Jamie’s Weblog

A short story about how I nearly killed my new camera.

Alternate titles:

• I’m a Moron
• I stabbed the heart of my camera
• I cracked my sensor!

Left on my own for the weekend, I decided to occupy myself by going to Hurst Spit for a spot of evening coastal photography. I was reasonably pleased with the results but then I noticed this:

Damn. I really should have cleaned the lens whilst on the beach. “Oh well, not a problem”, I thought, “I’ll just clean it now”. So I meticulously cleaned the front on the lens — but this mark still came out on the photos. So I cleaned the back of the lens. No change. This is when I noticed that these marks were not present through the viewfinder and therefore… it was dust on the sensor. Arrggghhh…I’ve only changed lens twice since I got the camera but this was obviously enough to let some dust in.

I was rather offended by this dust, and certainly couldn’t face photoshopping every future photo I took (I don’t even own photoshop), so feeling far too gung-ho I recalled some advice I’d received from a Jessops salesman when I asked about dust. He suggested that lightly brushing a cotton bud across the sensor would be enough to pick up any dust. He also stressed that it was extremely fragile and could crack easily. I read the camera’s instruction booklet and opened up the mirror. With infinite gentleness I moved the tip of the bud across the sensor. I closed up, turned on the camera and took a test shot:

Arrrggghhhh!!!!! I’ve cracked the sensor. Oh my God! I’ve cracked the sensor. No! Sh*t! It’s still under warranty. No, this isn’t covered by the warranty. Can they replace CCD sensors? Nope, I don’t think so. Damn! I’ve just wasted a £450 camera. I couldn’t really afford it to start with, but I certainly can’t afford to buy another.

I sweated. I paced the floor. And finally I woke my fiancee up at midnight in Croatia to tell her the bad news. She thought someone had died; I felt as if they had. She managed to marginally calm me down and convince me to look online for the support phone numbers. Ah, typical, today is April 1st and Konica Minolta ceased their camera business on March 31st. I found some updated details thanks to Dyxum and Digital Dynax, wrote these down, resolved to call them on Monday morning and went to bed. I didn’t sleep. The cautions of the Jessops technician and a quote from “The digital photography handbook” kept floating back into my head: “If you have a D-SLR and can see dust on the sensor, never, ever clean it yourself. The CCD is very fragile and, despite the fact that you can buy CCD cleaners, if you touch the sensor, it will break.”

The next morning I was in a morbid mood. My one reckless action was going to have serious financial implications for me (I’m only a PhD student and I’m trying to save for our wedding in September). More drastically, it was going to rob me of a hobby I had only just started but which I enjoyed immensely. It was only last week that I was smuggly thinking how unique the Dynax 5D was now that Konica Minolta had ceased their camera business. Three months since I had bought the camera and there still is no other camera I would choose. Unfortunately, stocks of the 5D were depleted across the internet so it would be hard to buy another even if I had the ability. I had just killed a unique camera I couldn’t replace.

As it was a a new day I felt the need to survey the damage. I opened up the camera again and I could plainly see the damage that my inept surgery had caused: a crack ran vertically down the sensor. In a moment of pure optimism I blew on the sensor hoping that the crack was just an impossibly large fiber lying there. It moved. The crack moved. In fact, it disappeared somewhere else inside the camera. It had been a hair all along. I reassembled the camera. Click! No “crack”. Click! Click! Nothing. The camera is not destroyed! Alleluia!

The dust marks (or “dust bunnies” as I’ve heard them called) are still there but I’m not as bothered by them now. They’re most noticeable at very small aperatures . I’ve also bought a blower thing, and I might consider some of those specialist sensor cleaners, but I’m not going to be cleaning my sensor for a very long time. My nerves can’t take it. Does anyone know of a Minolta(or Sony)-approved service centre in the UK that will clean the sensor for me?!

P.S. Why are they called “Dust Bunnies” anyway? I can only assume it’s because the photographer has learned to leave them well alone for fear of consequences of their removal — like having a “pet” funnelweb spider in your bedroom and calling it “Funny”.