Just to put it out there, after having owned a LaCie drive for a couple of years now...it's a fantastically quick drive, but I've already gone through two of them due to drive failure (thankfully, under warranty). If you decide to go with a lightning supported drive, I don't recommend LaCie personally (not sure what else is out there though since I haven't looked after dropping $500 on this drive, lol).
The two machines you listed will be more than sufficient for photography and graphics work within Creative suite and light room. As with any computer, get as much RAM and storage as your budget allows internally if for no other reason than to retain value down the road when you go to replace it (the new MBP's are not user friendly when it comes to internal upgrades, so you'll want to upgrade when you order it unfortunately). I think within the next couple of years we'll have easier upgrades to the SSD's inside of them, but the RAM I think will remain a bit of a pain.
And yes, if you don't mind having external drives, the smaller internal drive should suffice just fine.
03-21-2014 12:11 PM