Tools for cleaning your camera and lenses

Every now and then, we’ll need to clean our camera bodies and lenses. It’s time for me to clean mine too. It’s been about 3 months since I’ve really cleaned all my gear.

Before we get into the details, I have to say that I’m not confident in cleaning the sensor inside the camera body. I normally leave it to the professionals to clean it for me. I clean my lenses on the surface just to get rid of oil stains, finger prints and dusts.

Here is a couple of handy cleaning tools:

Blowers - Great for blowing dusts off lenses and sensors before wiping them with the cloth. You can get this delivered to you for free from DealExtreme.com. It’s only $5.64!! I got the exact same blower from my local camera shop for $10 bucks. And that’s excluding my transportation costs!

If you’re using the blower to clean the insides of your camera, be sure to turn it upside down so that any dusts will fall out of the camera instead of falling into!

Micro Fibre cleaning cloth - Remember to use a blower to blow off any dust and dirt before wiping with the cloth. You do not want any dirt or stones on the lenses to cause scratches. 

The micro fibre cloth is great for wiping off dirt and dusts. It also removes finger prints and smudges easily! Best of all, it doesn’t leave lint and other dusts on your lenses. You can get this from DealExtreme.com too. 

I got a 3M Micro Fibre Cloth from my local Auto Shop. What can I say? I’m brand conscious! You can probably find it at your local supermarket. It looks like this:

Other tools that are good to have includes:

Lens cleaning solution - You can find them at your nearest camera stores. Useful to get rid of marks and stains easily without leaving any stain on your camera. Here’s some more tips from Darren Rowse at Digital-Photography-School.com:

In most camera stores you’ll find an alcohol based lens cleaning fluid that is well worth having. It will help you to lift off fingerprints and other smudges without leaving streaks on your lens or filter. Keep in mind that you don’t need too much of this fluid at a time - usually just a drop or two wiped in a gentle circular motion with a cleaning tissue will remove most marks on a lens or filter. Always apply the fluid to a cloth or tissue rather than the lens itself.

Alternatively - many photographers believe that simply breathing on your lens and then wiping with a cloth is a safer method for cleaning it - rather than introducing harsh fluids. My own approach is to start with breath and then use the fluids for difficult marks to remove.

Lens Pen - Pen-like device with a round cloth cleaning head useful for cleaning corners like the LCD screen on the camera and also the lenses. You can get this from DealExtreme.com too. They have a lens pen with 2 heads. One end is a round cloth cleaning head and another end is a brush. VERY handy!

Just a disclaimer, I am in no way affiliated with DealExtreme. I am also a customer and I find that they have great bargains and best of all FREE SHIPPING! I have ordered a lens pen and some other items for my PSP and I have not been disappointed!

If you have any other great online shops, please do share it with us! Drop us a comment!