Digital Photography Computer Buying Guide

This guide to buying and building a computer for digital photography was rewritten October 2020. Technology moves at a steady pace among both computers and cameras, so they need to keep up with each other.

Computers are an integral part of the digital photography workflow. Images are created on-camera but they necessarily pass through one or more computers on their way to be shared, printed, sorted and backed up. Although any modern computer can handle digital images, a purposefully built one can greatly enhance the experience.

What does a Digital Photography Computer do?

Computers are by their nature extremely versatile. For digital photography, the purpose of a computer it take ingest images produced by a camera and take them through all the steps in the digital photography life-cycle called photography workflow. Strictly speaking, images may not even begin as digital. A computer may start scanning from a negative or print to create the digital image directly inside. The entire workflow can happen on a single computer but can span multiple, such as when sending processed images to an online print-shop.

The digital photography workflow generally takes images through the following sequence of steps:

1. Transfer images from a camera or intermediate media into temporary storage.
2. Evaluate images and deciding those to keep.
3. Optionally convert RAW files into images.
4. Optionally process: images to tune them.
5. Catalog and organize images for later retrieval.
6. Store images on various media.
7. Display images for enjoyment or other purposes.
8. Optionally share images online, with publications or privately via electronic means.
9. Prepare images for printing.
10. Print to give images a physical form.

Although these steps are a logical sequence, other variants may be used, certain steps can be omitted or repeated even. Once a digital images exists as bits, it can take many paths through the workflow to produce different outcomes. Any computer that can take an image through these steps is technically a digital photography computer. In this guide, we discuss how to choose all the parts that make this workflow more efficient.

What is the most important for a Digital Photography Computer?

The one component that is absolutely critical for a digital photography computer is an accurate display. The reality is that the vast majority of displays are incapable of accurately showing image colors. Without reliable colors, it is extremely difficult - not to say impossible - to see when an image exhibits unwanted color casts and requires correction. Unless processing black-and-white images, there is no substitute for a good display.

Most computer screens these days are LCD with a number of variants available. Some people look at the panel-type as an indicator of quality but this is potential quality rather than realized. For this reason, it is more important to look at color-space coverage and bit-depth. These say what colors can the display represent and how accurately, respectively. As with lenses, price is a broad indicator of performance. Good monitors are not cheap and cheap monitors are not good. That being said, they start at an affordable price:

Laptops uses are almost certain to have a poor display since it is difficult to produce accurate colors with even tones in such small sizes and with low power consumption. Good thing that pretty much any modern laptop supports at least one external display. Considering this is 2020, expect a monitor to connect via Display Port and most likely HDMI. With recent standards, these ports support at least 4K of resolution which is sufficient to run over 99% of displays on the market.

Just because a computer monitor is capable of producing accurate colors, does not mean it is doing so. To accurately see those colors, a display almost always requires calibration. However, not all display can actually be calibrated. So, when selecting a monitor for photography, it is crucial to look for one that can be. Otherwise, it is possible to calibrate the graphics card instead which improves things but introduces issues such as banding.

How to get a computer for digital photography?

Unless restricted to a laptop which simply cannot perform to the level of a dedicated desktop, modern computers are highly modular and can easily be assembled from parts. The key is to know which component to look for and how to ensure everything is compatible together. That topic is covered on the next page of this Digital Photography Computer Buying Guide where every component is explained.

One can avoid the work of building a computer, which is honestly quite satisfying, by going for a pre-built system. A few exist purposefully built for photography but most gaming machines are likely to deliver a suitable level of performance with the exception of the display. Gaming computers and screens favor a high refresh-rate which is irrelevant for photography over quality and accuracy. So, when going the Gaming Computer route, get one without an included display and buy the screen separately.

Powerful workstation exist too but be careful when selecting one as many lack graphic capabilities that are beneficial for working with digital images. Usually workstations are designed for design, illustration, pre-press or similar work that is heavily visual are better for photography.

Note that small things can make a significant difference and it may be possible to upgrade a few components or buy add-ons to make an existing system work better for photography. By far the cheapest way and frequently overlooked is simply to use a card-reader rather than USB cable or worse, Bluetooth, for off-loading images. Make sure to select one which reads the memory card format used by your camera:

Laptops are all-in-one systems and so are rarely upgradable. There are a few with Discreet Graphics which is a must when working with the high-resolution images produced by recent digital cameras. Graphics and processing required for the digital photography workflow use a lot of power and therefore are likely to limit battery-life of suitable laptops.

Ready to build a Digital Photography Computer?

Head over to the next page of this guide to learn about every component that makes a great computer for digital photography. A number of price-points are covered and, since technology evolves rather quickly, a new page with the most up to date recommendations will be added to this article periodically. Next, everything you need to know for building a digital photography computer in 2020.

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