jcsorensen wrote:
I just received a Minolta IV F light meter that I got off of E-bay. As I'm reading the owner's manual, it says you use the Spherical diffuser to take a flash reading and for ambient light readings.
However if you want to get the ratio of a main flash to fill flash , it says you need the flat diffuser on the meter. Can someone explain this to me as to why this is? Will the spherical diffuser get you in the ball park when working lighting ratios, or will it not even be close?
Look forward to playing with my new toy--just wish I didn't have to be at work so much so I could play a lot more.
With the flat diffuser the meter becomes very directional so the reading you get when you point it at one flash won't (or shouldn't be) influenced by a second flash.
But I use the same meter you have with the regular spherical diffuser to set up lighting ratios. I meter each light individually to calculate the lighting ratio, so the advantage of the flat diffuser (which I have) is pretty much moot. Even when I have both flashes firing, in order to get a combined exposure, I can get good individual light outputs by just flagging the meter with my hand.
That by the way is my work flow. Meter the main, set up the fill so it's almost a stop under the main (1:3 lighting ratio); then with colour slide or digital capture I measure them together which gives me my exposure. The limited latitude of slide or digital requires this approach and you still get a ratio that those media will handle.
"There's never time to do it right. But there's always time to do it over."
Canon 5D, 50D; 16-35 f2.8L, 24-105 f4L IS, 50 f1.4, 100 f2.8 Macro, 70-200 f2.8L, 300mm f2.8L IS.
