A lightmeter vs digital P&S camera?

[Naumoski]

Hi,

I'm about to purchase a Rolleiflex next weekend which meter isn't accurate. What concerning me is the metering of the light, i use other film cameras but with built and accurate meter and haven't used a lightmeter or digital camera for metering, and that might be a little awkward.

Can i relay on getting good exposure using a digital P&S camera, or I should try to found a light meter?

The main usage would be shooting portraits, and that's why I don't want to make silly mistakes.

I would probably use B&W T-max 100 films and Portra 160/400 VC, if that's make difference.

Thanx.

 

[ChrisN]

I'd prefer my light meter, as my digi P&S iso sensitivity doesn't seem to match up with my film iso sensitivity. But if you consistently use a particular digi P&S, and adjust your personal film speed and developing to match, there's no reason why it should not work.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Another vote for a light meter. With negative films, exposure is keyed to the shadows. With digi, it's keyed to the highlights. This means that with negs, you give the minimum exposure possible without 'blocking' the dark areas to a featureless black. With digi, you give the maximum exposure possible without 'blowing' the highlights to a featureless white.

Where are you?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Matus]

Digital P&S can bse used as a light meter, but you need first check its true ISO it can be off as much as 1 stop. Just try to compare to some light meter or a DSLR (those are usually more accurate). Then go ahead and shoot a roll of Something like Velvia or Provia to check whether the procedure works for you. Just do not forget - your shutter needs to work correctly too.

There is one caveat though - one tends to slip to using a digital camera as light meter without thinking - just checking the screen. Now one day you may need to work with normal light meter and may fail to judge the exposure properly.

 

[oftheherd]

As ChrisN says, you should be able to make a P&S digital work, but it would be a lot of work, experimenting and all. There will probably be some experimenting with a light meter to get photos the way you like them nonetheless.

But if your primary goal is to do portraiture, a hand held light meter will be even more necessary. After all, you probably will want to use different lighting ratios in portraiture.

 

[Ezzie]

A DLSR with spot and/or centre-weighted metering does work. But I´d rather not trust a P&S, I wouldn´t know what it based its decisions on. And in rather low light conditions they tend to blow it anyway.

 

[ChrisN]

Of course the other bad thing about using a digi P&S for a meter is finding that the digi images look better than the film photos. That's depressing.

 

[Darshan]

I use to use my GF1 as my light meter, it was cumbersome, I was not getting spot on exposures and I was not thinking much about the light. Few weeks ago, I got a Sekonic L-208 (very cheap) and I love to use that little meter...incident + reflective and my test roll came out perfect. Now I only carry my M4 (and the light meter) with me. 😉

 

[Naumoski]

Another vote for a light meter. With negative films, exposure is keyed to the shadows. With digi, it's keyed to the highlights. This means that with negs, you give the minimum exposure possible without 'blocking' the dark areas to a featureless black. With digi, you give the maximum exposure possible without 'blowing' the highlights to a featureless white.

Where are you?

Cheers,

R.

I'm founding your post very helpful and true in practice.
I'm afraid a P&S without manual control of the exposure/apperture might not be practical.

I'm in Macedonia.

Also, the hand development of B&W film by the lab might variate in the exposure and ISO of the film.

 

[Naumoski]

Maybe I should try first to found a lightmeter in the local photo labs and some old photographers, if I found a working one, to try it out, comparing with a digital camera.

 

[Neare]

You could always try leaving any sort of metering at home and do it on intuition... or sunny 16 perhaps. You might surprise yourself 🙂

 

[David Hughes]

I will vote for a light meter. Especially one that can give you incident light readings. These are very useful for portraiture.

Regards, David

 

[emraphoto]

All the point and shoot is going to give you is reflective metering. I mean you can probably sort it out from there with a little thinking but a handheld seems way more accurate and faster for difficult lighting.

 

[jamesdfloyd]

All light meter, All the time. If it is worth taking the picture, it is worth taking it right - use a handheld light meter.

 

[Steve M.]

Get yourself a light meter. If you are going to be doing low light portraits a selenium one won't work in low light, and the older CDS cell meters can take a while to give accurate readings in low light. I finally spent the money (about $100 US for a used one) and bought a Sekonic L-308B Flashmate because of it's ability to do low light metering. That's not something I do much of, but film and processing is not cheap, so after a few mistakes w/ cheap meters I should have just bought the Sekonic to begin with. There are so many variables w/ photography that it's best to eliminate the possibility of error in every stage of the process. Without accurate exposures you never know what's going on. Learn to use a hand held meter and you will save yourself a lot of trouble and money. Same w/ your shutter. Either buy an inexpensive shutter tester, build one from the plans on the web, or have your camera tested so you know at which speeds it's really firing before you waste money and film.

 

[Naumoski]

I know that there are other threads about choosing a lightmeter, but can you point me some good models, and also which type of meters like: for incident light, spot meter, reflective light.., should I look for?

 

[sig]

Another vote for a light meter. With negative films, exposure is keyed to the shadows. With digi, it's keyed to the highlights. This means that with negs, you give the minimum exposure possible without 'blocking' the dark areas to a featureless black. With digi, you give the maximum exposure possible without 'blowing' the highlights to a featureless white.

Where are you?

Cheers,

R.

Based on this, does that mean that light meters are only good for film and not for digital? Or are the specialised light meters for digital?

thanks

 

[Roger Hicks]

Naumoski, Sig:

Spot meter = maximum possible control with negatives (TRUE spot, not in-camera 'spot')

Incident light = quickest, easiest route to good exposure in transparency, Polaroid and digital.

Negative: http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/ps expo neg.html

Slide/digital http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/ps expo slide.html -- though of course you can get a LOT out of a RAW or DNG file: the module needs updating, as I wrote it before I got a decent digital camera.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Naumoski]

Naumoski, Sig:

Spot meter = maximum possible control with negatives (TRUE spot, not in-camera 'spot')

Incident light = quickest, easiest route to good exposure in transparency, Polaroid and digital.

Negative: http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/ps expo neg.html

Slide/digital http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/ps expo slide.html -- though of course you can get a LOT out of a RAW or DNG file: the module needs updating, as I wrote it before I got a decent digital camera.

Cheers,

R.

Roger,
Thank you for the links, they are deeply descriped, I will browse through them.

all the best.