light meters for ancient times?
 

Im looking to get into photography school (langara) and suddenly had a thought about light meters.
how useful are light meters? are they only useful for film photographers?

ive heard mixed opinions about light meters saying that if i shoot digital, i dont need one.

what are your opinion on them?

Just dont want to spend my cash for something i ultimately dont need.

it's good to have to understand the light better rather than trial and error with the digital.

what kind of light meters are you talking about?

the ones built in the camera are kind of the same in film or digital to me

from what i understand, the palm sized ones can give you a lot more information

im looking at the L-358...other sekonic are too expensive

I use my L358 at every shoot.

Plus it makes me feel important =P

I use it mostly cause I work with flash strobes. So by knowing what the power ratios are between the lights on the subject I can control the key, fill, and background better.

lol i was once told by my lighting prof in film school that once you're experienced, you pretty much dont need a light meter, but you had to occasionally stop production and pull it out to play with a bit so ppl on set will feel your worth the thousands of dollars a day they're paying you haha. Pretty much for show haha

I was prepping for a concert gig during a band's sound check one time.

Every time they stopped to make adjustments in the sound board or whatever, I jumped on the stage and started metering for the different areas of the stage.

Basically an excuse to introduce myself to them and now there are talks about making their album covers =)

Seriously though, a light meter is very useful. I use film for some of my shoots so it saves me from wasting exposures and I can't chimp on film LOL

Get a Minolta light meter. They are cheap nowadays and do excellent job.

The main difference is that you get a much more precise metering for flash setup. At least that's what I used meter for, you can get an exact composition of the frame at the exact lighting you want when you compose shot with single/multiple flashes. The in-camera flash can only do so much. Plus, you can spot meter beyond anything your camera can ever do.