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

Oct 16, 2026–Mar 14, 2027

Light Is a Plastic Medium at the Hirshhorn Museum explores the innovative work of American abstract photographer and educator Esther McCoy Corpron (1901–1988).

Working primarily in Texas, Corpron used light, form, and experimental photographic techniques to push photography toward fine art. The exhibition features six bodies of work created from the late 1930s through the early 1950s, tracing her evolution from nature studies to abstract light drawings and explorations of space.

The exhibition includes 48 photographs recently gifted to the Hirshhorn by Herbert Lust, along with additional loans from his collection.

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
Independence Ave SW and 7th St SW
Washington, DC 20560

https://hirshhorn.si.edu/exhibitions/carlotta-corpron-light-is-a-plastic-medium/

Jul 24, 2026 - Feb 28, 2027

An exhibition that blends photography and sculpture in new ways. Using anonymous photographs found in thrift stores and online, Pascual transformed everyday images through enlargement, cropping, and the addition of unexpected objects. By altering their scale and presentation, she turned ordinary snapshots into sculptural works that challenge viewers to see familiar imagery in new and thought-provoking ways. This exhibition features seventeen works created between 2009 and 2014, highlighting her innovative approach to reimagining found photographs.

National Museum of Women in the Arts
1250 New York Ave NW, Washington, DC 20005

https://nmwa.org/exhibitions/marlo-pascual-making-something-out-of-something/

September 21, 2025 - January 11, 2026

The first exhibition to consider photography’s impact on a cultural and aesthetic movement that celebrated Black history, identity, and beauty. Uniting around civil rights and freedom movements of the 1960s and 1970s, many visual artists, poets, playwrights, musicians, photographers, and filmmakers expressed hope and dignity through their art. These creative efforts became known as the Black Arts Movement.  

National Gallery of Art West Building
Sixth St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565

https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/photography-and-black-arts-movement-1955-1985

September 18, 2026 – April 18, 2027 Much Here Is Beautiful: Photography Surveys of the U.S. Bicentennial is a major exhibition and accompanying book uniting regional photography projects funded by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) during the 1970s and early 1980s. It runs from September 18, 2026, to April 18, 2027, at the Smithsonian Art Meseum in Washington, D.C., showcasing 225 works by more than 200 photographers.

Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM)
G Street Northwest &, 8th St NW, Washington, DC 20004

https://americanart.si.edu/exhibition/bicentennial-photography-surveys

Ongoing Exhibit

National Geographic presents “Photo Ark: Animals of Earth," a powerful wildlife photography exhibition by renowned National Geographic Explorer, photographer and founder of the Photo Ark, Joel Sartore. This visually stunning showcase highlights global biodiversity through striking portraits of animals — many of them endangered species — photographed in Sartore’s intimate, signature style that captures eye contact on black and white backgrounds and eliminates size comparisons, giving a mouse the same importance as an elephant.

National Geographic Museum of Exploration
1600 M St NW, Washington, DC 20036

https://moe.nationalgeographic.org/en/whats-on/animals-of-earth

Ongoing Exhibit

The museum's collections include photographs that document:

• Immigration and life at Ellis Island.

• The Civil Rights Movement.

• Labor conditions and industrialization.

• Military service and wartime experiences.

• American families and everyday life across different eras.

Works by influential photographers such as Lewis Hine and Dorothea Lange illustrate how photography has been used to expose social problems, influence public opinion, and inspire reform.

The National Museum of American History treats photographs as primary source documents that help historians interpret the past while reminding visitors to think critically about what every image includes and what it leaves out.

The National Museum of American History
1300 Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20560

https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_1296376

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
950 Independence Avenue, SW
Washington, D.C. 20560
http://indian-ocean.africa.si.edu/

Ongoing VIRTUAL exhibit

NOT AN OSTRICH: & OTHER IMAGES FROM AMERICA’S LIBRARY, organized by the Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles and drawn from the photography collections of the Library of Congress, presents a taste of this institution’s spectacular holdings of more than 14 million photographs. Selected images reproduced for this online exhibition were made between 1839 and today. They trace the evolution of photography, from daguerreotypes and other early processes to contemporary digital technology.

Library of Congress
10 First Street SE
Washington, DC 20540
Southwest Gallery, Thomas Jefferson Building
https://www.loc.gov/exhibitions/images-from-americas-library/about-this-exhibition/

Ongoing VIRTUAL exhibit

An icon in modern photography, Mary Ellen Mark (1940 - 2015) documented people around the world who might otherwise be unknown or forgotten.  From street children in Seattle to circus performers in India, Mark captured the lives and stories of individuals with empathy, humor and candor.  The exhibition includes photographs from some of the artist's best-known series that depict girls and young women, reflecting Mark's wonderous and uncanny vision of girlhood.

National Museum of Women in the Arts
1250 New York Ave NW
Washington, DC 20005
https://nmwa.org/whats-on/exhibitions/online/mary-ellen-mark-girlhood/