Prime lens kit for canon 60D

[ayalara]

Hi,

I am building a prime lens kit for my canon 60D. I already have the canon 50mm f1.8 stm and the canon 135mm f2.8 soft focus.  I want to add prime lens in the wide, normal and medium telephoto focal length range. Don't have the budget to spend on L series lenses. Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Alberto Ayala

[kvbarkley]

Do you need a macro?

[kvbarkley]

Primes are usually EF lenses and as such geared for FF lenses. So primes don't go very wide for crop-frame cameras. You might want to look at the EF-S 10-22 zoom

[RobertTheFat]

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@ayalara wrote:

Hi,

I am building a prime lens kit for my canon 60D. I already have the canon 50mm f1.8 stm and the canon 135mm f2.8 soft focus.  I want to add prime lens in the wide, normal and medium telephoto focal length range. Don't have the budget to spend on L series lenses. Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Alberto Ayala

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A "normal" prime lens on a 60D would be about 31 mm. Sigma used to make a 30mm f/1.4 that wasn't bad and was very affordable. Maybe there's something similar today. Also, I think I read that Canon makes a 30-something prime that might be worth looking into.

[ayalara]

I have in mind the canon 24mm stm, 40mm stm, sigma 30mm f 1.4, canon 35mm f2.0 and the canon 85mm f1.8. I saw those rokinon manual lenses but since those lenses don't have focus indicator on the camera it would be hard to focus.

[RobertTheFat]

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@ayalara wrote:
I have in mind the canon 24mm stm, 40mm stm, sigma 30mm f 1.4, canon 35mm f2.0 and the canon 85mm f1.8. I saw those rokinon manual lenses but since those lenses don't have focus indicator on the camera it would be hard to focus.

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That list is a bit deficient at the wide end. Any decent walking-around zoom lens for an APS-C camera will reach down to 17 or 18 mm. And true WAs range downwards from there.

[Waddizzle]

"Don't have the budget to spend on L series lenses. Any suggestions?" 

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@kvbarkley wrote:

Primes are usually EF lenses and as such geared for FF lenses. So primes don't go very wide for crop-frame cameras. You might want to look at the EF-S 10-22 zoom

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On a budget?  Good advice, there.  The EF-S 10-22mm zoom will give the Full-Frame equivalent of 16-35mm, which would go well with your "nifty fifty."  Many zoom lenses today have great image quality, and afford you a wider range of coverage than a set of primes.   Also the EF-S 10-18mm zoom is worthy of consideration if you're on a budget.

If you do not have the budget for what you know to be quality lenses, then do not compromise on your lens purchases.  Over the long run, you will wind up buying the lenses that you had originally set your sights on.  While the EF-S 24mm, and its' cousiin the EF 40mm "shorty forty", are fairly good lenses, I would not want them to be the "best in my bag lenses."  Having a good general purpose, walk around zoom lens is invaluable for one just starting out.

I know the feeling, I do.  You want everything at once.  Call it "lens fever", and it cannot be properly cured.  But, the money you would spend on that collection budget primes could be better spent on one of the wide angle, zoom lenses suggested above, or even on more costly the EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM Lens from Canon.  Trust me.  Trust us.  You will very rarely be disappointed investing in quality Canon lenses.

[RobertTheFat]

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@Waddizzle wrote:

"Don't have the budget to spend on L series lenses. Any suggestions?" 

---

@kvbarkley wrote:

Primes are usually EF lenses and as such geared for FF lenses. So primes don't go very wide for crop-frame cameras. You might want to look at the EF-S 10-22 zoom

---

On a budget?  Good advice, there.  The EF-S 10-22mm zoom will give the Full-Frame equivalent of 16-35mm, which would go well with your "nifty fifty."  Many zoom lenses today have great image quality, and afford you a wider range of coverage than a set of primes.   Also the EF-S 10-18mm zoom is worthy of consideration if you're on a budget.

If you do not have the budget for what you know to be quality lenses, then do not compromise on your lens purchases.  Over the long run, you will wind up buying the lenses that you had originally set your sights on.  While the EF-S 24mm, and its' cousiin the EF 40mm "shorty forty", are fairly good lenses, I would not want them to be the "best in my bag lenses."  Having a good general purpose, walk around zoom lens is invaluable for one just starting out.

I know the feeling, I do.  You want everything at once.  Call it "lens fever", and it cannot be properly cured.  But, the money you would spend on that collection budget primes could be better spent on one of the wide angle, zoom lenses suggested above, or even on more costly the EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM Lens from Canon.  Trust me.  Trust us.  You will very rarely be disappointed investing in quality Canon lenses.

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Truthfully, a case can be made that zooms are now so good that it usually makes sense to buy only special-purpose primes. e.g. the 30mm f/1.4 (because there are no affordable f/1.4 zooms) or the 60mm f/2.8 macro.

[jrhoffman75]

The EF-S 17-55 and the 85 f/1.8 are both highly regarded for their image quality.

[ScottyP]

I love primes too, but agree with the suggestion of the Canon EFS 17-55 f/2.8.  That gives you the normal angle and the moderately wide angle. 

Later on you might get an 85 f/1.8. If you have that you could then get rid of the 135 soft focus and get a 200mm prime for the long end, if you really need a long end. 

We should ask what you shoot though.  Some people try to have a lens for every focal length. It is better to have just a couple of good lenses at the focal lengths you use most rather than five or six cheap ones, covering lengths you don't really use much.