Best cheap light meter?

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Hello, All.

I am looking for opinions on what you believe are the best choices of cheap used ($20 or less) light meters.

I have inherited my Grandfather's Leica IIIF RDST with collapsible 50mm Summicron, and plan to have some fun with it shooting mostly landscapes. I have been studying the exposure charts available on this website, and hope to reach the point where I don't need a meter, but one would be helpful while I am learning.

The online auctions have what seem to be hundreds of vintage meters listed for sale. I do realize that a large number of selenium meters have given up the ghost, but assuming that the meter is in good working order, what are your recommendations amongst the many Gossens, Westons, etc.? Again, price is an issue - the Digisix, Polaris, VC Meter are all cost prohibitive for me at this early stage.

Thank you for any opinions.
 
I hate to state the obvious, but a sub-$20 meter will probably be less use than sunny-16. If you do get lucky and find one which is within a couple of stops of accuracy, then it will be quite expensive to shoot enough test film to be confident enough to use the meter at each end of it's scale and for precise results. I'd suggest spending the money on a few rolls of cheap colour-slide film instead and use that to practise metering by eye.

EDIT: It reads as though I am advocating sunny-16 as a meter replacement. Sorry about that, I was meaning as a temporary thing until you can manage to spend somewhat more on a reliable and accurate meter ! To keep that simple, remember that hearing-aid batteries can be a workable replacement for the old mercury cells, but that something using a current battery size would be even better.
 
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I have a 'Metraphot 3' which I use and it's great, seems pretty accurate though most of the time I'm using it to weigh up shutter speeds and aperture values. There are normally several on eBay but some sold 'AS IS' i.e not working. Keep your eyes peeled and you'll find one. It's nice and small, too.

ped
 
The $20 limit looks a bit tight to me too - and Mablo, I think Leningrads are probably a bit more common in Helsinki than Atlanta.

In my experience, OLD Westons, IIs and IIIs, are more reliable than IVs and later. You need to set Weston speeds instead of ISO (next step down), and the Invercone incident light dome is more difficult than with later models, but that's minor.

My own suggestion to the OP is that you go along to a camera club, and explain your situation, and someone will probably give you a working meter. Especially if you let them play with your IIIf.

Cheers,

R.
 
I was on the same boat few weeks ago. I went to ebay hunting for meters. I got myself a nice little Super Pilot for less than 15 shipped, and wasn't expecting much for something this cheap. To my surprise, the little gem worked and very accurate, matches the meter on my DSLR almost completely even with the old batteries.
 
Gossen

Gossen

Hi, my first was gossen sixtomat, it´s great, even has incidental cover that slips into place, and protects the selenium cell from getting old.
Bought it for 20 usd.
Now i have two of them, they have two scales, one for the old speeds and newer ones.

Selenium cells are ok!


Bye
 
Roger Hicks said:
The $20 limit looks a bit tight to me too - and Mablo, I think Leningrads are probably a bit more common in Helsinki than Atlanta.
Click to expand...

Dear Roger, I don't think so. FSU cameras or other photographic gear were never imported here as far as I know. The only western country at the time where Soviet cameras (maybe light meters too) were sold was UK. I have a Zorki 4K which was imported to the UK in the -70's.

There is however a common place where both we in Helsinki and people in Atlanta buy our gear: http://photography.shop.ebay.com/?_...id=p3910.m570.l1313&_nkw=leningrad&_sacat=625
 
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Mablo said:
Dear Roger, I don't think so. FSU cameras or other photographic gear were never imported here as far as I know. The only western country at the time where Soviet cameras (maybe light meters too) were sold was UK. I have a Zorki 4K which was imported to the UK in the -70's.

There is however a common place where both we in Helsinki and people in Atlanta buy our gear: http://photography.shop.ebay.com/?_...id=p3910.m570.l1313&_nkw=leningrad&_sacat=625
Click to expand...

That's interesting. Thanks.

Cheers,

R.
 
Kyle Cassidy and I made this a few years back and it works real good. :D
lightmeter3.jpg
 
Yes, it is 11 YO thread. And phone metering app is the only right answer by now for the question in title of this old thread.
But if you are OK with modern rangefinder world pricing, then Twinmatte is good.
I purchased it for something like 90 USD new shortly after getting used, working M4-2 for 650 USD.
Now M4-2 is well above 1K USD, but I don't think TwinMatte price went too high.
 
I just picked up another tiny shoe-mounted Vivitar 24 CdS for under $20.00 shipped.
It works fine with a single 1.5V 44/76/357 cell and reads a surprisingly narrow area.

Chris
 
Best cheap light meter?

So many vintage meters out there to choose from... Yes this day and age phone app meter. But, if you want to quasi-period meter with incident capabilities check out the over-built/over-engineered black enamel wrinkle finish GE DW-68 meters. They are heavy but pretty cool. I found a working version w/case for $15. And... ...no batteries required.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I suggest the V-201x show mounted meter. Available over eBay for about $60. I have a video comparing it to the L-208 on YouTube.
 
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