Please spend my money

[Justin Low]

Well, I've got about $100 and I need to get a light meter.

I'm looking for a reflective meter to use outdoors, day and night. Something small and compact would be nice. Digital is a plus, as long as it's within my budget. I'm not keen on a selenium cell one as my Gossen wasn't very reliable (it's dead now).

Suggestions please?

 

[modafoto]

Well, I've got about $100 and I need to get a light meter.

I'm looking for a reflective meter to use outdoors, day and night. Something small and compact would be nice. Digital is a plus, as long as it's within my budget. I'm not keen on a selenium cell one as my Gossen wasn't very reliable (it's dead now).

Suggestions please?

hmm...I don't how much it is, but I think it's only a little more that your $100.
I use the Sekonic L-308B II Flashmate. It has both reflective and incident modes for flash and ambient light. It can give either the EV or a shutter/aperture match. And it is very small and compact. With an attachment about $7) you can measure contrast between different light sources.

 

[Justin Low]

Thanks Morten! I have played with the first version at a store previously and I quite like it. Unfortunately, it costs too much for me, even on eBay.

 

[modafoto]

Thanks Morten! I have played with the first version at a store previously and I quite like it. Unfortunately, it costs too much for me, even on eBay.

How is it? I bought mine used from the guy who also sold me his flash heads. I gave 500 DKR (approx. $75). Maybe this price is a bit low (he sold it to me because I also spent approx. $600 on the flash kit)

Morten

 

[Justin Low]

It fit my requirements very well, although I got a bit confused with the different modes (coming from a match needle meter). I especially like the sliding diffuser sphere for the incident mode. You got yours for a very good price. I remember that it was selling for S$270 (roughly $160) when I checked early this year.

It'd be great if I could afford one of those. Meanwhile, I'm looking at alternatives.

 

[Joe Symchyshyn]

Suggestions please?

"The poor man buys his tools twice"

My suggestion is to find the light meter that is perfect for you, save your money and invest in the perfect light meter... If the light meter that you really like is $160, save another $60 and get that one.

joe

 

[mark]

What about this

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=257033&is=REG

I saw one for about 100 at B&H used, a year or so ago.

 

[modafoto]

"The poor man buys his tools twice"

My suggestion is to find the light meter that is perfect for you, save your money and invest in the perfect light meter... If the light meter that you really like is $160, save another $60 and get that one.

joe

I agree...I am saving up for a lens right now ($600) and work my butt off to get it. But I know that it will be it's weight worth in gold when I get it.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

You can usually find a venerable Gossen Luna-Pro SBC for around $80-150 used. This is a classic, standard meter with a match-needle readout.

If you want something really small and compact, consider the Gossen Digisix or Digiflash. You can even mount it on your 35mm rangefinder camera and take reflective readings like an SLR with a centerweighterd averaging meter (sort of like the Voigtlander/Cosina meter). I think my Digisix was around $100, but if the Digiflash had come out by that time, I would have bought it instead. For ambient incident readings, the Digisix is just as accurate as my Minolta Flashmeter III. Then if you want a fancier meter later, you can use the Digisix as a field meter.

 

[Justin Low]

KEH has a couple of Minolta Autometer IIIs on their website hovering around $100 or so. How are they in use?

 

[Robert Kennedy]

I gotta say go with the Sekonic. Great meter. And it does almost everything. Yeah, no spot, but I always think that is best seperately....

 

[mark]

This may just be me but I find that I use my gossen luna pro a lot more than my fancy dancy sekonic with all the bellas and whistles. Lately the only time the sekonic comes out is when I am using flash. There is something about the simplicity of the luna pro-which is old as the hills and still working fine, in fact it matches my sekonic exactly.

My point is, there is no solid reason to go with the digital meters, because they are in no way better, unless you really need the multiple functions.

 

[Alexz]

Not much help though, but nevetheless would spoil teh thread by my question:
recently I begun enjoying medium format, and got tired ot lugging my 35mm gear with me for metering purposes when intending to shoot on MF only. So I begun looking for a good, not very expensive spot meter. I'm not a studio shooter, so no fancy flash metering required (can be a bonus though...), perhaps a basic incident metering would be also great in one device.

Any suggestiosn out there ?

 

[Ian Grant]

What about this

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=257033&is=REG

I saw one for about 100 at B&H used, a year or so ago.

Hi Mark

If you quote prices a currency would be very useful as your profile doesn't indicate where in the world you are posting from.

As nearly all the ex colonies now have their own currencies we have to guess its not pounds.

I should add that other countries have dollars and they aren't the same value when it comes to exchange rates.

So Justin starting this thread should have qualified his $ as again no country in his profile.

This is an international board emminating from New Zealand !

 

[John Koehrer]

Small & compact reflected/incident. How about the gossen digisix?
Don't know about Pricing in Singapore.

 

[sparx]

I bought a Minolta Flash IV meter for £50 which does everything I ask of it so far except spot reading and I can buy an adaptor for that. At the current rate £50 is, i think $100.

 

[Justin Low]

I haven't seen the Digisix/Digiflash in Singapore, but judging from it's price on Freestyle, I'd probably pay the slight premium for the Sekonic.

For the moment, I just got myself a small Gossen Super Pilot for about $25. I'd be using this with a Rolleiflex (it's off to the workshop the moment it arrives for a CLA), and I just bought 10 rolls of the Arista.EDU film to try with it.

Thanks for the suggestions guys! I will probably get the Sekonic should I need it in future.

 

[ian_greant]

Save your $100, use Sunny 16

 

[hitcher]

I bought a monolta Auto IIIF years ago, I love it!. I bought it used at a photography garage sale, I think for less than $100. I have used it for all of my shooting for these many years and it still works perfectly. The only limitation this meter has is the absence of a sync socket for remote triggering.

For what it's worth.

I also agree with the find what you want and save for it principle.
Good luck with you meter search.