About a year ago I wrote a post on sensor cleaning for digital cameras. What I didn’t say at the time – I was really hoping I would be cleaning my sensor for the very last time because I was going to begin testing a prototype product that would protect the sensor from dust.
Well after one year I’m beginning to think I may never need to clean my sensor again! I love this product! Unfortunately, it hasn’t been available to the public until recently so I had to wait until now to write about it.
So the product is called Dust Shield and is made by Dust-Aid, the company that makes the great cleaning products I wrote about in my Sensor cleaning post. Effectively the product is a clear optic filter that is placed over the opening to the camera’s chamber sealing off the chamber and sensor. This product has a number of advantages – some not so obvious:
- The main advantage is clear – by sealing off the chamber I am able to prevent dust from ever reaching the sensor. I should add, before installing, I went to great lengths to completely clean the chamber including the sensor and mirror – otherwise every time the mirror flipped up and down I was afraid it would just reposition existing dust, possibly onto the sensor.
- When working in a dusty environment the camera is still going to pick up dust, but now it lands on the Dust Shield instead of the sensor. The selling point behind the Dust Shield - it is far easier to replace the shield then clean the sensor.
- But here is an advantage I didn’t anticipate. What I found is dust was far less likely to show when on the Dust Shield. I believe this is because the dust is now landing a fair distance away from the sensor, it just doesn’t create ugly black spots like it does when it lands on the sensor. I’m always surprised at how little spots or scratches on filters aren’t viable on the final image – I believe the same principle is at play.
- When it does get dusty, the Dust Shield is far easier to clean then the sensor – usually a couple of puffs from a hand held blower and I’m good to go.
Of course I know what everyone is thinking – what does it do to image quality? I gotta admit, I was skeptical. Having spent some $8,000 on one of the finest cameras available, and a bunch more on top quality lenses – I did not like the idea of now adding a piece of film to the image path. My photos are our sole source of income, I just can’t sacrifice quality no matter how convenient! I had to be sure image quality didn’t suffer – here is my review.
I felt the best way to really test this product is with my absolute sharpest combination of equipment. So I mounted what I think is my sharpest lens, my Canon 100 macro, on my best camera, a 21 mp Canon 1DsIII. I used the two second timer with mirror lockup with a f-stop of /8, – probably about as good of a combination as I could get. I then mounted the whole thing on a monstrous Gitzo 1548 tripod, placed a bean bag on the camera and photographed a dollar bill taped to the wall. If I couldn’t detect softness with my best setup, then I’m not going to see it with say a lessor camera or with a softer lens like the 100-400.
Full frame version of the dollar.
For reference, here is the full-frame version of dollar. The red represents the area in which I cropped a 400×600 area of the image with the results displayed below the jump.
Without Dust Shield.
With Dust-Shield
I didn’t do any post processing - not levels, curves or sharpening.
Looking at the results, if anything, I felt like the version with the Dust Shield was just as sharp if not possibly slightly sharper. Now there is no way it could be sharper, I believe this appearance is because the “With Dust Shield” version is slightly darker. In the 10 minutes I messed around with installing the Dust Shield for the first time, I lost some ambient light, but I wanted to keep both exposures equal at 1/30 of a second so it came out a bit darker. If I was to do this test again, I would use flash as my main light source and eliminate this variable. Maybe for some reason the “with Dust-Shield” version has more contrast which would also give the appearance of a sharper image. Irregardless, this test was good enough to convince me!
Now for the bad news. Currently, the Dust-Shield is only available for the Canon 5D and 5D II. I understand they are planning on adding new versions soon. I don’t have any more myself so I unable to do any further testing because I don’t want to remove my only Dust-Shield. In fact, I’m embarrassed to admit but I miss placed my samples and have been using the same Shield for over a year now. It is safe to say, when more become available, I will be ordering more!
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I am in desperate need of this! …and so glad I have a 5D! Excellent writeup Ron and thanks for the info!
Very cool indeed. I had heard about this idea a while ago and had not seen any reviews so far. As a 5D Mk2 video shooter I’ve become very interested in this because removing dust spots from video footage is a LOT harder than photographs (and I’ve had a couple of commercial shoots where I had to do some post-processing dancing to mitigate a chance dust devil.)
Thanks!
I hadn’t thought about the hassle of dust on video! Thanks guys!
I need this now!!!
I’d be interested in a 1Ds Mark III dist shield. I remember reading about this on their site a while back and was concerned about the impact on image sharpness. Great write up and test. Are the crops above 1:1 crops… no resizing?
Anyhow now all I need to do is wait to either test and/or buy.
dist… dust… you know what I mean
Hey Ron,
Is it just me or is your dollar bill missing the left 3rd? That thing’s worth nothing.
Sounds like a cool product .. and it certainly doesn’t seem to affect sharpness at all, from this test. Hope they can get it going for Nikon cameras.
Any idea on price?
Cheers
Carl
If it’s that good – and it certainly seems to be, from your testing – then Canon and Nikon need to get their behinds in gear and build something similar into their cameras. Lease the technology from the inventor or whatever, so the little guy don’t lose out. But it’s time to stop the messing around: digital doesn’t need the dust drawback, and neither do we.
I’ve shipped my camera to Nikon twice to have the sensor cleaned, and both times it took at least ten days to get it back. I even asked about driving to their SoCal repair facility, to see if I could get it cleaned that day (I was willing to get up at 4am, drive, and be there when they opened at 7am – if I can do that for a sunrise, I can do it for a spot-free sunrise!) I was told no, they don’t do same-day cleanings or repairs of any kind. And no, they couldn’t guarantee that if I dropped it off one day, it would be ready the next. How ridiculous is that? To add insult to injury, the last time I shipped it off, it came back with a huge speck of dust on the sensor… the old ones were all gone, I’ll grant you, but for heavens’ sake (literally)! Luckily it was removed easily with the blower, but still.
I think the camera manufacturers need to take more responsibility for this.
Nice write-up, Ron, and thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the info-I hate cleaning sensors.
Great write-up Ron. I’m curious about the loss of ambient light, was it enough to require a slower shutter speed?
@ Jim – yes those are full sized slices from the original tiff, they weren’t re-sized, it is a 100% view. I’ll let you know if hear of the 1Ds III version becoming available.
@ Carl – I started by photographing the whole dollar bill, but couldn’t open it in Photoshop. I thought that was an urban myth, but it isn’t.
@ Moira – I feel you pain and frustration! Did you see my link near the top on cleaning your sensor – you might give that product a try, it works pretty well – and beats being without your camera for 10 days!
@ Carl – For the 5D I see he is charging $20. Not sure if that is for one, or more.
@ Dennis – I hear you!
@ Richard – I kept the shutter speed the same. The two look fairly close in exposure, but if I switch between the two images while looking at a histogram – the “mountain” of exposure data for the “with Dust Shield” does shift a little to the left. Changing the exposure even just 1/3 of a stop probably would have shifted the exposure even more. But, with flash I could have kept the exposures identical.
Hey Ron,
You lost light in 10 minutes? That’s Alaska, eh? Days be short.
Sounds like a great product.
Cheers
Carl
Hey Ron – this is VERY interesting, good thing I have a 5D mk 2!
The only concern I can think of that wasn’t addressed in your test is lens flare. This is essentially adding an “element” even though it’s not changing the light path. I wonder how these will do when the sun or another light source is in the frame.
Thanks Dave – Good question. In the past year I have been using it, I haven’t noticed any increase in lens flare, but I haven’t specifically tested it either.
Has Pop Photo did a test on this? Sounds like something thy would have already done.
I can’t find anything in my mags about it though.
Looks like a good test you done. But if the final photo was darker, doesn’t that mean
there was somewhat less light comming into the camera? If you had used a flash, I
would say you would have gotten the same results. After all, flash is about 98% as
consistant as daylight.
I want to also add, if ther was a difference in actual light intensity, you could have used an
off camera exposure meter to make sure the exposures were identical. With doing this,
thre is no way to know if the light was the exact same, unless the exposures were taken very
close together.
hello Ron,
It’s very interesting. Thanks for the info.
GodBless!
Shill – one who pretends to be an objective buyer of a product or service in order to lure others to buy said product or service………………Websters New World Dictionary
Have you tried the product Steve? I’m guessing not, but then again, it is so much easier to just make a personal attack.
I have nothing to gain from this product – I received a few samples early on and can’t even get them replaced. I don’t receive any kick-backs, commission,s I’m not an affiliate – nothing, I won’t make a penny from this product or company.
Furthermore, I didn’t write this to help a friend out – Ross and I have never met in person, and only began exchanging emails when he asked me to review his cleaning product.
For me, the only benefit is being one of the first to share a new development with my readers.
The one think I have said to every person on Twitter who ordered to product is “let me know what you think” I’m interested in reading more feedback on the product or my test results. I’m not interested in personal attacks.
Ron,
I did try the Dustaid platinum and it made my sensor a mess. As to this shield, the comparison pix Dustaid has on their website has the sharper one WITH the shield and the fuzzier one without. This is an optical impossibility, no? Or is it just BS?
When you Google Dustaid, this is a prime example of the reactions to their products:
http://www.photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=813645
But I do commend you for leaving my comment here, and for answering it directly.
Regards,
Steve C.
Steve,
I looked around on the DustAid – Shield website and can’t find the samples you are talking about.
I followed your link and read the all the comments on the forum – lots of strong opinions from a bunch of people who have never used the product. What does that tell you? One person suggests using a lens cap instead? The internet is overloaded with opinions from people who have never tried the product – just wait until the next camera announcement.
I know of at least 4 people who have now ordered the product, and I have asked them to share their experiences – although I think your mind it already made, I do hope to share or have follow up comments from other actual users.
Ron
Ron,
I believe you missed the point of that thread. Those people were discussing the “concept” behind the shield plus the reputation of the company regarding their other products. Like I mentioned in my previous post, there is an utter vacuum of postive reviews on the internet about any of dustaid’s products. Personally, I’ve been using the VisibleDust products ever since my nightmare with the platinum.
When dustaid makes a product specifically for the 5D (which is what I shoot), it does not stop air and dust from entering the chamber through all of the other seams/ports and openings in the 5D body. The camera came out in 2005 and it is NOT weatherproofed like the current Canon models, i.e. 7D. Air is continually being introduced into the chamber through these other ports, and this is happening while the lens and the shield are mounted onto the body. So it may be stopping dust at the lens mount, but there’s no way possible it is cutting down on the lion’s share of dust entering the chamber, not to mention bits of debris generated by moving parts in the chamber, behind the shield. Most people swap lenses very rapidly to avoid dust entering the body, I know I do.
The sample pictures were on their website in the past, don’t know why they removed them. As for Dustaid’s reputation on the internet and through the professional photographers I come in contact with everyday, as far as their whole product lineup – no comment.
Ron, if you’re happy with their products, then that’s all that matters. Thanks for your views and for allowing me to explain my position here which was previously misconstrued. You are a fairminded person.
Kind regards,
Steve
Thanks for your comments Steve.
Ron, I’m confused. You stated that the product was currently only for the 5D and 5D II, but you somehow did your test with a Canon 1DsIII. Did they produce one specifically for your camera or, if the stock Dust-Shield fits the 1DsIII why don’t they market it as such?
Best regards,
Scott