Hi Gang, it was my birthday on Tuesday and I got £200 from my gran, and would like to spend it on a new lens for my camera. I'm still relatively new to photography, so would appreciate your advice on what to get. (I currently have only the stock 18-55mm lens that came with the camera)
It depends what you fancy doing. Are you more interested in focusing on one particular field of photography or do you want something that will be good for all around use. If you are just looking to expand your creative skill, I'd look into getting a 50mm of some sort. I've seen some very nice results from the Canon EF 50mm f1.8 II. The bokeh on that thing is gorgeous.
I think nature photography is my most likely subject, am surrounded by trees here, and near the New Forest and the coast. I have taken a number of shots hoping to crop them tightly to achieve a sort of zoom.
Are you looking for a telephoto zoom lens then? 17-55 covers your wide angle fairly well, so I'd probably look at the EF-S 50-250 F/4-5.6 and if you can stretch to about £225, pick up an EF 50mm F/1.8 II as well.
I can give a halfway nod to the 50-250 - I have one. Bokeh is HORRIBLE though so you have to really use that in your composition or learn how to work around it in photoshop. That being said, I've still not sold mine - it does the job I need it to and the IS and range are great for the price. Personally, if you're shooting "nature" that can mean two things - wildlife or landscapes. If it's landscape, look to just upgrade the lens you have - I shoot a good 90% of my shots at between 17-35mm. If you're looking at wildlife, you need the telephoto at times and low aperture at others, so tim's recommendation of both those lenses will be by FAR the best bang for your buck. Hope that helps.
I didn't know what 'bokeh' was and found this: http://www.diyphotography.net/diy_create_your_own_bokeh ! Anyway, I meant either wildlife or landscapes, and I guess that a zoom lens is more use for the former. Where do you guys generally shop for camera equipment?
That's not an example of good bokeh, though. See here for more info. As for shops, try Warehouse Express, though they're not always the cheapest so make sure you do a bit of Googling and shop around.
I tend to use onestop-digital.com since Canon lenses have international warranties. I won't buy a body from there though - I tend to buy them from a UK supplier with guaranteed UK stock.
I use warehouse express for a lot of things, Karlu occasionally for some studio things and ffordes.com for second hand suff
Since you've got a Canon body, I'd advise putting the cash towards a Nikon one.... Kidding! My dSLR came with an 18-55 kit lens, and the first lens I bought was a prime (85mm) that's relatively fast (f1.8d); shooting with fast lenses is tremendous fun, and really allows you to be creative with depth-of-field, focus and composition. Fast lenses are often used for portraits, but they can also be great for detail shots (this, this and this) - just because you're surrounded by landscape doesn't mean you need to use a big telephoto to take pics. Just my 2c, anyway
I own one of these and although its a very nice lens, I wouldn't recommend it as a first off lens. I wish I had gone for a nice 50mm lens before I had jumped into all of this telephoto business.
I highly recomend the Canon EF-S 55mm-250mm IS lens. here some of my best nature work with it http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=65153840%40N00&q=55-250IS&m=text and can be found here for like 190 quid http://www.camerapricebuster.co.uk/prod596.html
That's what I ended up getting! I paid a little more than that because I decided I didn't want to wait for delivery from an online shop.
