Can anyone suggest a good portrait lens for a Canon 550D?

[Caz4500]

Looking to start doing portraits and wondered what the best lens would be, I have a canon 550D and currently I have the 55-85mm lens that came with it and use that for landscapes.
If anyone wants to check out my website btw its Caroline Mound Photography | Wix.com
Thanks
Caz

 

[Overread]

There isn't a "best lens".
There simply isn't. There are a massive range of options and, honestly, almost any lens can be used for the subject of portraiture. The key is understanding your own creative and situational requirements and then researching the market and setting yourself a budget to work with. Then you can start to sort through and work out which lens (or likely lenses) are going to suit your style and your situation and your budget.

Without that you'll just get a long list of suggested lenses based on other peoples criteria and you won't have any ability to sort through them yourself.


If you don't really have any feelings on the subject, then its not the time to buy a new lens. It's time to shoot more with your kit lens, to get more experience with it and note down the focal length(s) you tend to shoot at. See if you find if you need more zoom or if its suitable enough and you'd like a higher quality over a similar range in a zoom; of if you tend to always be a single focal length and then want a prime.

 

[jaomul]

Welcome to the forum.
There is no best but the following are good. EF50mm f1.8, not expensive but lovely portrait lens on your camera, EF50mm f1.4, even better. For outside portraits EF 85mm f1.8. All these lenses are good to start, any fast lens over 50mm that produces good quality images should be great for portraits.