Do you worry about absolute accuracy of your meter

Like Jason I use and need to have an accurate spot meter. I use the spot meter for exposure of my transparencies. The meter is used to check the exposure range and the brightest part of the scene;the brightest readings are normally corrected to obtain the proper exposure to maintain highlights. I usually expose in 1/2 to 1/3 stop increments.

Rich

If you are the type of person that uses a meter BEFORE you make a photograph then you need to concern yourself about the deviation of your meters accuracy over time before you bother with a single reading from it because it will get you in trouble over longer periods of time and that is a fact. Consistent measurement linearity is the desirable end point.

And accuracy drift over time does not have to be linear - your high or low readings can go all to hell quickly and you would not be aware of it because we all attribute the crappy results to operator error. Selenium cells deteriorate over time, micro vibrations on airplanes and in automobiles do have a cumulative affect on micro circuitry. The meter calibration industry is not a sham and in general few people concern themselves with this important support component to their photography.

I personally send my incident and spot meters in for a caibration every other year and I always talk to the tech that does the work. I have yet to have less than 1/2 stop of adjustment and a couple of times I was off over a full stop +. I remember dropping it just before I sent that meter in and it was a good thing that I did. Considering how much I pay for ULF sheet film, it is cheap insurance.

Cheers!

My in camera meter is 20 years old and gives perfect slides

Markok765 said:

My in camera meter is 20 years old and gives perfect slides

Click to expand...

One of mine is ~20yo and another is ~30yo and yes, both seem to expose properly, even with Kodachrome, in the real world.

I recently recalibrated the QL17 GIII so I could use 1600 film. For a while I was obsessing over using something as a standard, other than comparing it with the 20yo Pentax and adjusting so they agreed.

On one hand, I would feel a bit more warm and fuzzy if I could compare these with some kind of a known standard.

On the other hand, the recalibrated camera passes the sanity checks of test rolls, both using 200 film in everyday conditions and 1600 film in dim light.

Oh well ...

dmr said:

One of mine is ~20yo and another is ~30yo and yes, both seem to expose properly, even with Kodachrome, in the real world.

I recently recalibrated the QL17 GIII so I could use 1600 film. For a while I was obsessing over using something as a standard, other than comparing it with the 20yo Pentax and adjusting so they agreed.

On one hand, I would feel a bit more warm and fuzzy if I could compare these with some kind of a known standard.

On the other hand, the recalibrated camera passes the sanity checks of test rolls, both using 200 film in everyday conditions and 1600 film in dim light.

Oh well ...

Click to expand...

On my last roll i had 4 photos that were underexposed. surprisingly, none that were overexposed