icanimagine Loc: Sacramento, Ca

I'm shooting with a Canon 7d and a 580 Ex II with two 430 Ex II speedlights. My question is how to meter my flash with a Sekonic L 358 flash meter. I'm confused on what to set the flash at before metering the output. Should I just go with Ettl and then make adjustments according to the light meter?

GoofyNewfie Loc: Kansas City

Manual..

CaptainC Loc: Colorado, south of Denver

First - you cannot be in the TTL mode and meter it. The flash/camera combination is sending out TTL commands and it is not meterable (is that a word?).

You can meter your 580/430 but they must be in manual.

You need to set the 358 to the mode with the lightning bolt. Not the bolt with the little c or t.

Set it so you are showing the shutter speed you are going to use. This is so it can compute the flash/ambient ratio.

press the button and the meter waits for the flash to occur. So give the flash to your subject to hold with the meter aimed at the light you are metering. When the flash fires, you will have your reading. I think the flash waits 90 seconds, but that is in the manual.

Remember, NO TTL. In that mode the camera is doing the metering and an external meter is useless.

icanimagine Loc: Sacramento, Ca

Thank you. That is the answer I was looking for.