sekonic 398
sekonic 398
I use a sekonic 398 -- it is big (like a small cell phone), but is very nice to use for incident readings. For some reason, the smaller meters don't seem as easy to control in use and incident meters (other than spot) are tricky for me, but that may be due to my own experience and how I think about exposure.
The 398 has a large white sphere, and you can point it at the sun, half away from the sun, or all in the shade to get a sense of the light hitting the subject, then pick the exposure. This seems harder to do with a small sphere, as it is difficult for me to see how much shade vs. sun is hitting the sphere of the meter. I find that when making multiple pictures in the same light, it is nice to meter once, then take a lot of pictures. Usually, I guess exposure, then see if the meter agrees, and often it does.
I once read a book called "Beyond the Zone System" that has great advice on using an incident meter. One point I try to keep in mind is that shade is about 2 stops less than sun, so that is a good rule to remember -- by going in the middle of sun and shade (i.e. one stop more open than sun) will often give enough latitude to include the whole range of luminance in the scene.
forgot to mention -- I like the 398, since no batteries needed.