How To Remove Stuck Pixels On Your Digital SLR

I was totally psyched out finally got the call on the 5D mark II; retiring my Mark II N, slammed the new toy on my 500mm birding outfit and birding I went despite the wind chill below 20 degree. The pair-up is definitely now a much manageable beast without the use of support. Handholding 500mm for Bird In Flight (BIF) doesn't gets this easy with a paper-weight prosumer body. Physically much manageable, but technically I still prefer the 1D series AF. Anyhow, my unit (serial number starts with 320xxx) shows none of the heated black-dots issues, however, does exhibits a RED-HOT pixel (no pun intended) located at (2569, 2799) X-Y resolution map.

Stuck pixels (shown up as one pixel color in Red, Green or Blue) are quite common on digital image sensor, and often coincide with images taken at high ISO sensitivity settings. Frankly, it's an easy fix in post-processing, image editing apps likes Adobe Raw Convertor can automatically map it out with ease. But it bothers me though, the stuck pixel is persistent with low ISO shots; to be honest, this is my first Digital SLR with stubborn pixel prior to 4 other Canon bodies I got to know in the past.

Images with Stuck pixel shown at 100%

Despairing and praying weren't helping, so I called up my Canon Guru for an advice, and I couldn't believe how easy it was to get rid of the dead pixel with a simple procedure :

Test for dead pixels : Left lens-cap on, set camera to exposure 30 seconds black-out image at varies ISO settings.
Fix for dead Pixels : Set camera to perform sensor cleaning mode manually (not auto) for one minute. You only execute the function, not exactly performing the whole sensor cleaning procedure. Magically, the sensor cleaning task should shake the stuck pixels off, if not, repeat couple more times until it does. Otherwise, time to call the technical support.

I was able to get rid off the dead pixel with one single execution, avoided sending in unit for a remapping process. Come to think of that, the 5D mark II is actually has nearly 3 times the pixel resolution than my 8MP Digital SLR, definitely more chances to get caught with stuck pixel. The same procedure should work for most Digital SLR with manual sensor cleaning function. Good Luck!