Advice on sensor marks. Do I buy the camera?

[Herr Barnack]

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On 3/13/2020 at 6:58 PM, fabianoliver said:

Hi ICT, thanks for your answer, I”ll take a look to the other pictures I take, “not the sky test” to see if they’re visible. The seller talks to me that in some beach pictures the dust was visible, but knowing that it’s just dirt, The deal can be done. You advised me not to clean Them because the procedure is always risky?

Done properly, cleaning the sensor is not risky. 

Follow the instructions to the letter that your camera manual, sensor cleaning fluid and sensor swabs give you and everything will be fine.

I have to clean the sensor of my M-P 240 about twice a year and have done so for the entire five years that I have owned it.  I have never had a problem.

The key is do not use too much fluid.  The swabs I use are 24mm wide for a full frame sensor.  I put three drops of fluid on one side of the swab down near the edge that will contact the sensor cover glass and two drops on the opposite edge.  With an APS-C size sensor, I would use 4 drops of fluid.  After you apply the fluid to the swab, wait 15-20 seconds so it has time to uniformly spread out and soak in to the swab.  The swab will be damp, but not have enough fluid in it that the fluid will seep out and find its way into your camera where it could cause damage.

A friend who shoots with Canon took his DSLR to a camera shop and had the sensor "professionally" cleaned at a cost of $50 USD.  Two weeks later, the camera died.  Off it went to Canon, who told him the damage was due to rain or some other liquid getting into the camera's electronics.  My friend had not used his camera in the rain during the two weeks since the sensor was "professionally" cleaned so guess where the liquid that damaged his camera came from??  $200 later, his camera was back home and working properly. 

Having a camera store clean your sensor is no guarantee that it will be done correctly or that no damage to the camera will result. 

Edited March 26, 2020 by Herr Barnack

[fabianoliver]

Thanks very much for your comment Herr Barnack, you give confidence!

I'll do it myself

Edited March 27, 2020 by fabianoliver

[Geoff Marshall]

On 3/27/2020 at 3:41 AM, fabianoliver said:

Thanks very much for your comment Herr Barnack, you give confidence!

I'll do it myself

You’ve made a good choice with the M8, don’t worry about cleaning the sensor just follow the instructions that come with the kit. When I bought my M8 I just put a Voigtlander 35mm on it and got some good results. Here’s a photo taken with that combination. 

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[pgk]

I tend not to wet clean my sensors. But I find that just using a sensor brush will usually remove the majority of dust particles. A dry Sensor Clean brush is a lot less invasive than wet cleaning and looking at your first post I would think that it will clean most particles away very easily.