Greetings
Do you all have any suggestion for nice but reasonable priced light meters.
How much do you use them?
I would like to get something to help with off camera lighting and remote setup.

Troy

Histograms are free.

Sekonic L-358 FLASH MASTER

I cant live without it. has optional wireless triggering also.

That's "incident" meter.

When I got my first digital camera, I sold my Sekonic 508.

Why?

Sekonic L-358. Love it. The wireless triggering is a great thing.

Because it's unnecessary (as in there's not a single thing a meter does that your camera doesn't do better). A digital slr gives you more information than any meter ever did - not only a basic light reading, but a histogram, and color info too. If you have time to use a handheld meter, you have time to take a reading with your camera.

Even if you're shooting film you can use your digital camera as a light meter to set your film exposure (as long as you've done some tests beforehand to understand how your camera readings relate to your film exposures) - or just as a basic preview of the lighting (I did that with a Nikon 950 before I got a digital SLR).

histograms give you all the information you need but they can be misleading if you're not careful and an incident meter is just plain faster...a lot faster...point and click

Absolutely right. Just did this for the formals yesterday. Tight schedule. We ended up having 15 minutes for most of the formals. AB flash and umbrella set up, set to full power, take a light reading, set the camera and ready to go. To do that with the camera's meter, I'd have had to take a few exposures to determine the correct exposure with a target.

BTW, we got the formals done in 12 minutes. Not the most creative, but people were already showing up for Mass when we were finishing up and looking at us funny. Had to be out of the church at 4:00. 2:30 service, went an hour and 15 minutes. We got it done and even the priest was impressed. No way we could have done that using the camera as a meter.

I have rarely used a meter since my move to digital. I've sold all my meters except the first one I ever bought when I was in school. It's a good solid little meter and very affordable @ $159



http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller...oughType=search

Cheers,
Zack

Thanks everyone for the help and input.
I really appreciate it.
Troy

i love using a meter. You can't go wrong using one. Just make sure your really learn how to use it. many photographers use them wrong, and also meter poorly..

I actually have one fore sale. i have used it like 20-40 times. minlota auto meter IVF. hit me up if you are intereested.

I agree on the value of understanding how to read the histogram. I also agree about the value of using an incident meter. An incident meter biases the exposure for the highlights which is ideal for digital.

The problem is that if you are using flash fill your incident meter will not read the flash and the TTL metering in camera can often screw up a perfect ambient exposure. Hence the advantage to really understand what the histogram is and how to use it.

Consequently I created a series of three tutorials which start out very basic on how the meter "thinks" and get more technical on using the histogram.

Hope that helps.

Rick

Honestly I think a meter is invaluable for studio work. Sure, I've just used my histogram in a pinch, but the ability to consistently produce the light ratios I want can only easily be done using a meter. Plus, even though I shoot raw and have quite a bit of latitude, I want my exposure to be spot on. There's no reason to cut corners when you don't have to.

That said, you don't need a meter if you've got a histogram, but to me it's worth it.

I use the Sekonic L-358 and used to use the L-308B. Both worked great, although the 358 is far more featured (if you need it). Or you can pick up a used 308 for cheap on ebay...

rick...why in the world would you use an incident meter with TTL....just doesn't make sense

Hmmmm....am I missing something?

If I'm using the cameras light meter, I'm measuring reflective light, correct?

With my incident meter, I'm reading the light falling on the subject, which is much more accurate with skin tones and black and white attire.


So I would assume that an incident light meter would be essential.

Is this inaccurate?

it's not necessarily any more accurate...it's just faster, and more reliable. You get a perfect exposure every time (assuming you know what you're doing) without having to take test shots and check your LCD histogram which can be very misleading if you're not careful in how you read it.

Perhaps my histogram readings are not as detailed as they should be, but I was under the assumption that a reflective light meter will underexpose a scene with a mostly white subject and overexpose a scene with a mostly dark subject....wanting them to be 18% grey.

This is something that I'm constantly stuggling with so insight is appreciated.

that is correct, reflective meters have a color bias, but you can still "get close" by using the histogram to correct your exposure, if you want to go through the whole "test shot, check, test shot, check" routine...not for me

Me neither. I prefer an incident meter, however, since I've switched to digital, my external meter is useless.
It's at least two stops off, and not predictably so.
It's a minolta.

Does anyone know if I can get it recallibrated, or if there is another reason that it's so off in digital, but not in film. I've been assuming that the lack of latitude in digital is to blame, and that my lab was just correcting the exposures when I shot in film.

In daylight TTL reads only the flash exposure and computes the flash output to "fill" the ambient as indicated by the ambient exposure setting in the camera. In low light where the flash becomes the main light source the TTL computes accordingly.

If I set an ambient Manual exposure using an incident meter that expsoure will be biased for the highlights which is ideal for digital. You may have to adjust your exposure by viewing the histogram to get optimal expsoure. The TTL metering will then add the flash exposure to the default value of 1-stop less in aperture. I can tweak that fill value by adjusting the +/- scale for the flash.

The TTL metering flash will often screw up a good exposure if the camera is in any of the automatic modes (P, Av, Tv) because while the camera's ambient meter is reading the entire scene or a major part of it (biasing the reading area depending on which metering mode you are using) the TTL meter is reading almost entirely the area as indicated by the active focusing square. If that area falls on a black or white area that is far from a middle gray the TTL will send out more or less flash exposure than the ideal. In weddings you can ofetn see this when shooting the bride or the groomsmen. The white or black area fools the TTL. Incidentally, you can often get a more accurate TTL reading by setting the lens on manual focus. When you turn off the auto focus you turn off the active focus square(s) and the TTL meter defaults to a reading of the overall scene. At least this is how Canon does it.

Rick

rick...I only said that because TTL is unpredictable...I can get the same effect your talking about using all manual settings and not have to worry about what the camera might do differently. I think you're giving yourself more work than need be...



biased for the highlights??? you have some weird setting on your meter that I'm not aware of...incident meters simply give you the correct exposure....I don't understand how that is biased

TTL is very unpredictable. Whenever I can I set my camera on manual and set the flash on manual as well and then adjust the flash intensity +/- (usually -) to balance. If you are bouncing the flash indirectly rather than pointing it directly at your subject the manual flash setting works very well even if you move closer or farther away from your subject. If you are shooting flash on manual direct the good old Inverse Square Law will bite you in the butt every time though.

Incident readings favor highlights because the meter is reading the light falling on the subject and "averaging" that light value to middle gray. Therefore the readings tend not to blow out the highlights.

Rick

Same here.

not in my experience, not at all.

The very nature of any light meter is to react to the light energy hitting the metering cell. The cell reacts to the brightest level of light With an incident meter the dome is pointed toward the main light source. Sometimes this is the sun. The still photographer's meter sets an exposure for the amount of light energy registered by the cell. The amount of light energy is translated into the still photographic terme of expsoure; shutter speed and aperture. The exposure is set by any meter to register a middle gray (mid range) value. This is the "average" value of a typical scene (but rarely the average value of a wedding scene). if you use the exposure data that an incident meter gives you, the exposure that results will rarely blow out the highlights because it moves the high values toward middle gray. Is it foolproof? Nope and that's where the histogram and manual adjustments come in handy.

Rick

anyone?