Every camera bag should have a lens cleaning cloth, an extra memory card and most important, an extra battery. Additionally, the accessories listed below might come in handy.

 A clear glass filter designed to protect your front lens element from scratches or other damage. Get one for each lens and leave it on, unless you're using a different filter. No stacking filters.

Sunglasses for your lenses. Use on a bright sunny day to help increase saturation and contrast. Also use to remove glare on water, windows and foliage.

When you need a slow shutter speed in daylight, this filter helps prevent overexposure.
Perfect for photographing waterfalls in daylight.

Shoot in the rain or snow and use a rain sleeve to protect your camera and lens.

If you struggle to see your LCD screen when you're shooing outdoors on a sunny day, try one of these loupes. 

Visit their website at
https://www.hoodmanusa.com/HoodLoupes-s/128.htm

Telephoto, wide angle, fish eye and macro are some of our favorites. They also have filters for smartphones.

Visit their website at
https://www.shopmoment.com/shop/categories/all?collection=photographer-collection

When your fingers are too big for editing on your phone, a stylus is a the way to go.

Visit their website at
https://tenonedesign.com/pogo.php

Ongoing VIRTUAL exhibit

"Sailors and Daughters" reveals the expansive maritime societies of Zanzibar, the east African coast, and beyond. From the 1840s, cameras traced the international migrations of traders, sailors, sons, and daughters through Indian Ocean ports, continuing trade that dates back over five millennia. East African cities flourished as hubs of both land and sea trade routes, which extended to the central African interior, Horn of Africa, Persian Gulf, Indian Ocean islands, western India and the Far East.

The region’s intercultural ethos generated a multitude of encounters between subjects, photographers, and the global audiences who viewed the resulting images. By gathering images from scarce and little-known collections of early photographs, lithographs, postcards, and private albums, this exhibition focuses attention on a diverse cross-section of the region’s people and their cosmopolitan cities by the sea. It serves as a starting point for a larger photographic and creative visual history of the prosperous and diverse communities of the Indian Ocean world.

Smithsonian National Museum of African Art

http://indian-ocean.africa.si.edu/

Ongoing from March 17, 2021

In her untitled series of photographs, Weems uses images of Augustus Saint-Gaudens’s memorial to commemorate the Great Migration of African Americans streaming north from the Jim Crow South after the Civil War. Layering text and pictures, Weems centers African American experiences that speak of racial pride and resilience, sacrifice and determination.

National Gallery of Art
6th St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565
West Building, Main Floor - Gallery 66
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/special/conversations-carrie-mae-weems.html

April 9, 2021–June 5, 2022

Photographer Alan Karchmer has risen to prominence in his field thanks to his skill in conveying architects’ ideas and intentions. Having earned a Master of Architecture himself, Karchmer uses his knowledge of the design process, coupled with his own artistic vision, to express the essence of a building. He is, quintessentially, “The Architects’ Photographer.”

This exhibition presents a cross-section of Karchmer’s professional photographs, coupled with personal photos and artifacts that shed light on his work. While the exhibition features numerous large-format images of remarkable beauty, it also includes didactic displays examining the technical and creative processes underlying such images. It thus illuminates why certain images are so successful in expressing both the physical and emotional aspects of architecture.

National Building Museum
401 F Street NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://www.nbm.org/exhibition/alan-karchmer/

September 4, 2021–March 6, 2022

This exhibition is dedicated to those who perished, those who responded, and those who are rebuilding after September 11, 2001.

National Building Museum
401 F Street NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://www.nbm.org/exhibition/towers-of-the-wtc/

November 28, 2021 – May 30, 2022

Photographer James Van Der Zee created an extraordinary chronicle of life in Harlem during the 1920s and 1930s and beyond. 

National Gallery of Art
6th St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565
West Building, Ground Floor, Gallery 22
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2021/james-van-der-zee-photographs-portrait-harlem.html

February 16, 2022 - May 01, 2022

“The Greatest Wildlife Photographs” brings together more than 60 of National Geographic's most compelling wildlife photographs, showcasing their power through large-format prints that highlight their detail and technical skill. 

National Geographic Museum
1145 17th Street NW
Washington, DC, 20036
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/tickets/events/event/national-geographics-greatest-wildlife-photographs/

March 1-April 10, 2022

This exhibition is a partnership between The Phillips Collection and the photography club at Woodrow Wilson High School. 

Woodrow Wilson students used Holga cameras and film to capture beauty in their own worlds. Inspired by Alma Woodsey Thomas, each student brought their own unique perspectives to create photographs that are complex, compelling, and of course, beautiful. 

The Phillips Collection
1600 21st Street, NW
Washington, DC 20009
https://www.phillipscollection.org/event/2022-03-01-community-exhibition

May 29 – October 2, 2022

For 50 years, Robert Adams (b. 1937) has made compelling, provocative, and highly influential photographs that show us the wonder and fragility of the American landscape, its inherent beauty, and the inadequacy of our response to it. This exhibition explores the reverential way he looks at the world around him and the almost palpable silence of his work.

National Gallery of Art
4th St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2022/american-silence-photographs-of-robert-adams.html

July 1, 2022 - June 11, 2023

Within a decade of its introduction in 1839, the daguerreotype—the first commercially viable form of photography—emerged as a highly popular means of documenting family relationships. Affordable pricing fueled the popularity of the daguerreotype and technical innovations made it possible to produce successful images of multiple sitters. This paved the way for the boom in family portraiture.

National Portrait Gallery
8th and G Streets NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/family-ties-daguerreotype-portraits

July 8, 2022 - January 29, 2023 - Part 1

This exhibition features more than 25 photographs by Brian Lanker, the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer who, in 1989, published the extraordinarily popular book “I Dream a World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America.”

National Portrait Gallery
8th and G Streets NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/i-dream-world-selections-brian-lanker%E2%80%99s-portraits-remarkable-black-women