Light meters are passe now. All you need is a P&S camera.Originally Posted by Brian Ellis
Don Bryant
Light meters are passe now. All you need is a P&S camera.
Don Bryant
ed and tim, i'd gladly donate $10 to paul's favorite charity for the pentax spotmeter article. FWIW yes, paul basically said that the fancy calibration (zone VI?) didn't make any difference to the spotmeter performance.
michael, yes there was an excellent trove of references.
regards
pete
The Zone VI meter has much less IR response than an unmodified meter. I compared both meters readings taking of a MacBeth color checker through a Hoya R72 filter. If I remember correctly, there was a 6-stop difference.
“You often feel tired, not because you've done too much, but because you've done too little of what sparks a light in you.”
― Alexander Den Heijer, Nothing You Don't Already Know
If I remember, Paul checked the modified meter and an unmodified meter with real (modern) film. In that comparison, the results were the same. IR response and different color response do not necessarily translate into different results on film in the camera. It also might be that mods made a difference on some old, now gone, emulsions that had different sensitivities. I know the Tmax films were engineered to have a different sensitivities than the older films, and there is a special Tmax filter factor chart showing a reduced blue sensitivity, i.e., skies look better without as much filtration.
Personally, I would buy the digital Pentax meter rather than a premium for a Xone modified meter.
Ed Richards
http://www.epr-art.com
As I recall Paul's test showed less than half a stop difference between a Zone V and a non Zone V meter. I think he concluded the conversion did little to create a better image. This is from the cobwebs of my mind! I use a un modified analog Pentax V!
Wally Brooks
Everything is Analog!
Any Fool Can Shoot Digital!
Any Coward can shoot a zoom! Use primes and get closer.
I don't remember the testing methodology he used, just his conclusion. But when I decided to buy the Pentax digital spot meter I bought the modified version from Zone VI. I hadn't read Paul's article at the time but my reasoning was that the modifications were unlikely to hurt anything and who knows, they might do some good in some situations. There wasn't a huge cost difference between modified and unmodified, about $100 IIRC.
Brian Ellis
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you do criticize them you'll be
a mile away and you'll have their shoes.
Unfortunantely he'd denied any cacheing of his old web pages (presumably using a robots file) so no historic information.
Still Developing at http://www.timparkin.co.uk and scanning at http://cheapdrumscanning.com
Do a search on this forum. There was considerable discussion about this subject with him here.
Last edited by Kirk Gittings; 26-Nov-2009 at 17:29.
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
That's about it. I believe he's now using a 5D2. My understanding was with that, he was no longer using 4x5. He's a most helpful fellow. When I was planning a trip to the Oregon coast, he offered up a mountain of information that was a great help.
paul has re-posted these articles on his website. they can be found by clicking on the "writing" tab.
pete
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