Help! Trying to decide on what PC to purchase to get my photography business going.

[jbphoto]

Hi! I recently started doing photography as a hobby with the intentions to become a professional and have my own portrait photography business. I've had my Nikon D3000 since November 2010 and have been shooting since then. I've had my few photo shoots (friends and family) and have been editing on various trial software on my Toshiba laptob, which I know is not AT ALL an adequate machine to be editing photos on. I am finally looking into buying a well worth machine that will help me truly get my business going. I'm tired of wasting time editing for hours, printing sample photos, editing again (to adjust color), and printing until the colors actually look right on print. I need a good machine that displays accurate color and is not toooo expensive.

I have looked into the following:
1) Macbook Pro 15" (I've read in photo forums that this one is perfect to start with)
2) Dell Studio XPS 9100, i7 processor, 6GB, 1GB NVIDIA video card, 24" HD widescreen monitor (I also read Dell was good...plus it is much less expensive than the Macbook Pro and I like that its a desktop and large display)

I'm afraid of spending too much for something I may not need yet, but I'm also scared that I might spend on something that isn't good enough for what I need.

I plan on doing photography part time for now, and I don't have an excessive flow of business. I do get lots of friends asking me to take their photos, so I want a good enough machine to deliver professional photos to my few clients.

Any advice and help will be greatly appreciated from those of you who have more experience than me.

THANK YOU!

[Athas_orm]

I'm pretty sure it's not the computer that makes you a professional photographer.

Also I'm sure that asking what you need to go professional after eight months probably will be frowned upon here.

Anyway some considerations.

1 The monitor. The monitor you purchase must be capable of reproducing an accurate colour spectrum.

2 Hard disk space. If your taking enough photographs in raw then this will eat a lot of space on your computer.

3 Processor. In general photographic editing isn't so dependant on processing power as say 3d rendering. The processor does make a difference however but only for certain opperations.

4 Software. The software you run makes a large difference to how you process your photographs. Look at the most popular software here with a workflow that is closest to what you want to use.

I'm sure pretty much any modern computer is up to the task. Unless you are already making money from your prints and are frustrated by a slow computing experiance.

[Superfitz]

The Dell...it costs less

[jbphoto]

Originally Posted by Athas_orm

I'm pretty sure it's not the computer that makes you a professional photographer.

Also I'm sure that asking what you need to go professional after eight months probably will be frowned upon here.

Anyway some considerations.

1 The monitor. The monitor you purchase must be capable of reproducing an accurate colour spectrum.

2 Hard disk space. If your taking enough photographs in raw then this will eat a lot of space on your computer.

3 Processor. In general photographic editing isn't so dependant on processing power as say 3d rendering. The processor does make a difference however but only for certain opperations.

4 Software. The software you run makes a large difference to how you process your photographs. Look at the most popular software here with a workflow that is closest to what you want to use.

I'm sure pretty much any modern computer is up to the task. Unless you are already making money from your prints and are frustrated by a slow computing experiance.

I understand that 8 months doesn't make me a professional, but whatever photos I do produce need to look as professional as possible. I don't want to give work that looks like just anyone did it. Based on what I have already done, I have lots of people wanting photos, but I obviously don't feel confident yet because of the fact that I've only been doing this 8 months. No need to be frowned upon... I wasn't trying to say I am a professional nor wanted to offend anyone who has been in the business for a while and is a true professional.

Thanks for the info on the computer.

[jbphoto]

Originally Posted by Superfitz

The Dell...it costs less

Thanks! If you don't mind me asking, what do you use?

[Strathias]

Disclaimer: I'm not a professional photographer (I just started in the hobby, actually), but I have been an IT professional for over 10 years, and have spent a lot of time helping clients choose technology based on their needs, including in the creative/design world.

"which I know is not AT ALL an adequate machine to be editing photos on."

What makes you say that? Being able to answer this question with specifics will help you a great deal.

"I'm tired of wasting time editing for hours, printing sample photos, editing again (to adjust color), and printing until the colors actually look right on print. I need a good machine that displays accurate color and is not toooo expensive."

This tells me that you're not satisfied with the color reproduction of the monitor on your laptop. You haven't complained about anything else related to the computer (storage space, overall performance), so I would start there. This is a great starting place, because you can always use the external monitor on another machine if you decide to do another upgrade later.

Most laptops have video outputs that allow you to connect an external display. What model Toshiba do you have? Do you know what type of video outputs the laptop supports? Assuming you stick with the current machine and just buy and external monitor, you'll need this information to pick a monitor that will work.

My recommendation would be to start researching external monitors and hardware based color calibrators. I've seen a bunch of information on both on this site and other photography sites. Unless you are having performance issues with your current laptop, I don't see a need to replace it completely.

Just my 2 cents. Good luck!

[UlpilotSC]

Originally Posted by Superfitz

The Dell...it costs less

Plus, it's not a Mac. (I say while typing this on my iPad)

I'd be less concerned what pc you're using and more that your monitor is calibrated and up to snuff. The problem with laptops: the screens can easily look a lot different based on your viewing angle. Just five degrees either way can make enough of a difference.

Get a desktop anything. You can easily upgrade it, add hard drives, swap video cards, etm.
Any average computer off the shelf should be adequate for photo editing. You aren't doing video or 3d modeling. The better the computer, the faster it will be, but pretty much anything should run Whatever editing software you need.

Btw- I'm not a pro.... But i am a nerd.

[JFSanders]

Like Strathias said, get a good IPS monitor such as the Dell Ultrasharp U2410. This will run you about 400 dollars or so. Then get a program such as Lightroom 3 or Capture NX2 (I use NX2 as I have a Nikon system and the program works seamlessly with Nikon RAW files and is very intuitive during the editing process).

After that you would upgrade your hardware as needed. The most important step for a professional is backup of images so look for those types of solutions. No image no money...

Jim

[SwissJon]

If ALL you want to do is photo editing and surf the internet, get the Mac Book Pro.

For some reason Apple castrated the Macbook, and only allowed it to use 2 cores on the i7, probably to keep the battery life up, but it's a damn good photo editing tool anyway.

If you want to do anything else as well, play games, do your accounts, use other software blah blah blah, get the Windows machine. Sure, the Mac can do it, but it can do it as well as the Windows machine can do photo and video editing..

To get the right tool for the job, decide what you want to do with it first.

[Jo.T]

I just got a new laptop and had to upgrade photoshop as CS3 just kept crashing something to keep in mind.
I went with a smaller 14" laptop still i7 and with 1 gig video card, i travel a bit so wanted something smaller that fits in my camera bag, which fits my airline carry on size restrictions. At home i add a large screen callibrated with spider pro and wireless keyboard and mouse plus a couple of external drives to back up photos.