Why use a light meter: somebody persuade me.

[E. von Hoegh]

Please...Do sell them. Sell them all.
You have clearly stated your metering preference.
Sell the meters, so they can be put to good use by those who may want/need them.

Marc

+10

[BradS]

I haveto agree with others...
Sell them all...i could definitely use at least one of them

Also agree that the necessity/usefulness of spotmeters is highly overrated.

[wiltw]

IMHO the usefulness of spot meters is a little over-rated, and certainly, three are two more than enough.

Spot meters are so overrated that

1. I have some form of spotmetering in six of seven metered cameras (Olympus OM-4, Bronica ETRSi, Olympus G2, Canon S95 ...all except the Olympus OM-1 which I purchased new 35 years ago, Canon 40D, Canon 5D).
2. with my handheld meters, my Minolta Autometer Vf incident meter has a 5 degree spot attachment, and my Minolta Spotmeter F reads one degree, so when I have these along, virtually every camera I own is accompanied by spotmetering.

When one understands how meters work, spotmetering is very useful to have.

[Terry Christian]

Although it can be handy to everyone, spot metering is done primarily in large format photography, where it is absolutely indispensable. Your mileage in 35mm or medium format may vary. If I were you, I'd still keep them.

[E. von Hoegh]

I haveto agree with others...
Sell them all...i could definitely use at least one of them

Also agree that the necessity/usefulness of spotmeters is highly overrated.

You may want to reconsider that claim.
While the necessity is certainly overblown, the usefulness is just as certainly not.
Just because you don't value a spot meter doesn't mean others don't find one very useful indeed.

[BradS]

Just because you don't value a spot meter doesn't mean others don't find one very useful indeed.

Yes. Obviously.

[E. von Hoegh]

Although it can be handy to everyone, spot metering is done primarily in large format photography, where it is absolutely indispensable. Your mileage in 35mm or medium format may vary. If I were you, I'd still keep them.

Of course it isn't "absolutely indespensable" on large format or any other format.

But a spotmeter is very useful for establishing brightness range, and sometimes a spotmeter is the only way (inaccesible scene) to do so. A spotmeter is of value on any size piece of film.

[ntenny]

If I understand correctly, the options mentioned by the OP don't cover incident metering, right? If the meters on your d*g*t*l cameras are reading the same as the separate ones, then that's a perfectly good substitute for reflected metering, and I assume the 5D can do spot metering as well. I get a lot of use out of incident metering, but not everyone does (though there are those who would argue that everyone *should*).

Also, the 5D is a pretty bulky load compared to even a large light meter, has more things that could go wrong, and is a major expense to replace if you drop it in the lake while metering that tricky shot off the edge of the boat, or whatever. (I'm not sure what the other d*g*t*l camera mentioned is, so maybe it addresses some of these issues.)

If I were you, I'd take one of the meters out and use it for a day, then decide if you feel like it offers advantages over what you've been doing.

-NT

[LJH]

At $20 per sheet of film, I'll use the most accurate tool I can get.

I don't have the option to bracket, nor do I have the room/weight/desire available to carry a digital, so I learned how to use a spot.

[Pioneer]

If I absolutely need to ensure that something is properly exposed then I use a meter. If I can get next to it I much prefer to use an incident reading. If it is too far away for that then I use a spotmeter to get the reading. Otherwise I just use Sunny 16.

Please keep in mind though that I usually shoot negative film, mostly black and white, some color. Slides are entirely different. If you shoot slides you need a really good meter, otherwise you are not getting the best you can get.