Comparison, first set

I got a new lens--Canon's EF 50mm f/1.8 II.

Up until now I've been keeping it simple and shooting with the kit lens that came with the camera (Canon's EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 zoom lens), which is a perfectly respectable lens for an amateur like me. But the more comfortable I get with this camera, the more I'd like to start investing in some equipment to give myself some more options.

This lens gets solid reviews, especially for low light conditions--and portraiture, which I'd like to start playing around with. And...it's dirt cheap, at least as far as lenses go. It gets a lot of comparisons to Canon's 50mm f/1.4 lens--but at roughly a third of the f/1.4's price, my wallet decided it liked this one much more than its more expensive cousin.

I'm not sold on it quite yet, though. Part of it is me getting used to a fixed-length lens (I hadn't realized how much I like zoom until it wasn't there). I'm also not quite impressed with how it performs in low-light conditions (but then, I also haven't dug through my folders and done any actual side-by-side comparisons of pics shot with the kit lens in similar low-light conditions). The reduced macro range is hard for me to swallow because I do love close-ups--but then again, this lens isn't billed as a macro lens, and I wasn't expecting it to be a macro lens. (And I can always swap it back to the kit lens if I want/need to for closer shots.) It's just more difficult for me to adjust to that lack than I thought it would be.

On the pro side the depth of field is fabulous. It's really outstanding compared to the kit lens. That was apparent on the first set of shots. And the overall clarity/sharpness...well, take a look. # 1 (previously posted) was taken with the old lens, # 2 with the new, and both under reasonably similar conditions:

1.
2.


To my eye there is a difference in clarity/sharpness between the two shots. But maybe that's just me?

Regardless, I need to keep playing with this--and I need to dig through my folders and find similar shots to compare to--so there will be more of these kinds of sets coming.