by The way a camera lens is cleaned really affects the quality of the pictures that it is able to take. Hence the cleanliness of a camera lens is an important factor in determining the quality of the picture that is going to be produced from my camera lens.
You should also consider that if you clean the camera lens a lot, it could result in damage being done to the camera lens that will lead to a bad picture. Cleaning the camera lenses is a double-edged sword.
And you should always be considerate about not over-cleaning the lens and damaging it in the process. The camera lens should always be gently cleaned. This should be done accordingly so that you do not harm the actual lens itself.
There are definite steps when you want to clean up a camera lens that you will have to follow. You should ensure an excellent cleaning process for a camera lens.
Firstly you can use an air blower to remove all the resting dust particles that lie on the camera lens. Removing the dust is the first part of the cleaning process. Not removing the dust efficiently could lead to scratches on the lens, which is really uncomfortable.
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How to clean your camera lens?
After removing the dust with the help of a blower, you can use a brush of a definite length that has camel hair attached. A lens brush is less harsh than a coarse cloth that could otherwise be used to clean the camera lens.
The camel hair is preferred because it is thin and lustrous and does not do any harm to the camera lens when it touches its surface. You can also take care that the brush used to clean the camera lens is always kept clean as foreign objects can be stuck in the brush.
Ensuring that the cleaning brush is in clean and working condition is important. The next step is to use a cleanser that is specially made for camera lenses. Camera lens cleansers are mostly alcohol-based, and you should always be mindful of how much you are going to use for cleaning your camera lens.
Just one or two drops of a lens cleaner will be enough to clean the camera lens fully without even leaving any kind of streak. You will have to be mindful of not spraying the lens cleanser on the lens itself; instead of that, you can spray the cleaner on a micro cleaning cloth and gently rub it onto the lens.
The cloth of tissue that is used to clean the camera lens should be made of microfibers, or it should be a muslin cloth. This is because the microfibers help in maintaining the no-damage policy when it comes to cleaning camera lenses.
The fingerprints on the camera lens should be cleared as soon as possible so that it does not harm the equipment any further. You will have to specifically be of utmost care to be gentle when it comes to cleaning the lens, as you surely do not want to harm your camera lens.
The equipment that you will need to clean a camera lens is listed in this article. For dealing with the resting dust particles, it is required to make use of an air blower. Besides, you can also use a lens cleaning pen which can be replaced by a lens cleaning brush in case you do not happen to get a lens cleaning pen. A lens cleaning fluid is required that is generally alcohol-based.
A microfiber cloth or a muslin cloth is required to dab the lens cleaning fluid onto the lens. This is done to ensure that this equipment operates correctly to clean the camera lenses. You should never use things to clean the camera lens that might harm the camera lens in the cleaning process.
When you start cleaning the camera lens, you should consider that the room in which the lens is being cleaned should not have resting suspended dust particles that are always and sitting on the camera lens, again and again, the room in which the lens is being cleaned should be clean itself any floating dust particles will not allow the camera lens to be wholly cleaned.
A room with high humidity should not be used for cleaning the camera lens as it would harm the cleaning process and it would make the cleaning process very inefficient. A clean table should be used for dealing with the camera lens.
The lens should be separated from the body of the camera for cleaning purposes. It should be kept in mind that we are only cleaning the camera lens and not the entire camera body cleaning the front glass.
Cleaning the front glass is a tricky process, and any small mistake can end up leaving a scratch that is bad for the quality of pictures that are to be shot from the camera lens. An air blower is used to drive out any of the loose dust particles that may be sitting on the camera lens, and it also blows away the sets of glass that might be sitting on the camera lens.
You could always run a quick visual inspection to see if dust particles are still present, and you can also use an air blower until the dust particles are cleared. If it has any fingerprints on the glass of the camera, you can use the carbon tip pen for cleaning the fingerprints- fingerprints should be removed as they can end up damaging the photograph shot.
In case you do not have a lens cleaning pen with a carbon tip, you can use a microfiber cloth with lens cleaning fluid dabbed onto it. By using the microfiber cloth, you can just gently e raw won the length using cleaning fluid onto the camera lens.
After cleaning the front lens, you will need to clean the backside of the lens, which is also referred to as the “contacts side” – the backside of a lens can be seen to contain metal strips that are gold plated.
There are also electrical contact points that allow users to autofocus and communicate accordingly. You should use the air blower to remove any dust particles or glass pieces, and you should use lens cleaning fluid and microfiber cloth to deal with any kind of fingerprints on the backside of the camera lens that cleans the contact lens as well.
In the next step, you will need to clean the exterior of the camera lens. Ensure that before cleaning the exterior, make sure the front, as well as the real part of the camera lens, are closed with their respective cap.
The hood of the camera lens should be kept separate at this point, and you can make use of the cleaning brush to clean the exterior of the lens. The brush should be used on all the edges as well, and you should ensure that no dust particles are left behind. The exterior can be easily cleaned using a brush and air blower. You can even use the microfiber cloth to wipe out any remaining dust particles.
You also need to clean the hood of a camera lens if the camera has a hood that is neither made up of plastic rubber or metal. In the case of a plastic hood, you can just use the lens cleaning cloth to clean it. And if it is a robber more, you can just use the airflow and the brush in combination for cleaning it.
The don’ts while cleaning a camera lens
- You should never make use of canned air because it might come out with too much force, and hence instead of removing the dust particles, it does not do anything to the dust particles.
- You should never clean by blowing air from the mouth, and this is because saliva particles accompany air blown from the mouth. It should be considered that the cleaning fluid used to clean the camera lens is specifically a lens cleaning fluid. Any other kind of cleaning fluid can cause sustainable harm.
- You should also not use plain water to clean the camera lens, and water settles on the edges and results in fungus formation. Any ordinary cloth should not be used to clean the camera lens as ordinary clothes are generally rough for the exterior of a camera lens. So it could result in scratches being formed on the camera lens.
- Do not rub any cloth or any cleanser too harshly on the lens, as you might end up staining the lens or breaking it.
Conclusion
You can always make sure to follow the detailed procedure when it comes to cleaning a camera lens. Ensuring fact that you do not over-clean the camera lens is important; this is because over-cleaning the lens may harm it, and this causes the picture’s lower-quality pictures to be shot.
However, when required, cleaning the camera lens is important as a clean lens renders a good-quality picture. You should also be mindful when dealing with a camera lens made up of glass material. You should consider that glass is fragile and should be handled gently in order to not be broken during the cleaning process.
You also have to take care of not over-cleaning the lens. The camera equipment does get dirty all the time. But choosing when is the right time to clean it is important; if you keep cleaning the camera lens, again and again, you might risk harming it in the process. The lens is very sensitive, and if it is damaged, the quality of pictures the camera would be shooting would not be satisfactory.
Hence you should only clean the camera lens if it is a must. For excellent filmmaking, you need to ensure that after choosing the correct camera lens, you need to take care of it by maintaining just the right amount of hygiene to the lens as this guarantees excellent performance.
