Sekonic L-158 vs Minolta CLC different readings?

[HLing]

As a beginner I often walk around with the selenium cell sekonic light meter with or without camera to learn and memorize the lighting. At times when I have my Minolta SRT 201 I often find that the readings of the Minolta internal light meter is different from the sekonic reading. Shouldn't them be pretty close?

Whenever I get to borrow the Leica IIIf I rely on the sekonic, but at this point I've not had enough images to compare yet.

I'm just wondering, before committing to memory (OK, maybe that's an impossible task anyway), if the accuracy of the light meter is camera specific?

(In the mean time, with the availability of a darkroom suddenly up in the air 🙁 I'll have to go film-less and just work on estimating the distance by eye and then checking with the focussing....)

 

[ath]

The Minolta CLC is a kind of early and simple Matrix metering. It has two zones, upper and lower half in landscape orientation. The lower half dominates the reading. This leads to differences compared to normal meters.

 

[HLing]

Yes, I have noticed that the needle position changed when I hold the camera vertically. So, when using the Minolta if I wanted to take a portrait orientation I should first meter it horizontally then?

 

[Landshark]

Personally I'd meter vertically to average the reading.

Regarding memorizing lighting, It's not a matter of memorizing a lot of situations.
Use the Sunny 16 technique and interpret what you want from there. It works like this:
1/ISO @f16. So if you shoot 200ISO film it's 1/200(250) @ f16 for bright sunny scenes. In the shade, 1/200 @f11 +/- a bit. It's not perfect but it's close for more information just search it's been discussed pretty often.
Take your meter and check it out, you're going to be surprised how constant it is.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Personally I'd meter vertically to average the reading.

Regarding memorizing lighting, It's not a matter of memorizing a lot of situations.
Use the Sunny 16 technique and interpret what you want from there. It works like this:
1/ISO @f16. So if you shoot 200ISO film it's 1/200(250) @ f16 for bright sunny scenes. In the shade, 1/200 @f11 +/- a bit. It's not perfect but it's close for more information just search it's been discussed pretty often.
Take your meter and check it out, you're going to be surprised how constant it is.

This is 1/3 stop UNDER, even for the (highly dubious) 'sunny 16' rule. Go to 1/125 and you'll be 2/3 stop over .. a much safer bet with neg film.

Too right it's not perfect. People get away with it because pos/neg photography is extremely forgiving, and most people don't care much about shadow detail.

Bear in mind that 'sunny 16' goes back to the '50s, before the 'safety margin' was dropped in ASA speeds and box speeds doubled overnight. A much safer bet is 'sunny 11' and in the shade you may well be a good deal better off with 1/125 at f/8 rather than 1/250 at f/11.

Cheers,

R.

 

[ath]

So, when using the Minolta if I wanted to take a portrait orientation I should first meter it horizontally then?

Actually my advice is to use a different meter when using the SRT. I highly dislike "thinking" (aka Matrix-) meters, especially when they are so simple.

 

[oftheherd]

Just to confuse you more, even meters from the same manufacturer may disagree one or 1 1/2 stops. Then you try to compare an old meter which is probably center weighted, to a matrix meter. Your best bet is to try doubling your exposures; one as the Minolta says, one as the Sekonic says. Check the negatives after normal exposure, see which is best exposed, and gives you the photos you prefer. You can also adjust either one if needed, by changing ISO if needed.

 

[HLing]

Thanks all for your input! I read them, had to think a bit, and then was whisked away to go shoot in Central Park 2 hours before B & H and Adorama closed down for one week. As a result, I had to use Fuji Superia X-tra 400 film when I ran out of B & W.

So, right there I applied my the first lesson a passerby told me the when I first took the camera out to shoot a few months ago: When using color film, set the ISO down to 50 if the film is actually 100.(is this what Oftheherd is talking about?)

I didn't test out the sekonic vs minolta this time since I didn't use the Leica. Usually I would press the stop-down button and I'd see the needle go under about the same amount that it's OVER. So, I'd leave it. or even up it slightly. In this case, Landshark's advice to meter it vertically made sense.

I'm glad to have, between Roger and Landshark, finally gotten an explanation of "sunny 16", as I'd been reading references about it without really knowing just what it is. Though I'm not sure what Roger said meant about this: "..Bear in mind that 'sunny 16' goes back to the '50s, before the 'safety margin' was dropped in ASA speeds and box speeds doubled overnight...." I tend to lean towards wider aperature anyway, somehow never really wanting to use 16 for whatever instinctual reason, so that's what I did.

"...Actually my advice is to use a different meter when using the SRT. I highly dislike "thinking" (aka Matrix-) meters, especially when they are so simple." Ath, I wondered about using an external meter for a 50 mm and a 135 mm lense with the Minolta. Wouldn't it be better to figure out the offset of the internal meter (or use the vertical orientation) + the stop-down for ref when I'm swapping lenses within a roll of film?

Anyhow, they say, "a picture is worth a thousand words"...well, I got 3 rolls of the films developed. Not a one was overexposed. A few were a little darker in places, but sharp. so, all in all, indeed film is quite forgiving. For the B & W rolls I'll have to see when I get them developed.


Thanks again all, for giving me things to think about!🙂

 

[ath]

"...Actually my advice is to use a different meter when using the SRT. I highly dislike "thinking" (aka Matrix-) meters, especially when they are so simple." Ath, I wondered about using an external meter for a 50 mm and a 135 mm lense with the Minolta. Wouldn't it be better to figure out the offset of the internal meter (or use the vertical orientation) + the stop-down for ref when I'm swapping lenses within a roll of film?

I suppose when this camera is the only metered one you use you can gain experience how to compensate in different situations (with this specific metering system; I use several different cameras and like to have the same metering pattern to make life easier). With negative film metering is less important than with slide film; just be sure to err on the overexposure side.

Didn't get the bit about stopping down.

 

[HLing]

..Didn't get the bit about stopping down.

On the Minolta SRT 201 there is a Depth of Field Preview button that stops down the aperature to whatever I have set my F stop, when pushed down (if it's not at the maximum aperature) it will show a different, usually darker lighting. I've not been quite sure how well it works because I've not printed many shots yet, but this last week having the color film developed gave some good results, so I'm learning to trust it.

 

[ath]

When you activate stop-down on the SRT the metering is no longer correct with MC and MD-style lenses.

 

[ZeissFan]

I wouldn't spend much time looking at differences in meter readings. An SLR's meter pattern is different from a handheld meter and therefore will give you a different reading.

Which is correct? Shoot exclusively using the readings from your handheld meter and then with the camera's meter. Figure out which works best.

I almost always find small variations in readings from my handheld meter and a camera's in-built meter. In the end, I stopped worrying about it.