Many people overlook prime lenses, because they just don’t relate to moving their feet instead of adjusting their focal length on their zoom lens…..but primes are very sharp and very fast! And generally more affordable.  I’ve talked to a couple different photographers lately who needed lenses but didn’t have a huge budget…..it’s a no brainer to me that it’s better to spend $100.00 for a 50 mm 1.8 than spending even more getting a cheap standard zoom with variable fstop, as a temporary solution. Sure, a 1.4 or 1.2 version of that lens is even better because of build quality and more aperture vains, but this is not the discussion for that lol. That particular lens should be in most every photographer’s bag….it’s very lightweight, and is very handy for low light settings. In fact I use that lens a lot when doing wedding photography, like the detail image below. Don’t rule out prime lenses. This one in particular cannot be beat for the price. There are several standard zoom lenses that cost 4 times as much that I wouldn’t trade it for.