Since I started shooting professionally in 1990, I've retired most of my older camera gear.
With new technology coming out every day (especially since digital), I find that I turn over camera gear quite fast. But the one item that I am still using today is my trusty Minolta Auto Meter IIIF light meter!
However recently, I found that my meter was not working! It was stuck with one reading only (showing an error) and I couldn't figure it out! I thought perhaps it was a low battery, so I went out and bought another 6 Volt battery to fix it (it's a special size.) It still registered wrong.
Disheartened, I started to look around for a replacement.
I was really upset... the cost of a new meter was over $250 but it was not that I could not afford a new one... I was not happy that my trusty old meter had died. So I decided I'd fix it the way I used to fix things at the San Diego District Attorney's Office (where I had worked in the past)... I "whacked it" on the palm of my hand! Whenever someone came to me to ask me to fix some piece of equipment at the DA's office, my standard answer was, "Whack it!" Often, it worked! So I suppose I shouldn't have been too surprised when the Minolta meter came back to life after "whacking it!" Perhaps I jarred something inside or perhaps it unstuck the "measure lock" button or something, but it works again!
This meter is super accurate and I just could not let it go without giving it one last try. I'm glad I did and I'm glad it works again!
I use this meter for incident light readings and also to measure the output of my studio flashes. While it's 18 years old, it's as accurate as any of the current models out there. And, it's the only piece of camera gear I still use today since day one of shooting professionally.
The only other items I still use today since the early days are my studio backdrop stands and my light stands and one of my studio tripods. They are still around as well. But they are not as old as this meter!
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