Handheld vs Shoe mount meters

cambolt

cambolt

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I'm now looking for a light meter for my pentax spotmatic. (internal meter is dead) Coming from the world of DSLRs and other cameras with built in meters, I have always thought it would be very clumsy trying to use a handheld meter on the street. While looking for a shoe mounted meter, I was surprised at limited number of options I had. This lead me to think that perhaps handheld meters aren't so bad. So, in your experience, are handheld meters any slower to use than shoe mounted ones?
Thanks
 
Pentax made an aux meter that mounted over the pentaprism of their SV style cameras. I don't know if it would fit over your Spotmatic, nor how accurate they would be after all these years. They do come up on ebay from time to time.

I never used a shoe mounted meter, but I have used various handheld meters. I don't find them difficult or slow to use. Not everyone would agree. I have used Sekonic and Gossen. With a strap around the neck they are there when needed, and no hassle when not. For street shooting you don't have to meter each shot anyway.
 
oftheherd said:
Pentax made an aux meter that mounted over the pentaprism of their SV style cameras. I don't know if it would fit over your Spotmatic, nor how accurate they would be after all these years. They do come up on ebay from time to time.

I never used a shoe mounted meter, but I have used various handheld meters. I don't find them difficult or slow to use. Not everyone would agree. I have used Sekonic and Gossen. With a strap around the neck they are there when needed, and no hassle when not. For street shooting you don't have to meter each shot anyway.
Click to expand...

Agree 100%. I never wanted a shoe meter for my M2. The Gossen is whipped out for a quick incident reading and returned to my inside breast pocket. Shutter speed and aperture set. The camera is up to the eye just long enough to focus and take the shot. Might not meter again for an hour.
 
Shoe mounted CV meter II

Shoe mounted CV meter II

I have always used a handheld Sekonic as well, until recently. I picked up a used CV meter II (shoe mounted), and have not used the Sekonic since. The CV meter works extremely well, and fits so nicely on my IIIC Leica.

It's just a matter of preference; both work fine.

Regards,
Reed
 
For shooting what we seem to have decided to call "street" the hand-held L-308s from Sekonic has been perfect for me, because I mostly meter indident,i.e. the light falling on the subject. But when I need a reflected reading, it switches very quickly to that mode. It becomes very second-nature.
 
Well, here is another issue: To avoid too much sky in a hand-held meter reading, one frequently tilts the meter top-forward 10 or 15 degrees when taking a reading. You can't do that as easily with an on-camera meter.
 
pgeobc said:
Well, here is another issue: To avoid too much sky in a hand-held meter reading, one frequently tilts the meter top-forward 10 or 15 degrees when taking a reading. You can't do that as easily with an on-camera meter.
Click to expand...

Why not? I do...

Cheers,

R.
 
Well, it's really hard work tipping a great big heavy Leica IIIa forwards 15 degrees, especially with the added weight of the meter...

Cheers,

R.
 
The much vaunted "Hicks camera tipping" technique is not only difficult to execute, but also vastly overrated. In theory it may achieve a more accurate exposure reading, but only at the risk of getting the wrong picture: perfectly exposed excess foreground with a truncated sky ("low ceiling error"). Practitioners of camera tipping routinely decapitate their subjects.
 
rgeorge911 said:
I have always used a handheld Sekonic as well, until recently. I picked up a used CV meter II (shoe mounted), and have not used the Sekonic since. The CV meter works extremely well, and fits so nicely on my IIIC Leica.

It's just a matter of preference; both work fine.

Regards,
Reed
Click to expand...

Yup, both are fine. I've gone the other way around. I used to use the VC Meter II on my M3 and IIIf, but lately I've been partial to wide lenses that need external finders. So I've gone to using my Sekonic L-208. At first I wasn't used to not metering every shot. But the hassle of getting the meter out of the pocket has taught me to meter only when the light has changed (and to get a feel for when that change occurs) or when I come upon a difficult scene. Not so scary with B&W film that's forgiving.
 
The advantage of "inside-the-pocket" meter readings is that they are battery-independent. It helps to use wide-latitude, rather forgiving black and white film.
 
I have a light meter application on my ipod touch (I am ready for your hate mail) and also an old weston V which seems to be working fine. As one who is fresh from automatic cameras, I have never tried just taking a reading once every hour or so. I'm assuming you just take a reading, then use this as a baseline, guessing the change in settings for each photo? I suppose if I can become good at this I will be able to do away with a dedicated meter...
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by PMCC
Is it better to take incident or reflective readings off the inside of your pocket?

oh, incident every time ... I lost that little grid-thingy years ago
__________________
Regards Stewart

I still have my grid-thingy after 35 years, but keep the incident dome on in my pocket unless the grid-thingy is needed. I learned to do that after numerous cleaings of those nasty little lint balls from the button of my Sekonic. And you can't do the cleaning in public 'cause people get testy about the lint.
 
This is the weirdest thread yet on RFF. I'm going right now to check that my Gossen isn't still in one of my jacket pockets - and get out my external finders and put one on each camera and put a match under the baseplate, tilting them forwards slightly and then turn off the light and go to bed.
 
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