Brian

FX is really the future. Nikon has been making half-assed attempts when it comes to the DX line. We have been waiting on the D300s replacement, the D500 for a really, REALLY long time. Combine that with the lack of DX lens choices that are of the "Professional Grade" type, and the ones that are out there, tend to be expensive. The downside is, I have a really hard time recommending a Pro DX lens that's $1400+ because DX lenses are ONLY designed to work on DX bodies. Sure you can mount a DX lens on a FX body, but that will throw the FX body into "Crop Mode" and really cripple the camera. You do not want to put a DX lens on a FX body. It's just not worth it. Trust me. Here are some ideas: Nikon D810 with 24-120 f/4 VR -- Right now Nikon has a sale going on, and it's $1100 off @ $3299. Nikon D810 (Body Only) -- $2796.95 The D810 is a fine camera, and I'm so tempted to purchase one. It's Dynamic Range is killer in the Nikon Line-up, meaning you can pull so much out of the RAW file. It's even better than the D4 line of cameras. I know of several Music Photographers that shoot rock concerts and festival events with a D810. So for Lifestyle and Portraits, this is the camera to do it with. Pros: Dynamic Range, Rugged Body, QUIET! QUIET! QUIET!! The shutter is amazingly quiet on this thing. Nikon really got it right this time. Cons: The 36MP and the large Raw file sizes that are produced because of it. So you'll have to upgrade your storage and at least have 16GB of RAM on your computer. So not only are you buying a new camera and lens, but probably upgrading/replacing your computer to handle the D810 files. Nikon D750 with 24-120 f/4 VR Lens -- Same sale is going on and this combo is $2296.95. Not much more than your budget of $2000. Pros: The D750 is also a fine camera. It's great for the folks like yourself who are making the jump from their D90 bodies to FX. It's very much like the D5xxx line, possibly the D7xxx line. The screen tilts out so the camera will allow you more options when it comes to angles. Cons: I really like this camera, but if you are rough on your gear like I am, I would be careful as the weather sealing isn't robust as the D810. For those wondering what do I mean rough? I was whale watching in rough seas, got slammed by a 25 foot wave which drenched me and my camera. I ended up pouring bottled water all over my D300s and 70-200 lens, so that the salt would wash off. I photographed a Wedding a week later with no issues with the same gear. I wouldn't try that with a D750. LOL!! That said, you might do well with a D750 for your 1st go-around in FX, since you are already shooting with a D90, it won't be that much different handling-wise. Plus the High-ISO capabilities with this camera...they are better than a D4s! So you really have two choices at this point with FX. Either a D750 or D810. Unless you want to go the used route in which case I'd recommend a D700 and some lenses. More info on the used option in the next comment blurb.

OK...$2000. That's tight. Right now, if you want to stay DX, you could get a D7200, which is the replacement for your D90. Or if you can wait a few months, the D500 should be out, which would be a step-up for you. It has a lot of the features and focusing system of the new Nikon D5. From the videos that I've seen, it's almost like the kid brother of the Nikon D5. Either way, you will have a lot more freedom with higher ISO settings, as the D90 really starts to look bad at around ISO 800. If I had to choose between the D7200 or D500, hands down I'd get the new D500. Unfortunately, that body by itself should be around the $1999 mark, which completely blows your budget for lenses. Lenses...you have all the consumer-grade kit lenses that come with bodies and that's going to increase your costs on this upgrade path. The upside is, you do not have any idea on what you are missing in terms of image quality. There is a big difference with the lenses you have and the pro-grade stuff. I was once like yourself, kit lenses, all those consumer grade zooms...yadda-yadda-yadda. I then made the mistake of borrowing a friend's Nikon 24-70 f/2.8 and have been spoiled ever since. That one lens alone has made me spend over $8000 in gear, and I'm still not done. LOL!! Side-story: I needed to upgrade from my Nikon D40, which come to find out was a "bridge camera body," meaning it was meant to be outgrown. So with limited funds, I found out that Best Buy was selling Nikon D200 bodies for around $650. The D300 had just come out and they were liquefying stock. "Great!" I thought. I can't afford to spend $1799 on a Nikon D300 and I really need to get away from my D40. So I took the plunge. Big Mistake. Now, while I liked the D200 and it's external controls and switches, it really topped out at ISO 640. Anything higher and it was Noise-City. Even Nikon tried to "justify" the noise by adding a blurb in the manual!! LOL!! So I lived with the D200 until I was able to upgrade to the D300s a few years later. My point to this side-story? While it's important to have a realistic budget, it's even more important to not try to save money by "settling," because at that point you are just wasting money and throwing it away. If I made things work a little longer with the D40, I probably could have saved myself $650 and used that towards the D300s, which I'm still shooting with...Weddings and all. OK, I told you that story to help tell the main one a little better. I'd just bought the D200 and was going to go on a Photowalk. A friend offered to lend me her Nikon 24-70 f/2.8G to try out on my fancy new camera body. (Ah...the smell of new gear.) So I mounted the 24-70 and started to take photos. The thing wouldn't focus. I freaked out...was there something wrong with my camera body? Did I break her lens? I unmounted and remounted the lens and took a few shots. I looked in my camera's settings and made the change to "only take the photo when it's in focus" to enabled. The camera produced a few more shots. I thought the lens STILL isn't focusing. "Why is the camera taking photos?" Frustrated, I decided to manually turn the focus ring until the entire image was blurry in the viewfinder and pressed the shutter button half-way. ZIP!! Image was in focus, almost instantaneously! My jaw dropped. It turned out that the lens focused so fast compared to my 18-55, the damn thing was waiting on me! That sucker locked on like a heat-seeking missle. No lens hunting back and forth. No waiting. Boom! In focus. "Holy Sh*t!" I said to the fellow Photowalker next to me. I had no idea of the speed difference in focusing, it was addicting. So I did the rest of the Photowalk and then went to take a few photos of the stuff that I normally would, just to have a side-by-side comparison when I went home. Now, by this time I was in hard 4PM light with no shade. Not the light that produces great photos, but I was burning daylight, so I shot any way. I then checked my histogram and then looked for the blown-highlights. The histogram was really even and when I went to check for the blown areas...aka, "The Blinkies," there was hardly any. In fact, there were none on some of the photos. It turns out that the Nano-coating on the 24-70 was doing it's job. Combine that with the better glass and my images were instantly better compared to shooting with the 18-55. So there is a BIG DIFFERENCE and if you experience this, your wallet will feel the pain. Like I said, this one lens turned me into a Nikon Pro-Grade Lens Snob. So my point is try to get your lenses lined up first, THEN get the body. Keep in mind, that you will need to choose your path, either stay with DX or upgrade to FX. Either way, you are going to spend around $4000, because right now you have all consumer-grade stuff. Well, the D90 is considered "Advanced Amateur / Prosumer," but we are splitting hairs at this point. A D500 is $1999 and lenses...they are going to cost you money too. So I guess before we go on, are you looking to upgrade to FX or stick with DX? Because at this point, you really are starting over from scratch and are at a fork in the road.

I found a portion of an old article about laptops and photo editing that I wrote a few years ago. Here it is, and I will be updating it to version 3.0 in the very near future. Oh, this article is more of a rant that needs to be toned down. That will happen in version 3.0. You have been warned. The short answer is: "I DO NOT RECOMMEND LAPTOPS FOR PHOTO EDITING." Culling and showing a slideshow...fine. Editing, notsomuch. Here is why: 1. The Screen's Angle of View is the main thing. Each time you open the display, your colors and contrast will change because the angle of what you’re viewing has changed. So unless you make some sort of jig or use an alignment tool to guarantee the angle of the screen is the same, you aren't going to be very consistent from shot to shot or batch to batch. Have a Cat or Children? A simple bump or rub from them can screw up the laptop's Angle of View. Even if you "know" that you have never touched the screen. There are no guarantees. 2. Laptop screens are usually very glossy and bright. Laptop screens are meant to be viewed in a variety of environments and in all sorts of lighting, from an Airport to Coffee Shop to your Home and points beyond. They are great for web browsing, watching a movie, writing e-mail, balancing your checkbook, etc. basically everything else BUT NOT PHOTO EDITING. 3. Be sure to budget for a Calibration Tool if you don't already have one! Your colors are going to be a whacked until you get a baseline and get calibrated. THEN you will have to compare them to your prints. Expect lots of frustration and questions posted in "Ask Damien" on why your screen won't calibrate correctly. Since laptops change so quickly, they are "orphaned" a lot quicker than desktops. Meaning driver updates or compatibility issues with your calibration tool likely won't be fixed or addressed. (I can't tell you how many photos I have seen in Ask Damien on why Calibration Profiles just don't "stick" with laptops, due to their crappy drivers.) The only laptops that I've still seen get good reviews for being decent out of the box are the MacBook Pro's, but those laptops are very expensive. Now, I usually get the response, "But my last laptop was fine and it lasted 7-10 years…" or "My Prints matched my laptop's screen pretty well (on my old laptop)…" or something along those lines. My response: YOU GOT LUCKY!! Don't bank on it happening again. As display panels change, so do the way they reproduce colors. Manufactures are always looking to cut costs and keep power consumption low on laptops, so the displays could be better…or more than likely worse with each newer model. 4. Horsepower is another issue. They are designed with low power consumption in mind so they aren't always the fastest. Heat…Heat is the enemy. The faster or harder something runs, the hotter it gets, the longer things take to complete, and things to lock-up and hesitate on a normal basis. So if you are doing a lot of batching, that could've an issue. Now comes for the upgradeability issues and hardware limitations. RAM usually can't be upgraded more than 8GB and HD's are small and tend to be slow, again for lower power consumption. Laptops usually only have 500GB HD, and if you are lucky a 750GB HD. Unfortunately, one third of that is taken up by the Operating System, and pre-installed crapware. After you add your software, there is very little room left over for large .psd and RAW files. Video Memory is often shared with the RAM so the ability to power very large resolutions that drive 27" displays is non-existent. Meaning, you can't just simply go out and by whatever display that you wish, you'll need to pay attention to the maximum resolution that the laptop can produce for an external display. Laptops that have their own dedicated memory are a little better powering the larger displays, but most people don’t request them, so those models are a bit harder to find and usually cost a lot more. 5. Keyboards and Trackpads are usually terrible. It's an eye-opening experience when you physically go to a store and try some typing and use a track-pad. Keyboards are quite cheap these days and I can almost guarantee you, a mouse will be hooked up to a laptop for photo editing. So that kills some portability right there. Now, I have seen some folks like trackpads for editing, but it's pretty rare to see. 6. Reliability. Laptops often only last about 3 years before they become "Too Slow" or start locking up or just downright fail on you. 3 Years is the average these days. So where do you get them fixed? At least with Apple and Sony, they have Apple and Sony Stores. OEM Batteries aren't cheap either. They average about $150 or more to get a replacement. Time-frame, batteries seem to last 1.5 years on the average. Sometimes it’s less, sometimes it’s more.

First question... "What is your budget?" Second Question... Is the D90 and 18-105 the only gear that you have?

It's better to stick with Raw, uncompressed preferred...or lossless compressed. 12-Bit is fine if that's an option on your camera. 14-bit Raw is also fine, but you really won't see a real-world difference between 12-bit and 14-bit. Now, I'm sure there are plenty of Measurebators out there that will tell me otherwise, but I like to keep things simple. Oh, the difference between Raw and JPEG can be summed up as this statement: RAW = "The End." JPEG = thend Now, to take it one step further, lets add MRAW and SRAW to the mix: Raw = "The End." mRaw = "The End sRaw = ThEnd JPEG = thend As you can see, you are throwing bits of data away, in addition to resolution. So it's best to stick with plain old boring Raw and keep things simple. The only time you want to throw bits of data away is when you are converting to JPEG.

Oops. Sorry about that. I sit corrected. I just edited my post.

Yep. I've used them since the 1990's. They are a good source for RAM and prices are reasonable. You'll see their scanning tool on the main page, but I'm thinking it will cost you about $100 to take your Mac to 16GB. (I think the kits are around $48 each). Still on 4GB? OMG!! You have no idea on what you are missing out. It will be like having a whole new computer. There is a MAJOR difference between 4GB and 16GB. Enjoy your purchase. PS: The scanning tool is a .dmg file that will go to your downloads folder. Look for it there and double-click it. It's harmless.

CS6 will be needed at the very least to support the D5500. You are out of luck with CS4 or CS5. You have two options: Use Adobe's DNG Converter Program Sign up for Adobe's Photoshop CC option, which runs you $9.99 /month, plus any applicable sales taxes. If by some chance you stumble across a copy of CS6, that will support the D5500. Unfortunately, Adobe is slowly killing support for CS6. Soon it will go the way of CS5, CS4, CS3, etc. and be completely discontinued.

You are right, you will get mixed answers. Around that time, Apple was changing things and their 27" models could go up to 32GB, but didn't list it. The rule of thumb is, if your iMac has a DVD SuperDrive built in, it can go up to 16GB. The 27" models that don't have the DVD drive can support 32GB. Now, I'm sure someone out there tried installing 32GB and it worked, for whatever reason. That said, I can not in good conscious recommend trying it if you have a DVD drive in your unit. I would head to Crucial.com, run their scanning tool. After you run it, you should see a page with your options. Look at purchasing TWO 8GB kits. Of course, it depends on what your current setup is. If you only have 4GB, chances are you have two 2GB Sticks. Those sticks would need to be pulled and 4GB sticks would need to be installed in their place. To get 16GB, you'll need four 4GB sticks in all the slots. If you have upgraded RAM in the past, we will have to talk about what's installed.

Specifically, this WD drive caught my eye: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1148572-REG/wd_wdbdtb0120jsl_nesn_my_book_pro_12tb.html As soon as you want drive mirroring, where one drive auto-copies to another, the costs increase. A RAID setup usually isn't cheap. Of course, you could purchase a few G Drives and use SuperDuper to copy things over. That will run you about $600 or so total.

Give this thread a read.

I like APC's stuff. This is what I use: APC BE750G Back-UPS 750VA 10-outlet Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Z80ICM/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awd_XA3WwbYFC8G3X

It's a common problem with Yosemite and El Capitan. The drives will randomly unmount. There isn't a fix I know of. Now for part 2. WD must use the world's cheapest cases and ports. Often with their externals, the HD itself is fine, it's just the crappy USB port that they use...you can't just get to it. What I'd recommend doing is taking the WD EHD to a Mom & Pop computer shop and see if they can transplant the HD into a new case.

Now it's hard to see the knob on the top, as the photo is kinda blurry. But this camera was EXTREMELY POPULAR in the US in the 1950's. It's the "Canon Digital Rebel" of its day.

1950's Kodak Brownie Camera

Yeah, they know that all Mac users have Safari, so they target that browser. The only time I've ever gotten those type of pop-ups is when I'm using Safari. It's even more funny when I'm using Firefox and a "Windows Pop-Up Appears doing a "Scan" while using Firefox on my Mac. It's so bogus it's not even funny.

I don't need no stinking 100% Crop. It's a 1950's Kodak Brownie Camera.

Unless you WANT problems and pain, if you are into that sort of thing, STAY ON MAVERICKS!! I know, it keeps popping up telling you that you should upgrade. Don't. Because you'll be in here bitching within a week and no, Apple won't let you downgrade at this point. It's a one-way thing.

So these are affecting Macs now. LOL. It's bogus. But in all seriousness, STOP USING SAFARI! It is the browser that is exploited with this crap. It also takes Apple forever to update it. Please use something like Firefox. Since you are here, chances are you do something with Photography. Firefox is Color Managed. Chrome is not.

Here is the "I have more money than Donald Trump" Edition. This is a MAXED OUT MAC PRO. If you were editing full length movies, working for Pixar or doing other high-intensity graphic projects, this is the machine to do it with: After AppleCare, the final cost is: $10,026.00. Plus shipping and tax. Of course, if you wanted to, you could finance it for 18 Months, if you are approved. The monthly payments would be around $600 a month to have it paid off before the 18 Month Penalty fee. Now it doesn't seem so bad. Oh, don't forget all the extra External Thunderbolt HDs you'll need. Those suckers aren't cheap either. Plan on a extra $5000-$10,000 on top of this Mac Pro.

Now here is the "I JUST WON THE POWERBALL AND HAVE MONEY TO BLOW" Edition. I went for broke and picked all the high-end options. Personally, if you are spending this kind of cash on a iMac, I'd love for you to send some of that money my way. I take donations. Without further ado... That's right. $1 shy of $4100. That whole $1 makes it "Affordable." LMAO!! Add AppleCare for $169 and we are at $4268. Don't have to worry about upgrading anything with this configuration, you have the best and most expensive options installed, at least as far as the iMac line goes.

Here is "The Performance Model." This configuration is more aggressive and goes against what I would buy myself, but for those that are looking for a bit more "Umph" and don't care what my thoughts are; here is the "Performance" iMac: Purchase Apple Care for $169 and we are at $2968 plus shipping and tax. Combine that with a 16GB Upgrade kit from Crucial.com (About $80 as I type this) to take it from 16GB to 32GB, and you have a sweet editing machine for about $3050.

This is the "Best Bang for your Buck" iMac. If I was on a limited budget and wanted to purchase a iMac, this is what I would get. I WOULD AVOID THE 21.5" iMacs LIKE THE PLAGUE!! The reason is you can't upgrade a 21.5" iMac after the fact. Well at least not easily. By the time you purchase the $1499 iMac and upgrade the RAM to 16GB, you are at $1699. For just $100 more, you can get the stock 27" iMac and have the ability to upgrade it to 32GB yourself for about $200. This is the stock 27" iMac with Retina Screen for $1799: Purchase AppleCare for an extra $169 and we are at $1968, plus shipping & tax.

Part three: For a bit of fun, I decided to choose the high-end 27" Retina iMac and max out all the choices. The Cost? Plus AppleCare. Plus Shipping & Tax. So for around $4500-$4600 or more (Depending on where you live...) you can have a tricked out 27" iMac. That is insane to spend that much money on a iMac, in my personal opinion. For that money, I"m looking at the Mac Pro line. So the bottom line is this: Apple really wants you to "Go Big or Go Home." If you choose to purchase a Mac today, be prepared to spend more than $2000, even with the base 27" iMac for $1799. Now, in keeping with tradition, I will configure three iMacs for various budgets and post them in the next few comments.

Why not the $1999 version? Because there isn't a major difference between the two. You see, Apple is charging you an extra $200 to have full upgrade options and they throw in a few minor tweaks to help sell the higher price-point. With the $1799 iMac, you get what they give you...for the most part. Sure, you can get different hard drives and extra RAM, but to get all the choices, you need to pay an extra $200 more. For me, that's like paying a restaurant and extra $50 to order a steak "Medium Well" instead of what they decide for me. Or that I should pay more, just to have the choice between Iceberg Lettuce or Romain in my Salad. Of course, for that extra $200, you get a Fusion Drive instead of a Traditional HD, and a slightly upgraded video card. Most of the time, since Adobe can't seem to figure out how to play nicely with Apple's video Drivers, we are un-checking "Use Graphics Processor" in PS' Preferences in order to prevent weird problems. (i.e., black-box problems while zooming in, fix issues with the Liquidfy tool, etc. Plus all the other weird behavior that doesn't seem to get fixed...only after to we tell Photoshop to ignore the video card does it stabilize. In which case, the extra "features" of the upgraded video card are lost... In addition to the video card upgrade, you get a 1TB Fusion Drive. Now Fusion Drives are fast. I will give you that. The main problem that I have with them, is you do not get a choice on what side of the HD the files reside on. It's up to the HD and Operating System to decide what goes where. Only after a period of around 30 days or so, will the HD move files from the Flash Memory Side to the Traditional HD side. I'm too much of a control freak and like to decide what goes where. Especially if something bad happens to the HD, you have no idea WHERE the files are and for me, that's very uncomfortable. So for those who can live with these issues that I have, the $1999 iMac is a fine purchase. That said, if you are just taking the default choices and not upgrading the CPU or getting a larger HD, then stick with the $1799 iMac.