Brian

Another thought... Say your husband is fast and edits 30-50 photos per hour. Ok. Then we are talking money. Quicker turn-around means higher profit. But then since he is a newbie, it's really easy to become sloppy. Especially when chasing the dollar. My advice: He should take Damien's classes and edit your shoots. Start there. Eventually he will "know" when to branch out to others...probably in about 2+ years.

I can tell you that looking at the same person in a few hundred photos becomes mind-numbing. I don't care how beautiful the person might be, cloning out that wart on her eyelid in each photo...ugh. Or smoothing skin / zapping zits / looking at pores sometimes turns my stomach, especially if you are editing something like a wedding. I personally hope that strapless gowns go out of style. Because having to liquify fat rolls and armpits on a bride 500+ times...oh let's not go there. Most people aren't beautiful. They are average looking and never think to have their makeup professionally done. "My Sister / Cousin Friend will do it!! She's watched a lot of YouTube videos and is passionate!!" Uh-huh. Good luck with fixing those mistakes / spray on tan in each and every photo. Think long and hard before diving into the trenches of retouch-up work.

It would be in both of your interests for him to take all of Damien's classes, then spend time on editing (and learning how to edit) your photos. Being consistent and proficient takes time and experience, often years. While Damien's classes are excellent, by no means will you take them and be an instant expert, taking on editing, restoration work and the like. Basically if you have to ask...chances are the answer is "No." There are no shortcuts. I don't care what website or workshop giver tells you. Damien has been doing this stuff for a long time, I think 20+ years. Yes, there is a market, but it's an investment of time. Even if you edit a photo for 3-5 min, after a few hundred / few thousand photos, that time adds up. Let's say 4 minutes per photo... that's 15 photos per hour @ $1.00 a photo. So $15.00 per hour. You have 600 photos from a wedding to edit. That's 40 hours at $15/hr, or $600. $600 for 40 hours of work. You can make more working a part time job. LOL! Oh, let's not forget taxes and things like equipment to buy and electric / internet bills to pay for. So take 40% out of that $600. So you are left with $360, conversationally speaking. Now take into consideration that photo edit / restoration work is piece-work. There will be times when you are overwhelmed and other times you are dead. Combine this with a full time job and it becomes a major time-suck. But wait! I will charge $3 per photo!! I will make more!! Uh-huh. Tell that to the photographer who charges $2000 for a wedding that you want $1800 to edit. They will look at you as if you are nuts. Oh, the more profit you make, the more you pay in taxes.

RTFM. I gave you page numbers in my comment above. But I really think it's the stupid BBF that's tripping you up. We also need to check to see if you are on Focus Priority.

Stop with the blasted back-button focusing!!! It is not the end all and be all technique that it's made out to be!!! It really only works if you shut off the shutter release button from focusing. Honestly, start using the shutter button to focus. Learn good technique. Yes, I know of all the blog posts and forums that claim it's the most Amazeballz thing you can do to nail focus and blah-blah-blah. The truth is, it works for some, but not all. AF-C is meant to continually focus when the shutter button is pressed half way. You really should be on AF-S (Single) when you BBF. If your subject moves, your focus will be off. If you are BBF and recomposing, you will have a few inches for your head to move, or else your subject will be out of focus. If you have the shutter button's ability to focus turned off and you only have a rear button allowing your camera to focus, then it will only focus when you press the rear button. Which for me will be a pain, literally. As I would likely poke myself in the eye. In addition, you need to set your Focus menu setting to "Focus Priority" instead of the default "Release Priority." When you set the camera to Focus Priority, it will only take a photo that the camera thinks that it's in focus. Release means it snaps the photo regardless. So let's start using the shutter button going forward, just to see what happens.

Now what's the difference between the "Business" and "Consumer" XPS 8900? State-side support if you live in the US. When you call Dell for help with the consumer models, you get "Bob," "Abraham," or "Judy" in India or Pakistan. With the business edition, you get "Joe from Kansas" or where-ever Dell US Support is. I like the 8900 because it doesn't come with a whole lot of crapware / bloatware. It's a straight forward computer. If someone comes across this thread and hates Dell, that's fine. Choose a different brand with the specs that I listed in the above comment box.

If you are an "Official" or "On-the-Books" business, then I'd get this Dell: http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-8900-desktop/pd?oc=cax8900w7ph1057&model_id=xps-8900-desktop If you are a hobbyist, then the Dell XPS 8900: http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-8900-desktop/pd?oc=cax8900w7ph1057&model_id=xps-8900-desktop What you are looking for is: i5 or i7 CPU 8GB RAM at a Minimum / 16GB RAM Preferred 1TB HD at a Minimum / 2TB or larger Preferred Dedicated Video Card with its own Video Memory. 2GB or 4GB of Video Memory is fine. Windows 7 Pro 64-bit at a Minimum. DO NOT get a Windows 7 "Home" edition, as it caps out at 16GB of RAM. You need the "Pro" version to go higher, i.e. 32GB of RAM. Windows 10 is "fine" at this point, as long as it comes with a new computer. Most of the issues that people have are ones that have upgraded from Windows 7 or 8. With brand new computers, the upgrade path to Windows 10 is easier. As for which one, Windows 10 Home Edition or Windows 10 Pro, I would always recommend going the "Pro" edition. But it's not a deal breaker if the computer comes with Windows 10 Home.

You are fine. Plenty of space on both drives. Bridge has a cache for the same reasons as your web browser does, when there is a lack of RAM, it looks to the HD to supplement which helps with performance and stability.

If you feel like spending $999, go ahead. Basically, the Thunderbolt Display is 1/4 of a whole Mac. You provide the CPU, HD, etc. For $700 more, you can get a whole new iMac, that has a faster CPU, faster graphics, larger and faster HD. You are paying a premium for convenience. Your MacBook will hook up just fine to it and Apple provides a cable to hook your MBP easily.

BUY IT!

Oh I know what that is. Mac has an equivalent called a Fusion Drive. Just get the one without it.

Do not fall for the marketing tech-speak. Don't spend an extra $120 on the "Special Edition." Do not spend a $120 on a 32GB SSD drive. You can always add a SSD drive at a later date.

Here, I'm gonna make this easy. If you are a legit on-the-books photography business, then buy this Business Edition Dell 8900: http://www.dell.com/en-us/work/shop/productdetails/xps-8900-desktop/cax8900w7ph1057 If you are a hobbyist, and can't buy the biz-edition, find the consumer version and try to match all of the tech-specs.

Neither. A Solid State Drive is like a bunch of CF cards all put together in a device that looks like a HD. The benefit to them is speed. Windows 10 can boot up fully in as little as 15 seconds. Now before you go buying stuff, in this case I WOULD NOT BUY EITHER. 256 for a main drive is microscopic by today's standards, let alone 32GB for a SSD drive!!! Please promise me you'll look for at least a 1TB HD and you'll post a screen shot of what you are going to buy before buying it. Pretty Please??

EHD on the left is the G-Drive. EHD on the right is the TM Drive. (Self-Built, has a WD Caviar Black 1TB 7200 RPM drive in a case.)

My Humble 2009 iMac:

If you are getting a new Mac, I'd use the Thunderbolt port. The nice part with that G-Drive is that it has a Thunderbolt Port AND a USB 3.0 port. I don't edit photos on a laptop. I have a Mac Desktop. My TM drive is always connected, but not always power it on. I'm more on my iPhone than computer these days. But to answer your question, you could hook up your laptop nightly for a TM backup. Of course, the benefit to TM, is if you screw up and delete something, you have a better chance of getting it back, as long as it's in the TM backup That said, nightly is fine. Hell, I go months, but I'm not shooting a bunch of sessions every week either. I do have a second HD that I clone the main drive, but it's not a G-Drive. It's just a EHD that I built myself with a old 2TB HD that I had. I just clone my photos to it. Document files, the little I have, get backed up to Dropbox. Honestly, I've been 2nd shooting lately and really haven't had my own gig in the last year or so. In fact, I'm almost ready to end this whole "Pro-Photography" thing. Don't have time for it with a day job. So I'm not the best example with how to do things. Asking me what *I* do might cause you serious issues. LMAO. But I accept if things go horribly wrong it's my own fault. I'm not going to go to a group and beg for help if something bad does happen. Now, when I do have gigs, I'm a little more paranoid. Cards get pulled out of rotation and images are copied from them, never moved. I don't reformat and use my CF cards until my Wedding / Gig is delivered to the client. The 2nd HD is used more, etc. Having multiple copies of files with at least one off-site backup is a good thing. Producing ACTUAL PRINTS is also another way to "backup."

Nope. Unless Apple releases a patch that is just meant for Safari, you can't just update the browser only. How about ditching Safari? I use Firefox.

The $79.99 Black G-Drive is probably a slower 5400 RPM drive, which is fine for TM. The one for $99 is a faster 7200RPM Drive. What I've done with my iMac is to have a 1TB TM EHD and one 4TB G-Drive for my photos and important files. I then have TM just backup the Inernal Macintosh HD. So my recommendation is to get two EHDs. One for data and one to backup the internal HD.

Any EHD can work with the Mac, it only depends on if it's partitioned and formatted with the Mac file system. Manufacturers know that people are willing to pay more for a Mac, so often you will see a "Mac Version" of a HD for $30-$50 more. It's complete and utter BS. The are banking on you spending more for "The Mac Version." LOL!! It's pure profit based on ones naiveness. I like G-Drives for the hardware that they use. They usually aren't the $79 special from a big box store. Coming Mac formatted is just a bonus. If any Windows users want to use a G-Drive, there is a process that you that takes literally 5 min to convert it over. No extra software needed. It's built into the OS. Same thing with converting a Windiws drive to the Mac file system. A good rule of thumb when it comes to time machine is the EHD should be 1.5 times the Data that you are backing up. So if you have a 1TB internal HD, that's almost full, you really should look at least a 2TB drive. Of course, if your internal HD is around 500-700MB full, you could get away with a 1TB drive. It's not a hard and fast rule. That said, the larger the TM EHD, the more wiggle-room you have in data recovery. The reason is when the TM drive starts to get full, it deletes files and folders from the oldest backup to make room. In addition, when you go to configure a TM backup, it's best to EXCLUDE ANY OTHER EXTERNAL DRIVES. Things can go really bad if you have a 3TB EHD and a 1TB TM EHD and you tell Time Machine to backup your whole Mac. So in short, just use your TM EHD to backup the internal Mac HD. Make sense? Time Machine is so friggin' easy to use. When you plug in a new EHD, the Mac OS pops up with a question, "Use this drive for Time Machine?" If it's the Drive meant for TM, tell it "Yes."

Hmm. I'm going to move this thread to the land of misfits. This is a good question.

I feel your pain. I have buyer's remorse everytime I make a large purchase. Just remember... Buy it Right...Buy it Once.

Seems to be ok.

This one seems to be the latest and greatest Dell Monitory. It's a 4K screen: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00PC9HFO8/ref=twister_B014R6J7VU?tag=macrumors-20&_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

Budget? Personally, I own and like G-Drives. Since you are getting a new iMac, it will have a shiny new Thunderbolt Port. So I would get a 3TB G-Drive with Thunderbolt and USB 3.0. If you can swing a $100 more, you could get a 4TB version. If that is too expensive, and you are looking at just getting a 1TB drive, then take a look at this 1TB G-Drive with USB 3.0. The cool part with G-Drives is they are already Mac Formatted. Just plug them in and go.