Lightmeters what's good?

[BBJ]

Hi All, well been looking at Light meters and there are a few but looking at Sekonic not sure which one yet as i see Poon has thenm so not sure on pricing for these via forum. Sometime after Xmas i might by the lights i have been toying with on getting so a light meter will be needed.

Garry might have more idea on these as wlel as you fellows doing studio stuff so lets here what you use or so on.
Thanks
John
BBJ

[robw25]

john
i have a konica minolta vf works ok cost nearly $500 when i bought it

cheers rob

[wendellt]

i've only used this one - VF

http://www.warehouseexpress.com/index.a ... nolta.html

[Nnnnsic]

The Minolta's are good as are the Sekonic's.

[PiroStitch]

i just bought a 2nd hand sekonic l-308s and it works beautifully. It's an incident, reflective and flash meter.

I was going for the Minolta Auto VF as well, but the guy at the shop (no it wasn't a retailer like Teds or Michaels) said he's had issues with the Minolta Auto IV where the needle(?) kept giving inaccurate readings. Nothing wrong with it, just needed maintenance as with anything else.

[Antsl]

Buy Minolta, more reliable than Sekonic in my experience.

[Oz_Beachside]

I have a Gossen Digi Flash 6. It is my first meter, so all was new to me at the time. It had a larger display, and easy to read.

Had I thought ahead a little more, I would have realised that wireless might be useful, and as I am now looking at wireless triggers like pocket wizards, I am looking for a suitable wireless meter.

Sekonic own, or are in bed with Pocket Wizard, so they are a good match.

The Sekonic L308 is about $150 new on ebay, L358 is a hundred more, and the L558 is about $500. Both the L358 and the L558 can take optional radio cards, to fire your pocket wizards (imaging may work to other triggers...). Think the cards are about $150.

[Oz_Beachside]

Buy Minolta, more reliable than Sekonic in my experience.

I was told the "Minolta Auto VF " was almost a standard amongst industry in Melbourne, however the brand name was changing?? Bought out by someone else? Cant remember, maybe a HP or someone?

[Antsl]

Konica and Minolta merged about four years ago and so since then all their equipment has been branded Komica Minolta. They are still making light meters and they are still the industry standard.

My preference for a meter is the Minolta Flashmeter V ... it is no longer in production however it is great for a couple of reasons. The best feature I like about it is that it has a beep function that advises you when it receives a flash pulse in wireless mode. This is so good because it confirms you are getting the reading you are expecting, particularly when you are working outdoors with fill flash.

Also has flash to ambient ratio, auto mode selector (it flicks between ambient and flash mode automatically) and has a backlight for those times your working in the last of the light for the day.

I use this meter a lot, even with digital. If you can find this meter, buy it.

[xorl]

Konica and Minolta merged about four years ago and so since then all their equipment has been branded Komica Minolta. They are still making light meters and they are still the industry standard.

That would be excellent news. Everything I've seen indicates that Konica Minolta have dropped out of the market. Do you have any links that show otherwise?

[joey]

Hi All, well been looking at Light meters and there are a few but looking at Sekonic not sure which one yet as i see Poon has thenm so not sure on pricing for these via forum. Sometime after Xmas i might by the lights i have been toying with on getting so a light meter will be needed.

Garry might have more idea on these as wlel as you fellows doing studio stuff so lets here what you use or so on.
Thanks
John
BBJ

What are you going to use it for?
Do you only need a light meter or do you want to use it with the flash light too? Does it have to come incident and reflective measuring? Should it be digital or anolog meter is good enough? Does it have to be compact so you can mount it on
your camera or hanheld is suitable too?

[gstark]

Mark,

In the camera side of the business, the Konica-Minolta IP has been acquired by Sony, who want to try to grab a slice of the DSLR pie.

While their stated aim is to try to get a fair proportion of the pro market, that will require some serious work on their part in order to get people to move from Canon and Nikon.

Sony will need to produce some very robust products for that to happen, and that, sadly, is not their forte.

Now, how much of this carries over to the lightmeter side of the business I simply don't know.

I'm not sure that I like the idea of a Sony lightmeter: the Sunpak that I use must be about 18 years old now, and still stands me in good stead. Hands up those who have any Sony branded that is more than ten years old and still serviceable?

John,

Why are you thinking in terms of a lightmeter? While I certainly wouldn't discourage this sort of purchase, I'm curious as to what uses you'd be putting it to, as much of your work is action based photography, and as such, it's probably a little less condusive to the use of this sort of tool.

FWIW, when using mine, I prefer to use it in incident mode: I find that this gives me the most accurate/pleasing results. That said, be sure to learn to use it in all modes, and to fully understand the differences in those modes and how they operate.

[PiroStitch]

Good luck finding the Flashmeter 5 All I found were the Auto meters, which are more the student base models. Then again I needed mine in a rush and didn't check ebay :S

Minolta have been bought out by Sony and apparently there might not be any lightmeter manufactured anymore If there are, it'll probably come with a mp3 player built-in

[Antsl]

Hi again,

Thanks Gary, I had forgotten that fact about the Sony buy out. That being said there is still no reason why you cannot get yourself a Minolta Flashmeter V like the one I have off eBay. check out this one....

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Minolta-Flash-Meter-V-light-meter-excellent-condition_W0QQitemZ260060921436QQihZ016QQcategoryZ708QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[BBJ]

Hi All, well been looking at Light meters and there are a few but looking at Sekonic not sure which one yet as i see Poon has thenm so not sure on pricing for these via forum. Sometime after Xmas i might by the lights i have been toying with on getting so a light meter will be needed.

Garry might have more idea on these as wlel as you fellows doing studio stuff so lets here what you use or so on.
Thanks
John
BBJ

What are you going to use it for?
Do you only need a light meter or do you want to use it with the flash light too? Does it have to come incident and reflective measuring? Should it be digital or anolog meter is good enough? Does it have to be compact so you can mount it on
your camera or hanheld is suitable too?

Joey, well all i am going to do is buy some lights that i have been wanting to do for sometime to experiment with and wellmy photo sales paying for it so thought why not. I do get asked a lot to do group shots but knock them back at some of the sport clubs like babseball teams etc...

As i am all new to this and normally hate flash so i gather that i would need 1, so i plan to do maybe some of this type photography and general stuff around with portraits and thought with a flash meter of some sorts could save some time. Thats my plan anyhow.

[joey]

As i am all new to this and normally hate flash so i gather that i would need 1, so i plan to do maybe some of this type photography and general stuff around with portraits and thought with a flash meter of some sorts could save some time. Thats my plan anyhow.

What is your budget?

[BBJ]

Garry, and all i am wanting to get some small studio lights like a couple of 400 watt flash heads etc.. to play with and like i said in prevous post i also want to try something different other than my motorsport but do get asked to do team photo's at some of the clubs so thought maybe somewhere down the track a meter could be a handy item to have and maybe get this right without too much hassles.

Ok i will be getting a wireless trigger to set the heads off and like there is a few around wasnt sure what would be good for the bucks, and well once you have got the gear even if not used all the time i will have it and well can be handy later on if i slow down a bit.LOL

[joey]

For around $200-$220AUS you can get yourself a Sekonic L-308S.

Pros:

It's digital,

-compact
-accurate
-can be used with flash light
- AA alkaline baterries are used.
Cons:

No aperture priority on this light meter
It's handheld and cannot be mounted on the camera

[BBJ]

Ok Joey, thanks yes small is good but yeh i was thinking about the 358 or even the 558 in that brand as i have not found the Minolta meter on any sites yet in OZ. Maybe the Sekonic L358 might be a good start. When i decide to buy one as i know Poon has them.
Thanks for the help as this is all new to me. But well have to learn somehow.

[redline]

i use a sekonic 358 with the pocket wizard attachment, great for firing lights without wires everywhere.
i paided 189$us a couple of years ago me thinks

[xorl]

Yep, from everything I've seen Sony has just taken the core camera business from Minolta and left everything else rotting. It's a little sad that Konica Minolta was widely recognised as the leading light meter brand when they sold everything to Sony. I can't see that Sony will ever have any interest in a niche professional product.. I guess Sekonic is celebrating tho' .

I got lucky and found a "new" Minolta light meter a few months ago. Otherwise I would have just picked up a Sekonic 308 or 358.

[gstark]

Yep, from everything I've seen Sony has just taken the core camera business from Minolta and left everything else rotting. It's a little sad that Konica Minolta was widely recognised as the leading light meter brand when they sold everything to Sony.

KM were well respected - and deservedly so - for a lot more than just their flash meters. In the late 70s - mid 80s, Minolta cameras were very highly regarded, and it's truly sad to see them in the hands of Sony.

John,

Ok, I think that pretty well anything from the units you're looking at will do the job that you're needing to be done. It's really a matter of how deep your pockets are, and which bells and whistles you feel you're going to need.

The radio trigger is great, but most lighting solutions also provide optical and hard-wired trigger options as well. Optical can be triggered from, say, any onboard flash, noting that the D2X doesn't have this luxury. A dialled down SB-whatever though can work great.

When looking at your prospective lighting solutions, and for shooting groups, remember to consider the likely size of the groups that you'll be shooting: larger groups will require a larger amount of real estate for them to stand on, and in turn that means that your lights will need to be set a greater distance from your subjects.

This means that you'll suffer greater light fall-off because of that increased distance, and thus you may need some extra power and/or more light sources.

Regardless, what youre needing is to get some degree of even illumination across the whole area occupied by the group, and for smaller or lower powered lighting solutions, the extra distance involved may demand your attention, if not prove to be a bit of a challenge.

[BBJ]

Thanks Mark and Thai, yes well i think this is the way to go then no hassles so will get our headman Garry to do some checking at some stage to on some figures from our Faithfull distibutor Poon. So after xmass when everything is not such a rush i will look into it.

[jerrysk8]

i have an L-358 with the p-dub chip. love it. wouldn't get anything else.

[Oz_Beachside]

My preference for a meter is the Minolta Flashmeter V ... The best feature I like about it is that it has a beep function that advises you when it receives a flash pulse in wireless mode. This is so good because it confirms you are getting the reading you are expecting, particularly when you are working outdoors with fill flash.
.

Do other meters have this beep function? I am finding my simple meter doesnt, and now that I use it in non-corded mode, I would like the audible sound.

Wondering if anyone has used the sekonic L-558, or the minolta VI?

[Greg B]

I have a Gossen Lunasix F, direct, incident, flash. German made, 25 years old, never missed a beat. The leather case still smells like leather. It is a beautiful instrument. Fully analogue, no beeps, turn a dial, line up the needle, slip into retro heaven.