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
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/

November 4, 2022 - January 7, 2024

A Window Suddenly Opens: Contemporary Photography in China will be the Hirshhorn’s first survey of photography by leading multigenerational Chinese artists made between the 1990s and 2000s. The exhibition will showcase 186 artworks made between 1993 and 2022.

Hirshhorn Museum
Independence Ave and 7th St
Washington, DC 20560
https://hirshhorn.si.edu/exhibitions/a-window-suddenly-opens-contemporary-photography-in-china/

June 23, 2023 - June 9, 2024

Drawn exclusively from the Portrait Gallery’s collection of daguerreotypes, ambrotypes and tintypes, this exhibition features early camera portraits of individuals such as Ulysses S. Grant, George Armstrong Custer, John Pelham, “Stonewall” Jackson and Gouverneur Kemble Warren. The course of these men’s lives and careers was shaped by their education at West Point.

National Portrait Gallery
8th and G Streets NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/duty-honor-country-antebellum-portraits-west-pointers

October 15, 2023 – February 4, 2024

Discover an intriguing chapter in the history of photography, as innovative practitioners searched for and perfected a method to produce identical photographic prints in ink. The process, which came to be called photogravure, yielded some of the most beautiful photographs ever made—featuring delicate highlights, lush blacks, a remarkably rich tonal range, and a velvety matte surface. Etched by Light: Photogravures from the Collection, 1840–1940 tells the story of the first 100 years of this process.

National Gallery of Art
6th St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565
West Building, Ground Floor - Gallery 22
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2023/etched-light-photogravures.html

November 5, 2023 – March 31, 2024

During her long, prolific, and groundbreaking career, the American photographer Dorothea Lange made some of the most iconic portraits of the 20th century. Dorothea Lange: Seeing People reframes Lange’s work through the lens of portraiture, highlighting her unique ability to discover and reveal the character and resilience of those she photographed.

National Gallery of Art
6th St and Constitution Ave NW
Washington, DC 20565
West Building, Ground Floor
https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2023/dorothea-lange-seeing-people.html

March 1, 2024 - January 5, 2025

Widely regarded as the preeminent Hollywood portrait photographer of the 1930s and 1940s, George Hurrell (1904–1992) created definitive, timeless images of many of the most glamorous figures of filmdom’s golden era. With a keen eye for lighting effects and artful posing, he developed a style of presentation that magnified the stars and influenced popular standards of glamour.

National Portrait Gallery
8th and G Streets NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/star-power-photographs-hollywood%E2%80%99s-golden-era-george-hurrell

April 26, 2024 - February 23, 2025

Through portraiture and biography, “Brilliant Exiles: American Women in Paris, 1900 – 1939” illuminates the accomplishments of sixty convention-defying women who crossed the Atlantic to pursue personal and professional aspirations in the vibrant cultural milieu of Paris.

National Portrait Gallery
8th and G Streets NW
Washington, DC 20001
https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/brilliant-exiles-american-women-paris-1900-%E2%80%93-1939-april-26-2024-%E2%80%93-feb-23-2025

January 28-30, 2024 

Kentucky International Convention Center
221 S 4th Street
Louisville, KY 40202
https://imagingusa.com/

February 24 - 25, 2024

Online
https://meredithimages.com/creative-photography-conference/

April 2 - 4, 2024

St. Louis Union Station
1820 Market St
St. Louis, MO 63103
https://shutterfest.com/