Sat Mar 19, 2005 5:07 pm
I guess it depends on what you want to measure. If you are looking for all ambient light measurement, both general reflective and incident, you don't really need to go digital. The Sekonic L-398 was the mainstay in my bag for decades - never needed batteries and it proved to be very accurate. Eventually, I wanted a flash meter as well as a 1 degree spot meter and after considerable angst, I opted for the Gossen Starlite. I didn't get the one currently available with the swivel head, my model preceeds that. Even so, the meter was about $400 a couple of years ago but I'm sure one can be found today on the used market for less. Quite frankly, it does everything - incident, reflective and spot including calculating averages; zone metering if you are into black and white and, of course, flash metering. With digital cameras today, people rarely need this kind of metering accuracy since they can view their shot and reshoot it if they don't like it. But, with film, you don't really know what you got until after the processor finishes with it.