In the 1960s my father got
me a used twin-lens reflex camera, and, with a few rolls of Kodak Plus-X
in hand, this teen-ager set out to photograph New York City. Lacking
a light meter, I learned to guess exposures following guidelines on
a cue card. Full sun, partial sun, deep shade, and cloudy day numbers
helped get me a reasonable exposure and I fixed the mistakes in the
darkroom as best I could. It wasn’t long before I was given a
General Electric Exposure Meter that measured light in foot-candles.
It measured light with a simple battery-less photocell, and by selecting
the measured values on a rotating metal dial I could calculate the exposure.
I had never heard of the Zone System and didn’t think very much
about highlights and shadow detail, but the primitive meter gave me
a far better exposure than the guessing method. Meters have come a long
way since then.
Enter the Sekonic Dualmaster L-558. With my primary work being nature
and landscape photography—shooting with view cameras and 35mm—this
meter gets me closer to a world of perfect exposures than any other
meter I have owned. In short, this one tool cuts no corners in its ability
to spot meter reflected light and strobes, store and display multiple
and average readings, utilize exposure and filter compensation factors,
and analyze light ratios. And, it can remotely trigger cameras and studio
strobes. It will measure in 1/10 stop intervals and, though I lack bench-testing
equipment, I have complete confidence in its sensitivity and accuracy.
