dustin_brazeau

<p>Ended up picking up refurbished versions of the 50mm 1.8f and the 10-18mm from the Canon store for about $330. Thanks for the help!</p>

<p>Background: I've been interested in photography for a while and finally made the leap and purchased a DSLR a little under a year ago. I like to do everything from taking picture of my son/family when we are out at the park or at family events, landscape, nature/wildlife, macro, and occasionally astrophotography. The most common being taking pictures of family, either portrait style or non-portrait/action style (not really sure what the right term for that is). Then then next highest priority being landscape, cityscape and nature/wildlife.<br> My Gear: I currently have a Canon 70D with the 18-135 STM kit lens. I also have a Dolica GX600B200 tripod, 2,4,8,10 ND filters and a Polarizer filter.<br> I plan to slowly build a collection of lenses to meet my needs, but being fairly new I'm not completely sure what my exact needs are and what type of lens to get first. I also can't justify spending more than $500 or so on a lens at this time given my experience level.<br> I would really like to get a lens with a larger aperture size to get better blurred background and bokeh effect that what I currently get with my kit lens. So for that reason I was looking at the 50mm 1.8f or the pricier 50mm 1.4f. I will be going to Hawaii in a few months so I would also really like to get a lens that would work good taking some nice landscape pictures, so I'm thinking something like Canon EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5-5.6 IS STM may be a good choice or maybe a used Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM. Another lens I was eyeing was the Canon EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM as kind of a middle ground between a portrait and a landscape lens, but I'm thinking I would probably be better off getting two separate lenses rather than compromising to save money in the short term.<br> As of right now I don't plan on selling my kit lens, so I would prefer to invest in lenses that can do stuff that my kit lens can't as opposed to just improve on what my kit lens can already can do. Eventually I will probably want to invest in something like a 70-300mm lens, but right now I think a combination of a large aperture prime lens and a wide angle lens would better suit my needs.</p>