Get dried rain drops off lens????
- Thread starter ajmax
- Start date
I just read that page, and one thing I would definitely not do is breathe on the lens unless you have no other options. Your breath is acidic, especially if you are diabetic. I would also not use common household glass cleaner, since the blue dyes found in brands such as Windex can leave permanent stains. It is also not suitable for cleaning LCDs and other plastic surfaces, since the ammonia will dull plastic.
Rain water is nothing more than distilled water + dust particles. So it's just the distilled water that is missing....
I would clean in your case with a microfibre towel that is a little bit wetted by distilled water. Normal water won't change so much, it's just that normal water has less osmotic pressure than distilled water because of the solved minerals etc. in it. So seen, distilled water should be "powerful" enough to clean / solve the particles on the lens that can be solved and for the insolvable particles: no "window cleaner" or alcohol or oil could solve them either (e.g. micro metal particles).
IF you want to care about acidity: there are definitely ACIDIC particles solved in the raindrops that might be now on your lens... waiting for some water to (re)produce an acidic raindrop. ... But it's difficult to estimate how acidic the raindrop was and so it's difficult to clean the lens with some drops of alkaline water on the microfibre towel because too alkaline is not better than too acidic.
As for the glass: the acid (of a breath e.g. or the solved rain-particles) won't harm it IMHO. (You keep acids in glass in a laboratory).
True, but those beakers don't have optical coatings.
And as far as I know the LAST coatings even strengthen / protect the glass...
So we should know about the type of the last coating on the HVX lens...
I just can't imagine that a light acid would harm the coat because many DOPs use the camera with a bare lens and rain-drops that are always acidic. The lens manufacturers certainly know that some raindrops can get onto the lens every now and then - so they would either warn us or (what I think) the acidic rain drops just don't harm the lens.
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brokenjack
Active member
http://nemeng.com/leica/020e.shtml
How to keep your Leica lens clean.
Breathing on the lens I think is the best. Been doing it on lenses that cost more than my house when I use to AC for big budge productions. I'm sure there are arguments for it and against it, like everything else, but it's better than leaving what's on the lens there for any length of time. Fluid has always left streaks for me, and I've always had to resort to breathing on the lens to get rid of them. Oh yeah, I do use compressed air....but...I know what I'm doing. Always keep that can upright and don't shake it any before you blow on the lens. Also spray away from the lens first to make sure you are not blasting any propellant all up in there. And pull the trigger lightly
How to keep your Leica lens clean.
Breathing on the lens I think is the best. Been doing it on lenses that cost more than my house when I use to AC for big budge productions. I'm sure there are arguments for it and against it, like everything else, but it's better than leaving what's on the lens there for any length of time. Fluid has always left streaks for me, and I've always had to resort to breathing on the lens to get rid of them. Oh yeah, I do use compressed air....but...I know what I'm doing. Always keep that can upright and don't shake it any before you blow on the lens. Also spray away from the lens first to make sure you are not blasting any propellant all up in there. And pull the trigger lightly
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