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Gossen Sixtino 2

Back in the mid-90's i read an article about the importance of light meters in photography. I had no idea how to use them and i was getting very nice results from my Praktica's lightmeter but still i felt like i wanted to have one. And so i did, i bought this little gossen sixtino 2 lightmeter. I went out shooting a slide film on my vacations and when i developed it i was really disappointed with the results. No wonder of course, since i had no idea how to use it in the first place. I threw it in a drawer and kept it there for almost 12 years.
A couple of years ago, when i bought the Zeiss Ikon Nettar, i realized that it wasn't very convenient to carry with me the digital camera just to take some reading so i thought that i could buy a new one since the little Gossen was left in Greece. And i did, i bought the Seconik Microlite from a charity shop which worked well for a year until it started giving erratic readings. I had to call my parents to post me the old gossen.
The Gossen Sixtino 2 is a tiny little light meter that reads both incident and reflective light. It is a selenium light meter so it does not need any battery to operate. When you don't use it, put it in a case as the selenium element will eventually die if it is left in the light.

Measuring reflective light with the Gossen can be a bit tricky.If you point the meter towards the scene it has the tendency to be fooled by the sky and underexpose.












I always tend to point the meter towards the ground which it tend to give more accurate readings.












If you switch the meter on to incident reading it tends to provide very thing negatives. No surprise of course, it is trying to emulate the 18% gray tone. Here is an example of what i mean. The grass is almost the same tone with the gray on the bottom of the picture.












I tend to measure with incident reading and give 1 stop overexposure. I usually get very nice results then.













Conclusion

The Gossen Sixtino 2 is an excellent light meter. It provides both incident and reflective readings. It is small, uses selenium element and it is light enough to always carry it with you. As with all incident light meters, it takes practice but the results will worth it. If you are looking for a light meter don't forget to take a closer look on this one. You might be surprised.

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