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light meters thefamilyman !!rTVzm2BgTOa
well, i've decided to get a large format camera (in the long term, gotta save my monies first and slowly buy related equipment)
The first being a light meter.

I've been looking around, i cannot afford US$400+ seems like the average price for a fairly good one, but i have come across 3 that seems to be of good value.
1. Kenko KFM-1100 US$229.95
2. Sekonic L-308S US$184.00
3. Sekonic L-358 US$239.00
(all from Adorama, this is where i do all my US shopping from)

I dunno really what one to get. I'm not using any remote fire flash system, and i have a PC flash cable, but i dont plan to use flash with large format so flash reading will only be an added bonus.

this is a long shot to get some decent answers from /p/ but i know there will be atleast one or two who know what they are talking about.
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>> Teus !QbSstcPD6U
I guess those are incident light meters. they're better, but I would just use a DSLR as light meter. it will give you a better sense of previsualisation.
>> Anonymous
/p/ lurker here.

could someone explain these things? why/how they are used... wtf's up with the little white ball, etc. i do video alot, would one of these useful for me?
>> Anonymous
>>104374
here's a general rule on life: if you've never heard of it, you probably don't need it
>> thefamilyman !!rTVzm2BgTOa
>>104364
using a camera for metering is an option, but only useful for reflective metering, not incident measurements.
>> thefamilyman !!rTVzm2BgTOa
bump for help.
funny how /p/ can go on and on about the same topic thats been repeated so many times, like what camera should i buy, what better film or digital.
>> Anonymous
>>104750

Because 99% of the people here will never use or need one.
>> Anonymous
>>104374
The meter in your camera measures reflected light, or light that bounces off of a subject, and what a light meter does is measure light that's falling onto a subject, or incident light.

a light meter is useful if you: a, dont have a camera with a meter (ie, medium large and old camera types) b, want to get more accurate measurements while doing flash photography on film
this might come in handy with video, but i have a feeling that youre not at the technical level to need one if you dont even know what one is
there more but thats the basics and i dont feel like typing anymore
>> Anonymous
I've had a Sekonic L-308 (the predecessor to the 308S, I think the only difference is the LCD backlight), and it's a very good meter. It does everything I could want an incident/reflected/flash meter to do, and it's very accurate.

Ultimately though, it doesn't really make much difference. I prefer one that has an LCD readout and both incident and reflected metering as well as automatic and PC-sync flash modes. Anything other than that is pretty superfluous in my opinion. The only other feature that would be great to have is a good spot meter, but that tends to come at a significantly higher price.

>>104364
I hate using an SLR as a meter for my LF camera for several reasons. First, it means I have to carry an SLR with a lens in addition to all the LF crap. Second, it limits me to only reflected light measurements. Third, it's easy to be shooting with the SLR and forget to set the ISO back to match the film that I'm using in the LF camera, and a wasted exposure on 4x5 is a pretty big deal. Fourth, with DSLRs the numbers don't always quite match up. Manufacturers tend to fudge their ISO numbers to make the camera look like it has better noise performance than it really does. They do this by underexposing a bit, then pushing the exposure in the in-camera processing. Obviously this leads to exposure discrepancies between the film and digital cameras, mostly with low light or high ISO situations. Fifth, the aperture range on the SLR will often not match up with the aperture range on large format lenses as they tend to go much higher than most 35mm-format lenses. While you can work around it, it's just another hassle that I'd rather not deal with. Digital cameras also usually don't offer low enough ISOs to give directly comparable settings to several popular large format films.
>> Teus !QbSstcPD6U
>>104771
thanks for the enlightment!