The AstrHori XH-2 is a good hot shoe light meter. It is well built, it looks great, it works, and it does not break the bank. If you want a compact reflective meter that sits neatly on top of a vintage camera, this is an easy recommendation.
This review took me three days to shoot because of a sequence of disasters that were entirely my own fault. I shot whole rolls with the multiple-exposure switch accidentally on. I diagnosed a dead camera battery as a gummed-up lens and retired a perfectly good lens to the repair queue. The meter, throughout all of this, worked perfectly. I was the unreliable component.
So this is a review of a good light meter, wrapped around a comedy of errors that is entirely about me and not about the product.
The XH-2 and its predecessor
This is the second AstrHori meter I have reviewed. The first was the AstrHori AHM-1, which some of you will remember because I took a piece of sandpaper to it (as the instruction manual actually suggested, to expose the bare brass underneath for a worn vintage look).
Side by side, the XH-2 and the AHM-1 are basically the same light meter. Same specs, same internals, same metering. The differences are the form factor and a slightly improved build quality on the newer XH-2. AstrHori clearly learned some lessons from the AHM-1 and rolled those improvements into the XH-2. So if you are choosing between them, the decision is really about which shape you prefer. The functionality is identical.
I prefer the XH-2. I am not going to construct an elaborate justification for why. I just prefer it. The little white ring around the multi-function wheel gives it a retro edge, a bit like the wheel trim on a 1950s Cadillac, and the styling suits the Bronica ETRS it lives on. That is reason enough.
![PLACEHOLDER: the AstrHori XH-2 and AHM-1 side by side, showing the difference in form factor]
What it is and how it works
The XH-2 is a compact reflective light meter designed to sit in a camera’s hot shoe (or cold shoe). It is a reflective meter with a 30-degree angle of measurement, which is a reasonable middle-ground angle, roughly equivalent to the view of a 60mm to 70mm lens on 35mm. Not telephoto, not super wide, a sensible average.
The controls could not be simpler: one wheel and one button.
- Press the button to wake it up
- Turn the wheel to change the active value (shutter speed or aperture)
- Double-press the button to switch between shutter-speed priority and aperture priority
- Press and hold to switch between constant metering (always reading, press to lock) and on-demand metering (only reads when you press)
- Short-press then long-press drops you into ISO setting, which you change with the wheel, then a single click takes you back
In shutter-speed priority you set the shutter speed and it gives you the matching aperture. In aperture priority you set the aperture and it gives you the shutter speed. Standard reflective meter operation, cleanly implemented with minimal controls.
That is the whole meter. It is not trying to be a Sekonic. It is a simple, well-made reflective meter for people who want a clean analogue-feeling metering experience on a vintage camera.
Day one: London, and the multiple-exposure disaster
I mounted the XH-2 on the speed grip of a Bronica ETRS, which conveniently has a shoe mount, and took it to London where I had work.
Loaded Portra 160, fitted the 40mm lens, metered, shot a roll. The first frame of the roll turned out to be many frames blended together, because I had the multiple-exposure switch on without realising. With the speed grip fitted, the switch is hard to see, which is my excuse, but the truth is I just forgot to check. Then I managed to mess up my video camera settings, so I lost the footage for the rest of that roll too.
Most of the frames came out nicely exposed, a couple slightly under, hard to tell whether that was me or the meter. Given the day I was having, probably me.
Day one continued: the lens that was not broken
Changed to a fresh roll of Portra 160 and switched to the 250mm lens for some long-lens work. The 30-degree metering angle is wider than the view of a 250mm lens (which is more like 8 or 9 degrees), so I had to read between the lines a bit, interpreting what the meter was seeing versus what the lens was actually framing. That is fair enough and entirely reasonable for a reflective meter of this type. You use your brain to fill in the gap.
The roll came back with one image and the rest blank.
My immediate diagnosis: the leaf shutter in the 250mm lens had gummed up. Bronica ETRS lenses have the shutter in the lens, so a gummed shutter is a real and common failure on old lenses sitting unused. I retired the 250mm to the repair queue and moved on.
This diagnosis was wrong, and the reason it was wrong is instructive, which I will come to.
Day two: the Severn, and the multiple-exposure disaster again
Back out, this time near the River Severn. The broken 250mm abandoned, I fitted the 75mm lens (which I had checked and confirmed working), loaded Kodak T-Max 100, and set off along the Severn path.
The night before, I had switched the camera to multiple-exposure mode to test the lenses without winding film. And I forgot to switch it off again.
So I started the day shooting multiple exposures by accident, for the second time in two days. Fortunately I caught it after only a few frames this time, went back, and re-shot everything so it would look like the day had gone smoothly. It had not. I remain an idiot.
The shooting itself, once I was actually metering correctly, went fine. The classic Severn Bridge view, some compositions with trees in the foreground, a red-filter test where the meter cleanly showed the three-stop adjustment the red filter required (1/80th at f11 became 1/13th with the filter on). Then onto a darker stretch of the coast path, onto the tripod, stopping down to f16 for a 4-second exposure.
And then the camera stopped firing.
![PLACEHOLDER: a Severn-side frame on T-Max 100, showing the kind of high-contrast scene that challenges a reflective meter]
The penny drops
The camera not firing, when the multiple-exposure switch was off, was the moment my brain finally started assembling the clues.
The 250mm lens from the day before. The 75mm lens now. Two different lenses, both apparently failing. What do two different lenses on the same body have in common?
The body.
The battery in the ETRS was dead. Had been, probably, since partway through day one. The “gummed-up 250mm lens” was not gummed up at all. The camera simply did not have the power to fire the shutter. I had retired a perfectly good lens to the repair queue on the basis of a dead battery.
The ETRS even has a battery test button on it. Did I press it at any point across two days of cameras mysteriously failing? I did not. I have spent so long around old mechanical cameras that my first instinct when something stops working is “gummed-up lens” rather than “dead battery,” even on a camera that needs a battery to fire and has a button specifically for checking it.
I need a clip round the ear.
Day three: London again, and a chat with a security guard
Day three. Went home, changed the ETRS battery, everything worked perfectly again. Back in London with the remaining few frames of T-Max 100, bright blue skies, hard shadows across the buildings, good high-contrast material for testing how the meter handles difficult light.
The hard shadows genuinely challenged the meter, as they should challenge any reflective meter. A 30-degree reflective reading of a scene with deep shadow and bright sunlit building is going to average the two, and you have to decide which you are exposing for and adjust. That is not a fault, it is just how reflective metering works, and it is why spot meters and incident meters also exist.
While metering a bright building at the end of a street, I had a visit from a security guard who informed me that, according to the law, I was not allowed to photograph his building because of access control and so on. I explained, politely, that this was not true: in the UK, on a public road, you can photograph whatever you like, including private buildings, and the only relevant law is that police can stop you if they suspect you are gathering information for terrorism purposes.
He was a nice enough chap doing his job. Someone had spotted me on a security camera. He did not try to stop me, and I only had a couple of frames left anyway. A little frustrating that people do not know the law, but no harm done.
The verdict on the meter
Setting aside my three-day comedy of errors, the AstrHori XH-2 is genuinely good.
It is well built. Solid, weighty, feels like a quality object.
It looks great. The styling suits the Bronica ETRS so well that it looks like a factory accessory, a natural part of the camera. The retro detailing (that white ring on the wheel) is lovely.
It is functional and simple. Two controls, clean operation, everything you need and nothing you do not.
The 30-degree reflective angle is a sensible middle ground. You have to use your brain with it (work out what it is seeing versus what your lens is framing, especially with long or wide lenses) but that is true of any reflective meter. It is not a supercomputer, it is a light meter.
It does not break the bank, which is genuinely one of the most important things about it.
A note on the category, because it explains the XH-2’s limitations honestly. There is a reason we still have spot meters, incident meters, reflective meters, and flash meters as separate categories. It is very difficult, possibly impossible, to make one meter that does all those jobs well, because it is a hardware problem, not just software. A spot meter needs a 1-degree angle, which requires a different lens in front of the sensor than a 30-degree reflective meter. So the XH-2 is a reflective meter and that is what it is. If you need spot metering, you need a different tool (I cover the Sekonic L858-D and the Reveni Labs Lumo elsewhere for that).
XH-2 versus AHM-1
If you are choosing between the two AstrHori meters: they are functionally identical. Same specs, same metering, same operation. The XH-2 has slightly better build quality and a different form factor. I prefer the XH-2, partly for the build and partly for the styling, but if you prefer the look of the AHM-1, you lose nothing functionally by choosing it.
I will not be taking sandpaper to the XH-2, though. The AHM-1 was designed for that distressed look. The XH-2 styling works as it is, and I am not going to mess with it.
Who should buy one
If you want a compact reflective hot shoe meter for a vintage camera, the XH-2 is a lovely choice. It looks the part, works well, and costs little. For shooters who want a clean, simple, good-looking metering solution that sits on the camera, it is hard to fault.
If you need spot metering or incident metering, this is not that, by design. Get a different tool for those jobs.
If you want a light meter and a competent photographer to operate it, I can supply the first but, on the evidence of this review, very much not the second.
You can find the AstrHori XH-2 at the usual retailers. Big thanks to AstrHori. The meter survived three days of my incompetence without complaint, which is its own kind of endorsement.