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Retina Macbook - photoshop and lightroom

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Photogeek123

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Aug 18, 2015
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Is the retina MB powerful enough to use programs such as photoshop and lightroom?

As a pro photographer, my editing for clients will be done on my iMac. However for portability/travel/occasional edits, is the rmb ok or would I be better going for the 13mbp? EG, could it handle importing and storing 2000 25mb raw files if I was on a wedding overseas? I love the sleek look of the rMB, but am anxious it won't be powerful enough for me.

All opinions welcome.
 
Of course it is. People used to run Photoshop on Macs in 1995. Today's computers are much more powerful.
 
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Owning 12" 13" & 15" Retina`s I would recommend the 13" rMBP, as much as the 12" rMB works for me (engineering) I feel it may not work so well for you. The Core M works best with short burst of activity allowing the CPU to ramp up massively, followed by a cooling period albeit short. Prolonged heavy usage will only result in throttling back to the base frequency or less, which is what I suspect will occur importing 2K images @ 25Mb per file.

The 13" rMBP has a lot more reserves and is still a highly portable solution, I find the Retina MacBook excels at being a business machine, being extremely "snappy" dealing with documentation, mail etc running proprietary engineering applications with ease. Best way to settle it would be to but both and return the one within the 14 day grace period.

Personally speaking the 12" MacBook is one of the very best Mac`s ever produced, equally my needs are specific and to coin a phrase niche. All the same if the rMB is not a revenue critical system then it will still work for you, albeit at a slower pace than the rMBP`s, likely another Pro photographer can chime in with a more specific advice.


Q-6
 
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Photogeek123 said:
Is the retina MB powerful enough to use programs such as photoshop and lightroom?

As a pro photographer, my editing for clients will be done on my iMac. However for portability/travel/occasional edits, is the rmb ok or would I be better going for the 13mbp? EG, could it handle importing and storing 2000 25mb raw files if I was on a wedding overseas? I love the sleek look of the rMB, but am anxious it won't be powerful enough for me.

All opinions welcome.
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I agree with what @Queen6 said completely. In a pinch, could you use the rMB for Photoshop and Lightroom? Absolutely. However, you're going to notice that it isn't so snappy during those times and it's going to take significantly longer to process all those edits. The rMBP will give you a lot more horsepower and be able to get the job done more quickly and efficiently.

I think that the rMB will probably handle your needs after another two or three generations, but if you need a portable solution now, definitely go with the rMBP. The 13" should be more than enough to meet your needs.
 
I disagree with the above. I had the same hangups about the rMB, moving from a 15" i7 rMBP. My main 'Pro' use is raw image editing in PS and Lightroom.

I went with the 1.3Ghz rMB and have not been disappointed one bit. I have not experienced any real world performance issues, and the rMB is not perceptively different from the rMBP when editing batches of files. Sure, on benchmarks the rMBP wins comfortably, but this is not reflected in day to day use.

I'd say the argument for the rMB is even stronger when coupled with the iMac you have. The portability to performance ratio is an absolute perfect balance, in my opinion.
 
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professional445 said:
dont you think the bride will be offended you needed to edit the wedding photos ROFL
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Don't you think we could still read your post if it was normal font size?

Also, all photos from any professional photographer go through some level of editing (exposure, colour, cropping, general cleaning up anything distracting, and so on.) With the exception of photos printed in news papers. So no, a bride wouldn't be offended. Editing a photo doesn't automatically mean changing someone's appearance.
 
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Been wondering the same thing as the OP. I have a CC account, so think that I will load it and give it a try. Since the 10.10.5 update, Photos is working much more smoothly and I'm thinking that may also be the case in LR. If anyone else has experience, I would love to hear about it.
 
lagwagon said:
Don't you think we could still read your post if it was normal font size?

Also, all photos from any professional photographer go through some level of editing (exposure, colour, cropping, general cleaning up anything distracting, and so on.) With the exception of photos printed in news papers. So no, a bride wouldn't be offended. Editing a photo doesn't automatically mean changing someone's appearance.
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I think it was a joke...
 
davidjearly said:
I disagree with the above. I had the same hangups about the rMB, moving from a 15" i7 rMBP. My main 'Pro' use is raw image editing in PS and Lightroom.

I went with the 1.3Ghz rMB and have not been disappointed one bit. I have not experienced any real world performance issues, and the rMB is not perceptively different from the rMBP when editing batches of files. Sure, on benchmarks the rMBP wins comfortably, but this is not reflected in day to day use.

I'd say the argument for the rMB is even stronger when coupled with the iMac you have. The portability to performance ratio is an absolute perfect balance, in my opinion.
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This - It works fine for me.
 
ive used it to tether shoot with 5d's and pentax 645D. minor adjustments on location as well as PS retouching a set when on a plane. mines the 1.1, should be fine.....if youre doing lots of layers then it would probably slow down though.
dunno about wedding work but it's more than fine for fashion in terms of retouching.
 
I have an iMac which I use for stills and videos. For a while I had the 1.3 MB, my wife now has it as her personal computer (she uses a Dell for work). I did use LR & PS CC on the MB for the time that I had it. It was fine for light editing. I have never imported 2000 RAW pics at a time. I did import ~ 700 RAW + JPG images and it was fine. I have a 250 GB LaCie SSD that I have used for back ups, you would probably want a larger SSD if the internal drive is too small for your uses. If it is really just the occasional edit, the MB is an unbeatable travel device.
 
I've used it for LR while travelling...it is fine once the 1:1 previews are built and I can run the Develop module just as quick and smooth as on my 15 rMBP. However, the big issue is generating the 1:1 previews...it throttles down due to heat generation very quickly and the process goes extremely slow. I was doing batches of 1000-2000 at a time and it could take 5 hrs. During the beginning of the process before the heat throttling, it could do 100-200 very quickly. I haven't used PS with it yet and probably won't as I do almost all my editing in LR.
 
I'm no pro, but I'm finding that for LR, the 1.2ghz is just fine. Thinking about getting a Mini for batch work but it's not as essential as I thought it would be. I'd say for individual file editing in field you'll be fine.
 
driftless said:
I have an iMac which I use for stills and videos. For a while I had the 1.3 MB, my wife now has it as her personal computer (she uses a Dell for work). I did use LR & PS CC on the MB for the time that I had it. It was fine for light editing. I have never imported 2000 RAW pics at a time. I did import ~ 700 RAW + JPG images and it was fine. I have a 250 GB LaCie SSD that I have used for back ups, you would probably want a larger SSD if the internal drive is too small for your uses. If it is really just the occasional edit, the MB is an unbeatable travel device.
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Important Post-Script: my comments were about downloading SD cards and not about importing them into LR. I should have been clearer in my original reply.
 
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