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Pentax SL

The Pentax SL is a meterless version of the Pentax Spotmatic SP camera, the two cameras are identical save for the meter. The Spotmatic cameras were a popular line of 35mm SLRs produced by the Asahi Optical Company in Japan, in the 1960s and 70s. The SL has a cloth, focal plane shutter capable of a top speed of 1/1,000th of a second, running down to 1 second, plus a Bulb mode. Like other Spotmatics, the SL uses the M42 threaded lens mount. Pentax did manufacture an add-on meter that attached to the top of the camera, in order to give the SL metering capabilities. This camera also has a self-timer.

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Pentax SL with Meter

The Pentax SL hearkens back to a time when built-in TTL light meters were revolutionary, not commonplace. Imagine a time when photographers had to train their eyes and minds to be able to look at the sky or the light on the ground and make a split second estimation of that light; calculating, based on education and experience, which shutter speeds and apertures were appropriate. With a bit of practice, a photographer was not hindered in the slightest by evaluating light.

When light meters starting to become better and more common, they were first carried by hand. Eventually, they were built into the cameras themselves and, as they slowly became our constant travel companions, we set aside the knowledge we had learned, or had never needed to pick up in the first place. We no longer had to know light quite so intimately, for our cameras could tell us what we needed to know. Such is the march of progress and technology, and it carries with it both benefits and losses.⠀ ⠀

Though we suppose that nothing is really stopping you from learning light in that fashion. It is easy to apply the Sunny 16 rule. A machine such as this Pentax SL, the meterless version of the Spotmatic, has all of that camera's sleek beauty without the temptation of metering. Well, ok, it has a meter atop it, but this can be removed and left at home.⠀ ⠀

We write this a bit tongue-in-cheek, but we actually do recommend that you at least guess your exposure before checking your camera's meter (or phone app). As a photographer, little harm and much good comes from encouraging yourself to pay more attention to light.⠀ ⠀

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