FidoPhoto

The originals are long gone.

Okay, it's full size when I open it, but it's hard to choose between two or ten itsy bitsy photos. So it's not a crisis, but it is aggravating.

There's a folder in Bridge that has DNG files and the metadata says they're only 256x171. This is bizarre because I took them with a nice big Nikon. When I look in Finder they're the correct size. Why are they showing up so small in Bridge?? Not all the folders are like this, but all the files in THIS folder are.

I don't think I agree. I've used Lightroom, Bridge, Photo Mechanic and Fast Raw Viewer and "best" is subjective. I cull for focus and FRV opens up raw files and zooms in faster than any of the others. It also has a tool you can toggle to highlight what's sharp in the image. Super useful and speedy to cull a couple thousand images.

Have you heard of Fast Raw Viewer? It says it has a WYSIWYG histogram and it looks interesting. It's certainly fast at providing a histogram and 1:1 views so you can assess focus.

https://www.fastrawviewer.com/

I have CS6 and Bridge works fine, but I have to convert the raw files from my new camera to DNG before Bridge can read them. I'm thinking it might be worth downloading the new version. What do you think?

Hi Brian,

I've Googled this and not found a solution. Is there a way to turn off the iMac monitor and still keep the system running so I can just work on my external monitor? If I use ctrl+shift+eject both monitors turn off.

Karen

Think I can get away with this?

Is there a way to fix the sticking up collar on camera right? I tried liquify and copying from the other side, but couldn't get it to work, mostly because of the zipper.

Of course! I turn them off when I'm not backing up to them and always eject them first. My main EHD is a 4TB G-Drive with Thunderbolt and it's been great. I'll get two new 4 TB G-Drives to replace the ones that have died. I don't need to spend the extra for Thunderbolt, do I?

I know EHDs fail. I expect it, but I've had two 3 TB G-Technology drives fail in the last year and I don't think they're more than a year or two old. Is this normal? And what do you recommend I buy as a replacement? I'm pretty sure my old MyBook drives lasted longer than these.

I sent my camera out to be cleaned once and it came back dirtier so now I do it myself. I watched a video on KelbyOne a long time ago on how to clean the outside and inside of a camera and I only clean the sensor when there are visible spots so I do it maybe once a year.

It wasn't this course, but something similar that they don't seem to have anymore.  http://kelbyone.com/course/excell_sensor_cleaning/

I know it's risky, but I do it anyway since I don't know of a better way to get the job done and rocket blowers don't get the spots off. I clean the outside of the camera and my lenses much more often, usually before every shoot or every couple of weeks if I'm shooting a lot.

What I use:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1165567-REG/photographic_solutions_us3box_ultra_swab_type_3.html

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/127525-REG/Photographic_Solutions_EC_Eclipse_Optic_Lens_Cleaning.html

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1117520-REG/visibledust_16111549_quasar_plus_7x_sensor.html

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/61515-REG/Visual_Departures_DB1_Dewitt_s_Boar_Bristle_Brush.html

and lots of q-tips with lens cleaning solution on them for contacts and crevices (not the sensor!).

If anyone else has the same issue, here's the solution that worked for my problem: https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/photoshop-menus-turn-white-mac.html

It's the Wacom tablet that's causing the problems. They emailed me the latest driver because their website wasn't working right, but there's some incompatibility with with Photoshop. (The internet is nice in that whatever issue you have you can find out exactly how not-alone you are.)

After a bit of googling, I reset all the preferences, restarted the iMac in safe mode and now I give up.

Okay, my new iMac is up and running, RAM is installed and rendering videos is way faster, as promised. One little glitch though—CS6 is behaving badly. When I hit Q to go into quick mask mode, paint an area and then hit Q again, nothing happens. I have to either use my mouse to click on the icon or go up to the select menu and choose to exit quick mask mode. Same sort of thing with the brush tool and the clone tool. I can use them, but then cmd+z doesn't work, the [ and ] don't work to change the brush size and basically it just refuses to respond to anything except menu commands or icons.

Any ideas what might be going on? I've restarted several times and my caps lock is not on. I don't know what else to try.

Okay.  What's the best tedious way? 

Is there a straightforward (meaning non-tedious) way to get ride of the white tent in the background?

The iMac came with 2x8GB though so I'm just going to add the 2 I got from Crucial. Right?

Was I supposed to get 2 of the Crucial RAM memory thingies? I only ordered one so I have 2x8GB. My new iMac is in its box in the other room. (I'm kind of afraid of it.)

After a few hours of Final Cut Pro X video tutorials and trying some stuff, I'm sticking with CS6. What I'm doing is repetitive and the better video software is designed for flexibility, not efficiency. If I ever get into making creative videos I'll switch, but no need for it right now. So it'll be the super fast iMac with the RAID0 EHD. Thanks again for your help!

Karen

Okay, the RAID0 is installed and set up. I downloaded a trial version of Final Cut Pro X and watched a good set of tutorials by Izzy Hyman and it seems like it'll be an improvement over using CS6 for video editing.

My question now is, what plug-ins do I need to help me edit video? Isn't Final Cut Pro X sufficient?

I'm struggling with the Mac Pro vs. iMac decision because I don't want another monitor on my desk and the Mac Pro is a LOT of money. Ugh.

I think you're right about video being the where the money is. I'd never considered it until I was asked if I did it and I said yes because I figured I could learn.

I don't know anything about RAID0 so I'll do a little research while I'm waiting for B&H to deliver the EHD you linked to. It's not hard to set up, is it?

I downloaded a trial version of Final Cut Pro X so maybe I'll be able to pick between the Mac Pro and the iMac based on what I'm going to use to edit. Do you think a new computer (either one) will be a lot faster than my laptop once I get the new RAID0 hooked up? I read that Adobe Premiere is better than Final Cut Pro X, but you can't buy a stand alone copy of Premiere anymore.

Thanks for the advice!

Video is a steady income for me right now, much more so than custom stills so I'm willing to invest a bit. I could spend $4000. Anything more than that might be painful. I have a 4 TB G-Drive Thunderbolt drive, but I'm not sure how to use it just for processing. I have 3 other 4 TB G-Drive EHDs that aren't Thunderbolt that I mirror with SuperDuper regularly. I already have a good monitor (NEC PA271W) so I was thinking the iMac wasn't the right choice, but I'll think more about that.

I know CS6 isn't ideal for video, but what I'm doing isn't much beyond white balance, brightness, adding a bit of text or an arrow and then a tiny bit of sharpening so it's okay for now. (The quality "bar" is shockingly low for the customers I'm serving—they're impressed that I use a tripod.) I'll look into final cut pro and then maybe shoot 4K video.

I take 5x7" printed proofs, do a slide show on my laptop and then I use my iPad with Preveal on it to show them what a particular photo will look like on their own wall. It's a great app and I know it's increased my sales.  www.getpreveal.com