The Lit Duo 1 is a handheld light meter and colour meter in one

It looks like there’s a new player in town when it comes to handheld light meters. While they might have fallen a little out of fashion for a while, they’re starting to become more popular again. Unfortunately, there’s really only been one big name in meters for the last couple of decades.

Until now. Lit Systems has announced the new Lit Duo 1. It’s has all the features of the typical incident meters we know and love, but it’s a colour meter, too. It measures white balance (including green/magenta shift), colour spectrum (including CRI), light flicker frequency and more.

Lit Duo 1 – A new generation of light meter?

Light meters used to be huge in the film days. Just about anyone who shot in a studio owned one. As we switched to digital and learned the convenience of the histogram in the early 2000s, they started to fall out of favour. Now, they’ve started to come back – particularly for video. But out of all the companies that made meters back in the day, the only one still around and making them is Sekonic.

Here we are now, 20 years later, and Sekonic has remained unchallenged. Sure, there are a handful of compact, inexpensive meters from the likes of TTArtisan and AstrHori, but they’re not for users with any kind of advanced need.

Now, that appears to have changed. On paper, the new Lit Duo 1 appears to blow Sekonic’s flagship L858 light meter away – and for not much more money. In fact, you’d end up needing to buy several devices to cover everything the Lit Duo 1 does.

What can it do?

The Lit Duo 1 lets you meter things in the usual way you’d expect from a light meter. It lets you measure the light in multiple priority modes. There’s even a video exposure mode where you can enter things like your frame rate and shutter angle.

It’s also able to measure the overall brightness of the light in lux. For photographers, it can measure flash duration. This is something the L858 can do, but it’s not a common feature on other meters at all. Even the L858’s predecessor, the L758DR, couldn’t do it.

You’re able to look at the colour accuracy of your lights. You can see the exact colour temperature and green/magenta shift of your light source. You can see the CRI and amount of the colour spectrum covered by a given light fixture.

You can also monitor adjustments from RGB and bicolour LED lights in realtime to check your adjustments are getting you where you need to be. Bluetooth and an app on your smartphone gives you a full remote control touchscreen interface.

One fundamental difference between the Lit Duo 1 and the two Sekonic meters mentioned above is that this does not include a spot meter. It’s an incident meter only. So, if you were planning to go shoot large format landscapes, this isn’t the meter for you.

But for the studio or locations where lighting brightness and colour accuracy are important, this looks like it could be a great alternative to the long-established competition.

Hopefully, when it gets into users hands, it will be able to live up to expectations. Because right now, it looks pretty slick!

Lit C1

I’ve not mentioned this so far because I think the Lit Duo 1 is worth the extra over this. But the company has also announced the Lit C1. For those who already have a light meter they’re happy with, the Lit C1 is basically a Lit Duo 1 but without light exposure metering capabilities.

It uses the same colour sensor as the Duo 1 and records all of the same information. White balance, G/M offset, colour spectrum/CRI, etc. It also has light flicker detection but it just can’t read exposures.

Again, if you already have a light meter you like or you think you’ll literally never need to meter light, then it might be worth looking at the Lit C1. But I think it’s still worth going up to the Lit Duo 1 – just in case.

Price and Availability

The Lit Duo 1 and Lit C1 are launching on Kickstarter on July 10th. Pledges for the Lit Duo 1 and Lit C1 for €504 ($545) and €564 ($610) with discounts up to around 40% during the campaign’s run. Items are expected to ship in March 2025.

Disclaimer: We only share crowdfunded projects we believe are legitimate. However, most of those projects are not in a delivery state. Make sure you look into the project and make an informed purchasing decision. While some projects may offer amazing rewards, others unfortunately may not deliver on their promises.

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