ddb@mrvax.DEC (DAVID DYER-BENNET MRO1-2/L14 DTN 231-4076) (11/13/84)
70-210 mm lenses: The Vivitar series 1 (latest version) is a good choice, as were the earlier versions at the time. I have a friend who does prefessional rock band work who now has two of them, and is very pleased with them. I've got the Series 1 28-90mm which is slowly displacing most of my Nikon fixed-focal-length lenses from my camera case (always excepting the 24mm f2); I'm very happy with the optical quality. The top-line Vivitar lenses, particularly the Series 1, are as good as the bigger names, as far as I can tell. Light meters: Depends on what you do. I have the Gossen Luna Pro F, which doesn't have the sensitivity of the SBC, but which reads flash. If you don't need to read flash, get the SBC (and save some money). On the other hand, for most situations requiring a separate meter, a spot meter (say 1 degree) is the only way to go. You can sometimes approximate the effect by going close with a wider-angle meter, but not always. Incident readings are of very limited usefulness unless you mostly photograph "average" subjects (in which case a wide-angle reflected reading will work pretty well most of the time also). The problem with incident readings is that the brightness range of the real world exceeds the brightness range of the films we have, so you can't afford to ignore the reflectivity of the subject. Also, of course, you can't always get your meter into the same light as the subject. -- David Dyer-Bennet -- ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-mrvax!ddb