Time Machine Problems???

I'm using a new i7 MBP with 8mb of Ram and a 500 gb HD.
I'm using a WD 1TB external HD to use for time Machine.
I've loaded about 100 gb's of pictures onto the WD HD using TM. I'm using Capture One 5 pro as my Photo program and here's the problem that I'm having; when I load a picture form the external Hd into CO 5 I'm not able to use any of the sliders to modify the pictures. The slider are not functional and it is like I'm trying to work with deleted files.
I use to have these pictures on the WD HD and I was able to use them and send them to the printer or online to a commercial printer, now it seems after using TM to load the photos on the WD HD that I'm just storing the pictures and not able to use them. I thought that TM was a back up program so I would have another copy of workable pictures? I'm probably missing a basic step in the process, maybe I need to start over.
Is there a way that I can start over and not use Time Machine and manually load the pictures onto my WD HD?
Thanks, Jerry

Time Machine is a backup program and as such uses hard links to files that have not changed after the initial backup is completed. You can't run a program from Time Machine as if it were an operating system.

To answer your other question... yes, you can drag and drop photos from your MacIntosh HD to an external drive for storage. You should then be able to modify them as you would those on the internal HD.

Regards.

Thanks

Thanks for your help, I'm still making the transition to my MBP and liking it more each day.
Thanks for the support and a great forum with members wiling to help and share their knowledge.

Regards, Jerry