Cleaning finger-marks off a lens/filter

[Legend83]

Picked my daughter up yesterday with camera over shoulder...two second look away and she had grabbed the front of the camera and got lovely smeary finger marks over the lens filter.

Best way to clean these off without damaging?

[GetCarter]

The cloth one uses to clean spectacles and a bit of breath work fine.

[RedWhiteMonkey]

A small dab of vaseline is really good for removing finger print marks on glass.


















or maybe not

[tim-b]

I've always used eclipse fluid and 'pec pads'.

To save you the embarrassment of typing 'pec pads' into google , here are the direct links;

http://www.wexphotographic.com/buy-pec-pads-10x10c...
http://www.wexphotographic.com/buy-eclipse-lens-an...

A bit pricey but it lasts for years...

[Seight_Returns]

I once read a thread on dpreview contributed to by some very intense people, some of whom claimed that breathing on your lenses to clean them promoted the growth of fungus.

I still breath on my lenses and filters and polish them with a microfibre cloth just like everyone else does.

[Gemm]

Lens Pen! (but always make sure you use a brush first).

[markmullen]

Another fan of the lenspen.

That said the front coatings are pretty strong, a lot of the pros I work with have used a quick breath and a rub on their shirt.

[Simpo Two]

RedWhiteMonkey said:

A small dab of vaseline is really good for making a soft focus lens

EFA, but you knew that...

[2slo]

I use disposable optical wipes, bought a box in a pharmacy last week (40 for 99p) camera lenses are one of their recommended uses. Fine for the LCD screens too.

[300bhp/ton]

Legend83 said:

Picked my daughter up yesterday with camera over shoulder...two second look away and she had grabbed the front of the camera and got lovely smeary finger marks over the lens filter.

Best way to clean these off without damaging?

Gwt yourself to Jessops and buy their blue lens cloth. Probably one of the best things they sell. It's about a fiver and you don't need any chemicals or anything. Much better than the nasty lens cloths I've seen with glasses.

http://www.jessops.com/online.store/products/3569/...

[sgrimshaw]

2slo said:

I use disposable optical wipes, bought a box in a pharmacy last week (40 for 99p) camera lenses are one of their recommended uses. Fine for the LCD screens too.

Be careful with cheap optical wipes especialy, if they are the "wet" ones.

Even though they say they are safe on coated lenses, it is possible to damage some coatings. They can also damage the anti-glare coating on some LCD screens.

In addition to microfibre cloths etc, I find the "dry" lens tissues (also available from Jessops) are very good, and have never damaged any of my lenses. Clearly, debris should be removed with a blower brush first.

Read a tip somewhere, ages ago ....

In a pinch, find a smoker who "rolls their own" ... cigarette papers clean lenses really well without damage.

I was sceptical, just tried it on an old lens and it worked really well.

[2slo]

Dry vs wet wipes? Bound to divide opinion. Two things put me off lens cloths: firstly if the reuseable cloth picks up a grit particle there is then the potential to scratch the lens when you use the cloth next time. Secondly using a dry cloth to try to shift, say, a greasy nose print from the LCD screen means it's more likely to smear than remove and then whatever it does remove will be on the cloth next time it's used. I'm interested to listen to alternatives but so far I'll stick with what I'm using.

[300bhp/ton]

2slo said:

Dry vs wet wipes? Bound to divide opinion. Two things put me off lens cloths: firstly if the reuseable cloth picks up a grit particle there is then the potential to scratch the lens when you use the cloth next time. Secondly using a dry cloth to try to shift, say, a greasy nose print from the LCD screen means it's more likely to smear than remove and then whatever it does remove will be on the cloth next time it's used. I'm interested to listen to alternatives but so far I'll stick with what I'm using.

I worked at Jessops for a couple of years and must have cleaned more lenses than most over that time. Always with the dry cloth, not any cloth as some are rubbish, but the big blue Jessops one. Never scratched a lens using it or had trouble cleaning them.

I'm not saying it's the best, but based on having used it on probably hundreds of different lenses (new, used, compact through to medium format lenses) I don't have any complaints. And despite having worked there many years ago, it's still the same thing I used on my own camera equipment.

[wolves_wanderer]

Blue Jessops cloth and breath. Never scratched a lens, Pentax, Canon or Nikon.