dri+Cap is a MUST have for your Lens and Cameras

It's been a while since I did not write anything here, this doesn't mean that I've completely forgotten the blog and all you out there, but it's due to the fact that I've been moving from one place to the other with some work that I did not have time to pause to write a few words in here.
Been working on several projects at the same time so time is not on my side for the moment.

Been also struggling with Canon because of focus issues with my cameras and that has drive me crazy for sometime now... but that's story for another long post soon ;)

Meanwhile and back to today's announcement.

A lot of people been writing me for a couple of times asking me some of my technical questions to make this, avoid that, build something and one of them that often gets in is about Fungus and humidity.

Quite frankly I never had any problems with that in the digital world, maybe due to the fact that my cameras never have the time to rest in one place for some time or even due to the fact that I never let them rotten in direct sun exposure nor inside my bags.

One thing I learn to do over time and after each assignment is to get all the equipment out of the bags (clean it properly if it was under heavy dust or rain) and put it inside a normal cabinet with many drawers I have with lots of small silica bags.

Been doing this for almost 10 years and no arm has come to my lens and cameras.

So my first advise is to take proper care of your gear and have it clean after every use, you will see that it will last much longer. A small thing for a heavy cause.

A couple of weeks ago I received an email from my friend Jim Lee from BRNO company about his new product, me and Jim we met at Photokina 2008 where he was showing another of his own creation and also a wonderful product the baLens a White Balance lens cap.

The product he talked is called dri+cap (Dry Cap) this is a dehumidifier for your lens and body, I found it so interested that he told me he would send me a sample so I can try it out and check for myself the difference it would make on my lens and body.

I decided to give it a try has this humidity thing is always something that you never plan when doing assignments abroad and this lens cap can save the day.

First, and before we talked about the product itself, let's talk about what this could be helpful for.

Has you may know excess of humidity can be a pain to cameras and lenses and in some cases can destroy them completely if you just forget about this factor.

Fungus can forms between the lens elements and under the lens coating in dark humidity environments and can be very expensive to remove them, sometimes even impossible to remove, after they have been detected.  

With this system the idea is to keep your equipment under proper RH levels that is considered to be between 35% and 45% under storing environment.

The dri+Cap absorbs the damaging moisture that can turn into mold, protects from ambient RH fluctuations while traveling in climates with heavy changes in temperature, even if you are moving from cold air conditioning into a hot humid environment and can avoid the build of moisture into the lens and body.

The idea is to carry them on your gear replacing your original lens cap with this ones.... Bam!!! Just that simple.

Let's take a look at the product itself...

If you opted to buy both the back lens cap and the body cap then they would come in a package like this (chose the brand of your equipment accordingly, micro 4/3 caps are planned but may take some time) with a set of instructions on the back of the package.



Inside you will find the back lens cap and the front camera cap as well as 8 silica gel well wrapped in this silver plastic protective bag.



Here is the front body cap.



...and here the rear Lens cap.



Here is how they look from the inside part when removed from the back protective plastic.



They both have a protective orange rubber that seal it against the body and lens.



A see through to show you the holes that the rear lens cap have.



A view from the other side where you will attach the cap with the silica gel (front of the cap).



The same view for the body cap.



You immediately see that the body cap has a lot more holes in it to cover a wider gamut to cover the all body camera hole.



Here is the silica gel pack when removed from the protective silver cover.



It's very easy to install has you just have to press it against the cover and screw it in.



Just like this ;)



After you screw it in this is what it will looks like with the silica gel already inside the cap and ready to use.



The the silica gel will changes it's color from orange to green when you need to change it. This is very practical as it will let install it and forget about it until it changes color and for that you just have to take a look through the holes. FANTASTIC!!!



For some, the size may be a problem (I do not believe it will matter that much consider what it will save you in protecting your gear) so here is a side-by-side with the original Canon lens caps. 



I match the body cap against the Canon original and a AAA battery and a CR2 battery. For the body cap it's the same size as the CR2 and it's half the size of a AAA.

So it's almost 2 Canon original front body caps on top of each other.



I also matched the rear lens cap against the Canon original and a AAA battery and a CR2 battery. For the rear lens cap it's a little bit taller than the CR2 and it's little bit more than a half size of a AAA. I also matched 2 of a normal Canon lens cap on top of each other and they almost match the BRNO lens Cap.

So it's almost 2 Canon original rear lens caps on top of each other.



Here is what it will look like on the lens itself.



View from closer look.



BRNO dri+Cap rear lens cap.



Canon original rear lens cap.



Here is how it looks in the body.



The original Canon body cap.



From another point of view.



Front view of the original Canon body cap.



BRNO dri+Cap front lens cap view.



Well, I was very impressed with this dri+Cap system and I'm sure I will have it on all my lens and bodies from now on.

This will replace my originals Canon lens caps, that no longer screw in conditions, and also would have a great protection from humidity and dust since they are rubber sealed.

You can get them through our LightingMods Amazon store, and if you live in Portugal the official retail store is Niobo.

Prevent your cameras from getting Fungus and other humidity problems by replacing them with this magnificent product.

The official BRNO page here.

Enjoy

DIY: Sensor Brush Visible Dust Motor Replacement

Not much have changed since I bought my "Never Leave Home Without it" Visible Dust Arctic Butterfly 724 and The Sensor Loupe kit and the way I clean my sensors.

In a previous 2008 post I taught you how to clean your sensor (Cleaning Dust Bunnies With a Butterfly), I know that back then we were in 2008 and cameras were not so evolved in auto cleaning sensor technology now in 2013 a lot has changed but since then the only real factor that changed was an upgraded the Arctic Butterfly new version the 724 (Super Bright) which now is equipped with 2 super bright LEDs Sensor Brush and changed it's color to a marine blue ;)

This Arctic Butterfly been traveling with me all over the place, from dusty environments to some splashy ones and well... a couple of weeks ago the brush motor just got it's last days and at a certain point it stopped rotating completely.

So I decided to make my hands dirty and find a replacement for it.

It's been a while that I did not post anything here on the blog on DIY (Do It Yourself) matter so here goes this post, to the fans of DIY, that I hope it would help you save a couple of bucks on buying a new one.

I will take you step by step on how to simply replace the motor with a much better and quite one ;)

Enjoy

Well first it took me a couple of days to really find a replacement unit for the motor itself. Just because I did not have any clue or idea what kind of motor or what type and RPM the guys at Visible Dust were using for theirs.

Luckily I found, here in Europe, RobotShop.com and these guys have almost any kind of motors for... well just take a look at their page and you will see what I'm talking about.



Well first let's start with the gear we need to make this simply replacement.

This is an easy procedure and what we need is:

- Damaged Arctic Butterfly ;)
- New motor Brushed DC Motor (RM1A) RB-Sbo-48
- Small knife to open the plastic case (nothing special here) and actually do not even need to cut.
- Welding Iron
- Some soldering



First let's start with the new motor that I happily found at RobotShop and that you can safely order has they ship very quickly to any place in Europe

Here is the direct reference for the motor

Brushed DC Motor (RM1A) RB-Sbo-48

It's not the same motor as the original Arctic Butterfly but it fits perfectly.



Here you can see the back part of the new motor RM1A with the connections. 



Here is the label order :)



Then I just attached the brush to see if it fit's the hole and it works, Excellent !!!



Next Step, you just open the battery cover of the Arctic Butterfly, remove the batteries and put the brush inside the protective cover so it won't get contaminated with oil or dust.

REMEMBER that the bush tips cannot touch anything or else it will contaminate your sensor with dust or oil particles. This is a tool that needs to always be clean, just remember that.



Now lets carefully open the Arctic Butterfly by starting near the button switch. This would be a much easier place to start open it up as soon has you lift it it will pop open. Not too much pressure needed.



Here it is... this is what looks inside.



Now let's remove the button switch and put it aside so you don't loose it.



This is the switch button and you can see the hole where it connects to the switch inside the cover and this is, when you assemble it later on, the part that goes down inside the hole.



Next you carefully lift the motor. You can see here that my motor had already a couple of visible damage and time corrosion and also some kind of oil inside??? (go figure...)



Closer look at the motor.



At this point you can clearly see that it has 2 soldering connection one by the red cable and the other on the yellow cables that goes also connects to the 2 front led's. Also notice that at the yellow junction is an iron part connected that comes from the battery connector and also needs to be soldered with the yellow cables.



Let's Start by unsoldering the red cable has this would be much easier to start from.



Now to the other side we unsolder the yellow connection cables.



Here is the connected silver iron that I talked earlier and that also needs to be soldered with the yellow cables so the motor can have it's power.

(This iron piece can be easily removed and later on put it to place with no problem).



Let's take a look at a side-by-side on the motors. On the right you have the new one and at left the older model.

You can see now that they are different and also the connections are on a different position but the new one fits almost perfectly in the cover.



This is what looks like when you remove the old motor. You see that the box it's full of some kind of oil that later on I've cleaned before putting the new motor. Maybe this happens because the motor is opened... well who knows...



To make it easier to solder I just put some solder on the tips before I started the procedure this way it will ensure me a quick solder of the parts. I've solder the + side to the red wire.



You can see that I've also removed the battery connect iron part so I can solder it better with the yellow connections.



Here in detail after putting the iron part to place. I also had to bend it a little bit has the connections were a little apart from the old motor one's.



Side by Side of the motors.



Another side by side view of the motors.



Let close this thing up by first putting the button switch into place.



Put some batteries and pray...



Insert the brush...



Ups... I noticed that something wasn't right has I tested the motor before closing and everything was working good but when I put the brush it did not worked :(

Fear not... quick and closer look revealed that at some point when closing the shaft the mother been pressed to one side and now the brush is touching one of the parts of the case.

Let's open this again and check out what is going on...



GOT IT!!!

Since the motor has a closer connections to the body part it touches this plastic mount at far back.



I just use an x-act to cut the tips of the plastic so that the motor connections would not touch it.

I did not unsolder the motor I simply and carefully moved it aside so I can cut this.



And after this last step I have my working and trusty Visible Dust Artic Butterfly working again.

What I noticed from the older model is that this one is a much more quite one and does not zuuummmbbb that much.

Hope this could help you save a couple of bucks when yours stop working.

If you want to know how to use it please also read my 2008 article Cleaning Dust Bunnies with a Butterfly