or above. Easily blows off.

I've noticed some sensor dust on mine as well. It's not completely unusual...I'm outside a lot and changing lenses a lot too. At this point the sensor cleaning function seems to work pretty well.

Jeff

Come to think of it, I took some photos with the D600, with a 70-300mm lens, of a boat way out at sea and on the horizon with blue sky as the background. When I copied them over to the PC I noticed some spots on the upper left side of a handful of zoomed shots at F8 and yes I did think it was dust. It only happened with that 70-300mm lens but I have seen dust before and immediately thought - Yep, dust... I got out my blower bulb and gave the lens a good blow and in and around the sensor and whatever I did, it appears to have stopped it... My ex D80, the D300 I still have and now the D600 all have shown dust. No big deal to me...

Thanks for the article. I checked mine out and I do see some accumulation. I'm going to clean and check it going forward. If it seems like a big issue then I'll just have to get adept at cleaning my own sensor.

PapaST said:

Thanks for the article. I checked mine out and I do see some accumulation. I'm going to clean and check it going forward. If it seems like a big issue then I'll just have to get adept at cleaning my own sensor.

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It makes real sense in learning how to do it yourself. A little scary at first, but doable by any medium skilled human being.
Cause either you pay to have it done or do it yourself, sensors do get dirty.

Marcel said:

It makes real sense in learning how to do it yourself. A little scary at first, but doable by any medium skilled human being.
Cause either you pay to have it done or do it yourself, sensors do get dirty.

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Can you give me a few quick steps on how you clean your sensor? What tools, etc . . .? Thanks in advance.

Phillydog1958 said:

Can you give me a few quick steps on how you clean your sensor? What tools, etc . . .? Thanks in advance.

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Here's a good video on cleaning your sensor - LensRentals.com - How to Clean a Camera Sensor

And here's Nasim's write up on sensor cleaning - How to Wet Clean Your DSLR Sensor in Less Than 5 Minutes and How to Clean DSLR Sensor and Keep Your Camera Gear Clean

Mojo Dave said:

Here's a good video on cleaning your sensor - LensRentals.com - How to Clean a Camera Sensor

And here's Nasim's write up on sensor cleaning - How to Wet Clean Your DSLR Sensor in Less Than 5 Minutes and How to Clean DSLR Sensor and Keep Your Camera Gear Clean

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Thanks a lot!

Well... after having my camera for a week I'm seeing fairly significant dust accumulation. I have a TON of spots at f/22... and some are even large enough to show in skys at f/5.6 or so...

I think I'm going to take it into my dealer today to see what they say. I'm not above hanging onto this one and just getting it cleaned every now and again (love everything else about this camera) but if it's defective I suppose I should trade it in...

I went from about 20 to 2-3 when I switched at my dealer. I've blown off the sensor twice and it is no longer an issue.

I suspect overtime (at least I'm hoping) the the dust accumulation will get to "normal" levels overtime. I'm getting the cleaning gear (arctic butterfly, sensor scope, etc.) and I'm okay with monitoring and cleaning as necessary.

Well... I took my camera into my dealer and they said that they would replace it... but I got their floor model and took a "dust shot" with it... and it was even _worse_ than my camera! So... no reason to replace (might just get one worse). They said they could send it in for cleaning... but it would be a month before I got it back. So, I told them I would use my Giottos Rocket Blower and see if it would do any good. I just got through cleaning the sensor with the rocket blower and thought I would share my results:

(all photos take using 24-70G at 70mm at f/22 focused near infinity on a piece of paper. Disregard the "yellowish splotch" it was some junk on the paper...)

First the "before" shot:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8047/8129213989_31d0230b70_o.jpg

Next, the "after" shot:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8474/8129240630_be4e27ba8b_o.jpg

This is after repeated (10+) mirror up cleaning sessions with the rocket blower. When I first took at look at the sensor I could visibly see the dust (mostly in the bottom left corner when looking at the sensor). I could see it getting blown away with the rocket blower. As you can see, there are still a few small spots... but they won't be visible at anything other than f/22 (where I don't shoot much). I could keep blowing, but it's just as likely that I will continue to blow around the dust instead of really getting it off. To get that last bit off I would need to either send it in or do a wet cleaning (which I'm NOT doing on a brand new $2100 piece of equipment. I understand that many people do... it's just not for me).

So the verdict? It is definitely _dust_. It is not oil (at least on my sensor) and it can be effectively dealt with in a "non-contact" way. I'm happy with the result and I'll just be diligent about blowing off my sensor every now and again. I hope that eventually it settles down a bit... but I can definitely live with this one "issue" for everything else that is awesome about this camera.

It is a huge relief to know that I can deal with this on my own and I don't need to send my camera anywhere....

I think you've got it within a normal range any camera would have at f22 shooting a dust test shot. When you first see how bad it is it makes you all the more conscious of it being there. I'm sure if I tested my D5100 at such an extreme shot I would see similar results. It's just really annoying that they allowed them to ship like that. I would have been really pissed if I had ordered mine online and got a dirty sensor!

I tried my Giotto but didn't have successful results albeit I didn't do it 10plus times. I may try it a few more times but really just going to wait till my tools come in. I'm kind of looking forward to cleaning my own sensor (carefully). Hopefully the issue goes away overtime. It's not a huge problem for me thus far.

Yeah - I had to work at it pretty hard. Had to get the tip somewhat close to the sensor and give it some good squeezes. I try to trap the tip with my other hand against the edge of the outside of the camera body so it won't move too much (or god forbid run into the sensor). I always blow from inside to outside to try to blow the dust _off_ the sensor... not just just straight down.

After each session I would shoot another test shot so that I could see how I was doing and try to figure out where the dust was still hanging out...

Oh - BTW - The internal "Sensor Cleaning" doesn't work AT ALL. I ran it multiple times with test shots in-between and never saw it remove a single spec of dust. I put the camera up to my ear to see if I can hear it doing anything... and I _was_ able to hear a slight electronic noise while it was running... so it is trying to do something... but it never made a bit of difference in the dust.

I kind of suspect that that is the root of the issue. I think that most DSLRs would probably have this must dust buildup from the factory... but their internal cleaning is working at getting most of it off the sensor. I think the D600 must just suck at getting dust off by itself...

PapaST said:

I tried my Giotto but didn't have successful results albeit I didn't do it 10plus times. I may try it a few more times but really just going to wait till my tools come in. I'm kind of looking forward to cleaning my own sensor (carefully). Hopefully the issue goes away overtime. It's not a huge problem for me thus far.

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I wouldn't consider touching the inside of your camera until your 1 yr warranty is up. Doing any hands on cleaning will void your warranty.

On a different topic, the thing you are cleaning is not the sensor. In fact it's the optical low-pass filter (OLPF), sometimes referred to as your anti-aliasing filter, that sits directly above of your sensor. At no point are you actually touching or cleaning the sensor.

Since originally noticing some dust a couple of days ago and giving it a blow with the bulb, I noticed that there is still a "bit" of crud - I'm not sure just what it is - in some of my pics when viewed under auto contrast or auto something in photoshop and set at F22 or above. I know it can't really be oil because I gave it a blow and that got rid of some but it also moved other stuff around. Blowing the sensor, or filter above it, wont really do much anyway. Today I used the Arctic Butterfly on the surface and that "moved" a lot of it around and also got rid of lots of other stuff. I wouldn't have even worried about it,, only there was this one big mark that was almost appearing on any normal blue sky shot, even at F7 - 8. It didn't look like a dust spot but had shape and length and for a second I thought it was an oil smudge. The Arctic Butterfly got rid of that but there is still lots of tiny stuff on those auto contrat pics, that doesn't show up normally. I am going to head into town during the next week or so and get some of those "Visible Dust" sensor swabs or paddles or whatever they are. I already have some but they are for smaller sensor sizes like the D300 and the fluid has probably gone off by now, so a new bottle of that too. Actually I have a container of lab grade Methanol (or os that ethanol) but I am a bit scared of that stuff as it is very potent stuff and really, that I know of, shouldn't be splashed onto your skin or breathed in, as many believe it to be super bad for your internals - may cause cancer and so on...

Personally I am not scared to swab the sensor/filter as I have done it before. It's really quite easy...!!!

Is this common with FF cameras or is the D600 an exception...A friend of mine had the d3 and had no probs...

I don't remember hearing or reading about problems with the others..