Can a sensor deteriorate?

Avotius said:
I got photos with poor detail sharpness and bad noise in the images. These compared to images I have shot in the past with this camera dont seem to match up. Before the images seem cleaner and sharper, now they seem mushy.

Is it possible that the sensor or something else is going kaput?
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Hi,


I noticed the same thing on my Canon 5D Mark II. It's 3 years old with 30 000 exposures or video and now on some parts of the picture i see bad noise (especially in the hair when I do portrait) in under certain light. It happens even in bright light. Recently I was looking at my first portrait that I made with this camera and pictures were brighter, sharpen even with the same combo lens.
I made some research on the internet if i was alone in that case but it seems that not very much people experimented that.
Good to see with your experience that i'm not the only one.
I guess the only thing for me now it's to go on with this camera and spend much more time on photoshop to reduce noise and increase sharpening and wait to buy for a new camera.
 
semilog said:
It is a well-known issue in scientific imaging that digital sensors do in fact deteriorate over time. This is due principally to cosmic ray hits that damage pixels. The damage is cumulative and statistically linear over time.
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But that causes dead or hot pixels - in severe cases with bleed into the horizontal or vertical line the dead cell is on. Even after JPEG these flaws tend to look very ordered ("digital").

The issue here, with its dirty lens like blur, looks rather as if one of the filter layers in front of the sensor (up to three - Bayer, AA and IR blocking) had deteriorated.
 
traveler_101 said:
I recall a rather unscientific conversation in which someone was speculating that 20,000 shutter activations is all you can expect from these cameras. If true, you are there.

I am moving away from M43 as well, but toward film rangefinders. Still I like having the E-P1 for certain purposes and occasions and would probably replace it with an older model, either E-P1 or E-P2, if it went out. In other words I am willing to put some money into it but not $1000 for an OM-D. I still think the IQ of the E-P1 is fine for what it is. Poor dynamic range is my complaint about it.
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Yikes! 20,000 is an awfully low number. I bought this camera when it first came out so it hurts the more because I paid what....800 some dollars for it (bought it at the local camera shop, so tax...).

I find myself also wanting to move away from M43 but I dont really see any other good alternatives for a compact interchangeable. I cannot shoot film here in China anymore because there literally is ZERO color negative or positive film processing here anymore and while I could get black and white and soup it myself the water here is so horrible I would have to buy a serious purification system to do it. I would really like to have an OMD but here it is about 1400 dollars for the body only, so no. Even at 1000 dollars I would not want to put that kind of money into a daily carry camera. A used Panasonic G3 is about 200 dollars, I could swing that, but then I would be loosing in body stabilization and getting those nasty Panasonic colors and noise I hate so much. Oh well.


pan said:
...I noticed the same thing on my Canon 5D Mark II....
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So maybe I am not crazy? Just maybe though. I use a 5D mk2 in the studio a lot. I also notice a lot of noise in the ISO 100 images but in a studio situation where you are literally looking at every photo at 100% with a very critical eye its going to happen. Even using a PhaseOne P40 MF back I see noise in the images, but that's because my clients are so picky about everything.


sevo said:
But that causes dead or hot pixels - in severe cases with bleed into the horizontal or vertical line the dead cell is on. Even after JPEG these flaws tend to look very ordered ("digital").

The issue here, with its dirty lens like blur, looks rather as if one of the filter layers in front of the sensor (up to three - Bayer, AA and IR blocking) had deteriorated.
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I do have a few dead pixels on this camera, but its not uniform or anything like that. Before I also though that maybe my Panasonic lens had haze or fungus but nope, and I used many different lenses. So yeah, I think it may be something on the sensor level that is going.
 
... I wonder if airport x-rays damage sensors like they do with film ... I do know that a single layer of aluminium foil offers the same level of protection as 3mm of lead, I did read a thing on cosmic-ray exposure on high latitude flights but I can't find it now ... a conspiracy I imagine
 
Avotius said:
I heard something about that before about going in airplanes with digital cameras. My Olympus has probably been on about a dozen plane trips since I bought it, 4 of those rides across the Pacific. Maybe with more cosmic rays it will turn into the silver surfer.
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The blacks in this shot at base ISO show a similar noisy pattern
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/olympusep1/17

Compare with your cat photo
 
Sensors do eventually wear out. I bought a Fuji S2Pro dSLR when they came out (about 10 years ago I think). Many have since died due to sensor failure. When I queried this with a repairer he said that it could be due to the sensors de-laminating which is in turn due to them heating and cooling each time they are used. Of course the S2Pro was a relatively early dSLR and very power hungry which might explain this, but I would expect all sensors to have a finite life due to this and other reasons. Whether some (like shutters) fail far earlier than others I wouldn't know as I haven't had direct experience myself (other than recently, an S2Pro which as I said is now old).
 
Sparrow said:
No really, exactly the same protection as 3mm of lead ... we had a physicist here on this board at one time who agreed
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Don't tease him - the solution to the puzzle is that both aluminium foil and 3mm lead provide next to no protection against cosmic radiation (other than IR and visible light, where both perform equally well). Even lead bricks are as good as useless when it comes to that. The only thing that helps against hard cosmic radiation is sheer mass, at a scale measured in kilometres of rock or water - neutrino observatories and the like accordingly are installed at the bottom of former mines or in deep sea probes.
 
sevo said:
Don't tease him - the solution to the puzzle is that both aluminium foil and 3mm lead provide next to no protection against cosmic radiation (other than IR and visible light, where both perform equally well). Even lead bricks are as good as useless when it comes to that. The only thing that helps against hard cosmic radiation is sheer mass, at a scale measured in kilometres of rock or water - neutrino observatories and the like accordingly are installed at the bottom of former mines or in deep sea probes.
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... why spoil things like that? you'll have the poor chap thinking there's thousands of gamma-rays whizzing about with no possibility of protecting oneself ... anyway, a foil hat is much more convenient than concrete after all
 
I do not know the answer to your dilemma. But I wonder about one possibility. Sensors have to be mounted inside the camera with some types of fasteners. Is it possible for the sensor to have been vibrated loose from its moorings?

I bring this up because 30+ years ago I began to get unexplained soft photos from one of my Nikon F bodies. It was found to be due to the mirror mounting becoming slightly loose and throwing off the plane of focus. I don't know what all kinds of mischief a loose sensor mount might present.

Vibration can cause screws to back out, glues to break, all kinds of bad things to fasteners. Airplanes vibrate considerably. Your frequent air trips may be the cause of the camera loosing sharpness.
 
Hopefully we are discussing cosmic radiation. I would hate to think anyone's sensor was exposed to alpha, beta or gamma radiation. Of course cosmic radiation is not affected in the least by reasonable thicknesses of lead or anything else. Lead a few miles thick may attenuate cosmic rays though.

Of course x-rays used to scan checked luggage in airports can be quite strong. I have no idea if strong x-rays can damage an unpowered sensor. Allegedly, if you protect film or your camera with lead they just turn the x-ray energy up to see if they can identify the object. Or they open up your checked luggage and hand inspect.
 
sevo said:
Don't tease him - the solution to the puzzle is that both aluminium foil and 3mm lead provide next to no protection against cosmic radiation (other than IR and visible light, where both perform equally well). Even lead bricks are as good as useless when it comes to that. The only thing that helps against hard cosmic radiation is sheer mass, at a scale measured in kilometres of rock or water - neutrino observatories and the like accordingly are installed at the bottom of former mines or in deep sea probes.
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Yeah, but who makes 3 mm lead-foil helmets?

Cheers,

R.
 
When I got my, then 4 year old, D2x I was disappointed with how it performed. Blurry, mushy pictures. Sent it out for a service and all was dandy. The report stated everything needed cleaning. The chamber in general, the sensor, the AF sensor, the works. Since then I get my interchangeable digital cameras cleaned once every 12-18 months, don't care if they have self cleaning sensors.
 
Interesting I should find this thread now. I shot some photos yesterday of a friend's new barber shop. I was using a 5D Mark II and good L primes and was shocked to see how noisy the images looked at ISO 400.

I haven't used that camera in a while as I favor my X100. I used to love the 5D2 but now the output is dissapointing and/or embarrassing. Maybe it needs a good clean. :confused:
 
Funny how I've not heard pro photo journalists complain about such things. But then again they cannot afford to not have their equipment work. Serviceing and cleaning is a matter of course for them. And a measly 20000 actuations before the sensor is for the bin would have generated a lot of noise, had that been the rule, rather than the exception.
 
Digital cameras used on the ISS accumulate quite a bit of damage to the sensors I understand. Far less protection 200+ miles up in orbit from radiation. One of the Apollo astronauts, I forgot who, said in an interview that occasionally he would see a flash of light with his eyes closed. The result of radiation hitting water in the fluid in his eyeball and reacting with one of the molecules.
 
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