Canon Digital Rebel XT lenses?

I recently purchased a Canon Digital Rebel XT, EOS 350 D camera. I am a complete beginner at this, so I need a lot of guidance.

We are going to Paris, France in a few weeks, so I need to know what the best lenses would be for shooting pics of the Eiffel tower (from near and far away) and the catacombs, etc.- wide angle and telephoto. Also, I want them to be zoom lenses. The kit lens that came with the camera just doesn't zoom in enough for me.

Also, do you know where I can get them? I live in Germany,so the place would have to ship to an APO address.

Thanks so much!

You may want something along the focal range of 70-300mm to suit your purposes. You may need a tripod or to brace yourself against a wall or some stationary object (and hold your breath) since any minor movement will be greatly increased on the lens side.

Whatever you do, avoid those super-zooms that go from like 28-200mm or 28-300mm because they have aberration and distortion problems which has nothing to do with brand names but moreso as a function of the difficulties of manufacturing zoom lenses with moving parts of those focal lengths. You're better off using two zoom lenses (keep the kit lens) than one of those supposed all-in-one lenses. You'll particularly see the aberrations and/or distortions when you enlarge an image (or print it) beyond 4" x 6". Stay away from generics, too; they have similar issues, too, because they made cheaper (barrel build) and have USUALLY have cheaper glass formulas in order to compete with brand names. That's basically why they do not retain the higher re-sale prices as brand name lenses.

You'll want a lens that will go from around 20mm to 200mm. If you get that in a single lens, it will probably be a little pricey. Therefore, you might want to get a 20-70mm lens and a 70-200mm lens. Make sure they are fully compatible with your camera so that you get the auto-focus and other features that the camera offers. (Canon lenses for this camera will support those features.) A 20mm lens will give you a very wide angle and 200 will give you decent telephoto shots.

Look for lenses at Amazon or retailers like 47th Street Photo. They should ship to APO addresses.

I have a canon 70-200 f/4 L and it's great. it's one of the cheapest L quality lenses, and i find that the lack of Image stabilization is no problem at all.

I JUST got almost the same camera (mine is the Digital XTi EOS 400 D)...I'm still learning it, but the beautiful thing about it is that the kit lens is a decent wide-angle lens with some zoom, but you can interchange lenses with those of a Rebel Film SLR (EF series lenses, which I have). My telephoto (I think it's the same as AJ_S's above) was purchased a few years ago from Best Buy (check their website, and see if they ship to an APO address). They usually have pretty good deals going, as well...

Also, check out the Canon website (in sources, below). They have a section that will tell you what kind of lens to use in various situations.

Good luck!

You likely purchased the camera with the 18-55mm lens (equivalent). It doesn't get a wide enough perspective for my needs. I purchased a 70-300 lens, but again the range doesn't give me a far enough telephoto, and the 70 mm equivalent is not a great improvement from the 18-55 lens. I have the same set up with 2 cameras, the Rebel Digital 350XT and the Canon 30D. I would like to get two lenss in the future. A wide angle lens, and a better telephoto lense. They could be prime lenses with no telephoto abilities. These cameras will accept 35 MM lenses, so you have a greater range of lenses available. For me, the best camera store in the United States is 47th Street Photography., in New York City. Getting back to lenses, I would stick with Canon lenses, but Sigma, Tamron and Vivitar lenses are all very good.