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Light meters - Sekonic L-478 vs. Sekonic L-758 Cine

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Jesse Rambis

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Hi Everyone, I wanted to get some opinions on which type of light meter you prefer between the Sekonic L-478 vs the L-758. I do like how the L-478 has a more automated camera dynamic range profile software, as well as its ability to input lens ND and light ND into your readings (and a cheaper price tag). The downside is it does not have a spot meter (and anything else?). The L-758 seems to be the "industry standard" and the go to for many DPs. So which meter do you all prefer?
 
L758 cine for me

Spot meter is awesome to have
You can also input ND and/or up to 10 stops of exposure compensation and high fps
 
Great to know, thank you both for the input.
 
The feature-set on the L758 Cine is great.... but you'll never use any of it - the finger gymnastics and complexity of button combinations required to access the features are so dense and difficult to remember you basically need the manual to be able to access them.

I like having my spot and incident meters combined, but operationally the meter is a bit of a dog.
 
It's just like anything else you just have to memorize it
 
Jake Wilganowski said:
It's just like anything else you just have to memorize it
Click to expand...

It's not just like anything else. I've never encountered another device - film-related, consumer or otherwise - that was so incredibly complicated and unintuitive to use.

Keep things simple and it's no worse than anything else. But the ease goes downhill REAL fast. People should know that before buying into the L758.
 
Mark K. said:
The feature-set on the L758 Cine is great.... but you'll never use any of it - the finger gymnastics and complexity of button combinations required to access the features are so dense and difficult to remember you basically need the manual to be able to access them.

I like having my spot and incident meters combined, but operationally the meter is a bit of a dog.
Click to expand...

I completely disagree. I use almost all of the features, which become second nature if you actually use it regularly. If for some reason you can't remember a few button combinations there's even a cheat sheet on the back.
It's just like anything else that has more than one function: it has a learning curve.
Great features, great build and has been very sturdy.
 
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758 is a GREAT first meter. Love mine.

Pentax spot or spectra for an experienced DP or gaffer. But since you're asking, 758. Great fun tool to learn with, just a mess of buttons and overkill/sloppy for any practical use. :)
 
Overkill for one person are features for others, and if someone finds it sloppy it's probably because they don't use it enough. If you want to be able to set camera profiles for dynamic range of various camera system and have a number of other features a few buttons away and are okay with using your brain to get over a learning curve then the CINE is wicked. Check out the videos at the bottom of the page on setting up the meter: http://www.sekonic.com/products/l-758cine/overview.aspx If you just want a good meter that you can use right out of the box then a spectra is a super choice, especially if you're not into all the techie, digital, computer, learning stuff.


Matt W. said:
758 is a GREAT first meter. Love mine.

Pentax spot or spectra for an experienced DP or gaffer. But since you're asking, 758. Great fun tool to learn with, just a mess of buttons and overkill/sloppy for any practical use. :)
Click to expand...
 
Eric M Hurt said:
Overkill for one person are features for others, and if someone finds it sloppy it's probably because they don't use it enough. If you want to be able to set camera profiles for dynamic range of various camera system and have a number of other features a few buttons away and are okay with using your brain to get over a learning curve then the CINE is wicked. Check out the videos at the bottom of the page on setting up the meter: http://www.sekonic.com/products/l-758cine/overview.aspx If you just want a good meter that you can use right out of the box then a spectra is a super choice, especially if you're not into all the techie, digital, computer, learning stuff.
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I don't want to do any of that, I want a decent spot meter and a decent incident meter that just work consistently and correctly out of the box. The Sekonic gets close, but it's not as accurately calibrated as the Spectra (easy to fix, you can calibrate it for $100 in LA) nor is the spot meter as good as the Pentax digital spotmeter.

I have no idea why you'd want to profile it for the dynamic range of multiple cameras when you could simply remember your over/under, but again, that speaks to my preferences. It's a good meter for those who like playing with techie stuff, yes.
 
Matt W. said:
I don't want to do any of that, I want a decent spot meter and a decent incident meter that just work consistently and correctly out of the box. The Sekonic gets close, but it's not as accurately calibrated as the Spectra (easy to fix, you can calibrate it for $100 in LA) nor is the spot meter as good as the Pentax digital spotmeter.

I have no idea why you'd want to profile it for the dynamic range of multiple cameras when you could simply remember your over/under, but again, that speaks to my preferences. It's a good meter for those who like playing with techie stuff, yes.
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Yes, I'm sure the meters are sent out uncalibrated... lol
 
Eric M Hurt said:
Yes, I'm sure the meters are sent out uncalibrated... lol
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Mine was. Pretty much everyone I know (who's competent) has needed to have their Sekonic meter calibrated straight out of the box. They're often as much as a third of a stop off and the discrepancies we had between them were a real issue when shooting 35mm.

But yeah it has camera profiles cool. Maybe the next model will have tetris. "Lol."
 
Matt W. said:
Mine was. Pretty much everyone I know (who's competent) has needed to have their Sekonic meter calibrated straight out of the box. They're often as much as a third of a stop off and the discrepancies we had between them were a real issue when shooting 35mm.

But yeah it has camera profiles cool. Maybe the next model will have tetris. "Lol."
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Hogwash. Maybe ya had an internal ND set on that fancy C100 and EF lens set up:-)
 
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Eric M Hurt said:
Hogwash. Maybe ya had an internal ND set on that fancy C100 and EF lens set up:-)
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We were shooting on a Panavision Millennium with Primos and 5230.

Edit: censored for politeness.

Look, it's a great meter if you like gadgets, I just recommend getting it calibrated. :)

Not as important if you're shooting digital.
 
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