geoffrey_wiseman

'Too dark' could be a lot of things, you're not giving us much information to go on. What mode (manual, Av, Tv, auto, etc.) are you shooting in? Are you using the pop-up flash?

Personally, if I were going for indoor, I'd go for something with a wide aperture. If you're not looking to spend a lot of money, I'd go for the 50mm f1.8. It'll zoom slightly less than what you've got, but can handle lower light. A flash is a viable option, although it'd depend on your distance to the stage, and whether or not flash is allowed.

Very different effective focal lengths on these two. As everyone said above, depends a lot on your needs.

Personally, I'd start with the L glass and consider moving up on the body later; the glass becomes obselete a lot less quickly, so it's a better long-term investment.

I agree with the thrust of this thread, that Canon prices in Canada seem not to have been adjusted and are "unfair". It's unfortunate, because I'd prefer to buy from a Canadian retailer, but it's starting to seem ludicrous for Canon gear.

Canadian retailers do not, as a rule, include taxes in the price listings (although it is done on occasion, it would almost always indicate clearly if this were true).

Depends on the kit options; there are lots of lens review sites if you want to compare the kits that are available to you.

The normal kit lens, 18-55 is a reasonable starter lens; it's not a great long-term purchase, but it's inexpensive, flexible and of reasonable (although I'll admit not STELLAR) quality.

Personally, I always save the RAW files, simply because that gives me the freedom to come back and reinterpret the original RAW in another way.

Yes, it eats up a lot of space; I put 'em on DVD for now, although practically speaking, the archival quality of various media is still very much open for debate.

To be honest, I'd say the 17-85 (IS, USM) should be quite capable of portraiture.

Now, that said, I'd think the 50mm f/1.4 or f/1.8 might be better (faster, sharper, zoom mostly irrelevant for portraiture, good focal length for head-and-shoulders, inexpensive to moderately priced), but ... if you can't get good results with the 17-85, then I'm not sure you're going to see radical improvement here.