Anybody have any experience with light meters?

[Malaxos1]

My wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I told her a light meter. Because she didn't have a clue she asked me to just get the one I wanted. So I got a Sekonic L-358. Pretty nifty gadet. From what I read that made me decide on geteing the meter is that the are much more acurate than a camera's built in meter as it doesn't measure reflected light as cameras do. Instead it measures the actual light falling on to the subject. Also I was told by the teacher in a wedding photography course I took last year that it was a must. Anyway I pointed my Digital Rebel at a object in my house and got a reading of 1/20 @ f 2.8 ISO100 and the Sekonic gave me a reading at 1/10 @ f 2.8 ISO 100. Guess which one was more acurate; the Sekonic. Now that is twice the shutterspeed, while not a huge difference in actual time it did expose the shot correctly. There is no need to mess with levels at all and there is more detail right out of the camera. My question to those who have used light meters is how do you use them? What is your approach? Anything you could share? Please let me know...Dean

[Motorsports Photo]

I use a light meter occasionally for only one thing: Finding out exposure when I only have my 50's stereo camera.

True a light meyter can be more accurate because it is more versatile with the ways it can handle light. Do you need it now? In the days of film you didnt have a "preview" when you did the shot. Now you can pop it up on the little screen and see if it looks right and check the histogram for exposure.

Oh yeah, and they come in handy for checking exposure when you have a portrait flash set-up.

A light meter is a tool I seldom use, but you may find more uses for it than I do.

-Pete

[w10d]

One brief point - generally when measuring the light falling on a subject, hold the meter at the subject and point it at the camera. If there is strong side lighting you may want to point the meter at the light source and expose for that reading, letting the shadows darken.

A meter is very useful if you want to take control of lighting, with flash, tungsten, mixed lighting and even just reflectors.

HTH.

[iwatkins]

I still keep my light meter in my bag as it has a spot meter. When doing landscape shots or sunset shots I simply set the camera up on a tripod, load up Cokin filters etc. and then frame for the shot.

Once that is done I don't want to be moving the camera about to get meter readings off the sky, a mid tone, the shadows. Especially so at sunset when light levels are changing very quickly (although you wouldn't know it as your eyes adjust). None of the 10D meter modes work too well in this situation.

This is where the meter comes in handy as I can quickly get three or four meter readings and then set the aperture/shutter speed manually on the camera. This is basically the only time I set the 10D to "M".

I find this methods more satisfying than my old method which was to set up the camera, and bang out as many shots as I could while messing with apertures/shutter speeds, seemingly randomly. :)

All other times, I find the 10D meter to be pretty good but I usually have 1/3 to 2/3's compenstation in to avoid highlight blowout. I can recover the shadows later in PS.

Cheers

Ian

[scottbergerphoto]

The Sekonic L358 and the new L558 are great meters that work for ambient as well as flash metering. The L358 can also be used for reflective metering like your camera meter. You have to remember that a meter just gives you a reading. That reading must be interpreted. When you use the L358 as an incident meter, hold it in the light of your subject, it is a measurement that doesn't take into account the reflectivity of the subject. It also doesn't take into account variations in lighting like shadows that may be in a different part of the picture. When your camera meters, it is a reflected reading. It is measuring light reflected off the subject. It also must be interpreted. It is set for an image that averages out to 18% grey(as is the incident meter but is not affected by the reflectivity of the subject). If your subject is darker or lighter then 18% grey, you have to figure out how to compensate for that (Zone System). Dark objects need less exposure then the meter says and light objects need more. My point is that a light meter is a wonderful tool to have. To get the most out of it, you need to understand what each kind of meter is telling you about that subject.
An additional benefit to both of those meters is that for $25, you can add a module to the battery compartment that intrfaces with a Pocket Wizerd wireless slave system so that you can trigger your strobes wirelessly to meter.
I suggest you read," The Confused Photographers Guide to the Zone System" by Farzaad.
Happy Metering,
Scott

[DaveG]

Malaxos1 wrote:
My wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I told her a light meter. Because she didn't have a clue she asked me to just get the one I wanted. So I got a Sekonic L-358. Pretty nifty gadet. From what I read that made me decide on geteing the meter is that the are much more acurate than a camera's built in meter as it doesn't measure reflected light as cameras do. Instead it measures the actual light falling on to the subject. Also I was told by the teacher in a wedding photography course I took last year that it was a must. Anyway I pointed my Digital Rebel at a object in my house and got a reading of 1/20 @ f 2.8 ISO100 and the Sekonic gave me a reading at 1/10 @ f 2.8 ISO 100. Guess which one was more acurate; the Sekonic. Now that is twice the shutterspeed, while not a huge difference in actual time it did expose the shot correctly. There is no need to mess with levels at all and there is more detail right out of the camera. My question to those who have used light meters is how do you use them? What is your approach? Anything you could share? Please let me know...Dean

I use a Minolta IVf Autometer. It's an incident meter with a built in flash meter capability.

It's primary function - to me - is to set up studio strobe lights on location. I can use it to set ratios and there no practical way to do this with a DSLR except by a lot of trial and error. So I still use it.

But you could use your built in meter to get an approximate exposure and then check the histogram to see what has exactly been recorded. After that review you can tweek the exposure as you see fit. My point is that you should probably do the same thing with the exposure that the Sekonic gives you as well.

One thing to make sure you do is to point the incident meter's dome BACK towards the camera position. The meter is measuring light that has "incidently" fallen on the subject. The camera must see the same light or your exposure will be off.

Another thing about incident meters is that they will NOT be able to handle a very light or very dark subject with film of limited latitude. I once carefully metered a frozen leaf stuck in a small stream. The overall image was dark as the brown bottom of the stream was visable. Anyway the shot - done on transparency film - was underexposed. Even my lightest one stop bracket was too dark. The slide film just couldn't handle the latitude. Digital "film" isn't much better, especially on the overexposure side. The incident meter is a good tool but it isn't a perfect one, so be careful.

[rodbunn]

I use it 90% of my portrait shots with my 10D, it works out much better than the built in meter. Also, when I set up my second strobe at wedding receptions I have to use a light meter to get the f-stop I want from that light..... It beats taking a bunch of test shots.

Good luck, Rod

[Yance]

Meters aren't magic tools that you click to give you the perfect exposure to use in your camera. If that's what you expected, you are in for a big surprise! You have to understand how they work and also what they are measuring. Then you have to know what effect you want.

[Vegas Poboy]

I have the sekonic L358 & it has saved me multiple times with film & digital. I use it in the studio & outdoors on just about anything I'm going to turn in for classwork or sell. A good reference guide is the hand exposure book alot of great info.
Good purchase, carry an extra battery.
Poboy

[Malaxos1]

The reason for getting the meter is primarily for weddings. I totally understand that with digital I get instant results. The problem is that I don't want to have to or depend upon reshooting because I got a wrong reading from the camera. I understand that it could still happen even with a hand held. The thing is, from my research before getting is that if you have real understanding on how to properly use the meter, you will have greater sucess overall. That is what I am looking for. My few test shots with the hand held reqiered no adjustments in levels. So I am looking for as much understanding on how to use them as possible.