Leicameter on Leica iii

[blen]

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Hello

I am looking to add a Leicameter on my 1934 Leica iii. 

What are your experiences with this and which models should I go for?

What are the potholes to look out for when buying one?

Thanks for alle advices.

Bruno

 

[thomas_schertel]

The Leicameters are made for the M series.

You can put them on the acessory - shoe of the Leica iii, but they prevent the shutter wheel from rotating, so the shutter does not fire and you can not longer change the times. 

There have been older Leicameters from the Metrawatt factory of  Nürnberg specially for screw-mount cameras. There have been other light metres for the acessory shoe from Gossen, Metrawatt, Bewi and other brands. Actually there is the VC meter from Voigtländer. But all of them do not couple with the time wheel of the camera. This would not be possible, because it rotates when firing the shutter.

yours sincerely

Thomas 

Edited December 26, 2018 by thomas_schertel
Schreibfehler

[a.noctilux]

Hello Bruno

If you are searching for "period correct" Leicameter, there was none built in 1934.

First Leicameter was on the market from 1951 : have a look at our Wiki, here

When I use my old Leica ( some from 1930's ), I don't use usually lightmeter for b&w or color negatives.

Some other days, I use one of my modern lightmeter, Gossen, Sekonic, Minolta, etc.

What I have at hand.

Sometimes, I use Voigtlander VCMeter II clipped on the accessory shoe, or in a pocket.

Anyway, have fun with your Leica III, with or without lightmeter.

[luigi bertolotti]

If you want to find one which is contemporary to your camera… it's very hard to find one working…  : so, better to look at postwar items : personally, I have a Leicameter 2, which is the smallest one… gracious, but untrustable (I bought it for 30 Euros….) though the needle does move… I think that a perfectly working one is not impossible to find… but costly.

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Of course, if you simply whish to find a meter for using, better to look for items of today… and the Voigtlander VC is compact and fine working... (btw, I have an old selenium meter branded as "Voigtlander", in white bakelite, which is quite similar to the above Leicameter… probably made by Metrawatt as the Leicameter 2)

 

 

Edited December 26, 2018 by luigi bertolotti

[a.noctilux]

I use the tiny VCMeter II with M and LTM, when I need a small accurate/modern lightmeter

like here top on M-A, to have an idea of it's small size

silver type can be have to go with silver chrome Leica 😇

 

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[luigi bertolotti]

21 minutes ago, thomas_schertel said:

The Leicameters are made for the M series.

...

Thomas 

Thomas, your statement is someway correct in strict philological sense…  There were "Leicameters" made for screwmount Leicas (see above) but seems that those were named as "Leica - Meter"… while the single-word term "Leicameter" was used only for the M version…

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Edited December 26, 2018 by luigi bertolotti

[thomas_schertel]

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Thank you, Luigi. I remembered those Leica-Meters but not exactly.

yours sincerely

Thomas

[willeica]

Early meters in working condition are almost impossible to find. For an LTM camera it is better to use a modern separate meter such as the Gossen Digisix 2 or the iPhone light meter app. If you want one in the shoe try the Voigtlander VC Meter II. You must always remember to transfer the settings to the camera as there is no coupling with any of these meters. The Gossen will give a nice range of options, though. With early LTMs with the 50mm Elmar I tend not to change the aperture much, but rather to vary the shutter speed. It is much easier on the fingernails. 

William

[wlaidlaw]

I have been trying for some time to find someone who has spare selenium cells for the Metrawatt made early small selenium Leica-Meters but have now given up. Ian Partridge the Weston Master guru says he has also given up, as does George Milton of Quality Light Metrics. Apparently the successor company to Metrawatt could supply spare cells up to the mid 2000's but ran out of stock some years ago. They will not be making any more. For larger meters, like Weston Masters, there are various selenium cells which can be persuaded to fit but the small Metrawatt meters used a custom made and very small cell, made by Metrawatt themselves. You cannot cut down a larger cell as that breaks them. I have a near dead Leica-Meter II and a Metraphot III (pretty much identical) which reads a little over 1EV low. 

I tend to use the very neat Voigtlander VC2 meters on my Barnack cameras. They are small, accurate and have a very easy to use interface . I was told by a Voigtlander dealer,  that they may be either out of production or about to be, so if you want one, I would not hang about. Apparently they were not listed in Voigtlander's latest trade catalogue. 

Wilson

Edited December 27, 2018 by wlaidlaw

[frame-it]

i just bought a new vc2 meter last week..list price was $258, they gave it to me for $160..i use it on my iiif

[wlaidlaw]

One point to note on the Voigtlander VC2 meters is that when the battery is low, they still work but are inaccurate. I found this out last year, when checking various lightmeters against each other (mainly my 3 MR-4 Leicameters, all of which had been rebuilt by different folk and disagreed with each other). I found a 1EV discrepancy between my then new black VC2 and my four year old chrome VC2. I was using a professional Polaris digital spot meter and my recently rebuilt and recalibrated Weston Master V as my standards. I changed the batteries on the older of my VC2 meters and they then agreed with each other and the two standards. I will now make a point of changing the batteries in my VC2's once a year. 

Wilson

[willeica]

19 minutes ago, wlaidlaw said:

One point to note on the Voigtlander VC2 meters is that when the battery is low, they still work but are inaccurate. I found this out last year, when checking various lightmeters against each other (mainly my 3 MR-4 Leicameters, all of which had been rebuilt by different folk and disagreed with each other). I found a 1EV discrepancy between my then new black VC2 and my four year old chrome VC2. I was using a professional Polaris digital spot meter and my recently rebuilt and recalibrated Weston Master V as my standards. I changed the batteries on the older of my VC2 meters and they then agreed with each other and the two standards. I will now make a point of changing the batteries in my VC2's once a year. 

Wilson

Agreed Wilson. I find that the relatively small Gossen Digisix is the most accurate meter and gives the most options. It comes with a little strap and you can wear it around your neck, like a Hollywood Director. 

William

[blen]

Thank you all for the comments and advices

I think I will start with a Digisix

Happy 2019

Bruno

[spydrxx]

The Metrawatt Leica-meter was my first one which I used with rangefinder bodies long before I got my first Leica. It was modestly accurate when I could read it, but really no better than the sunny-16 guidelines. You could use a hand-held meter which might be period correct, and slightly more accurate if the cell inside is up to snuff.

[wlaidlaw]

If anyone wants a reliable period meter, I would highly recommend Ian Partridge, ian-partridge.com  He totally rebuilds Weston Master meters, so that they look like they came out of the Sangamo factory yesterday and probably work better and more accurately than they did when new. He installs a new selenium cell and then calibrates them very accurately. They come with the incident light meter dome, silk cord, restored zip up case and a reproduction manual. Here is the one I bought from him a few years ago. One additional advantage is that they have the old style Leica speeds shown, as well as modern. 

Wilson

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Edited December 27, 2018 by wlaidlaw

[spydrxx]

My father used the Weston V and got great results...such that as time and technology passed he never upgraded.

[Pyrogallol]

I have been using a Sekonic  Twinmate L208 for some years and find it very accurate, small and easy to use, I use the incident cover nearly all the time, it can be clipped onto the top of the camera. I have a couple of Weston meters which still work but they are a bit large and heavy to carry with a small Leica.

I had a couple of the small Metrawatt meters a few years ago but the one I was using did not like being left near a spare car battery and it stopped working.

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[schattenundlicht]

+1 for the Twinmate.

At first, on unboxing, I was very disappointed by the flimsy appearance and feel, which seemed rather inadequate for the price point. However you can have it dangling around your neck for the whole day without noticing it, and it does what it is supposed to do rather reliably.

The Twinmate displays the newer standard exposure times and apperture settings, yet it also shows ticks for the older numbering found on vintage cameras. The EV display is helpful for Hasselblad cameras and for Zone Exposure considerations.

Because of the very small slide on „light dome“, one should take incident light readings with a grain of salt, all the more so in difficult lighting conditions.

The battery seems to last for ages and the built in battery tester assures that you will have consistent readings until it is time to change the battery.

EDIT: I never use the Twinmate with the accessory shoe mount on a camera. I find it less displeasing aesthetically and far more flexible to use handheld, switching between reflected and incident readings or excluding sky for semi-selective readings (in reflected mode the angle of measurement is 33 degrees).

Edited December 28, 2018 by schattenundlicht