Although Instagram has been around for years and is hugely popular, not everyone is completely familiar with the free photo app and how it can quickly transform your mediocre selfies into stunning glamour shots.
Okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but most Instagram users will admit that Instagram's filters changed their lives. You're guaranteed to find at least one that can make your mobile phone snap into a work of art.
But before you dive right in and starting fiddling around all the options, you need to know how the app works. We've therefore laid out everything you need to know, including tips and tricks and even descriptions for each filter.
Let us know in the comments if you know anything else worth including.
What is Instagram?
Instagram is a video and photo-sharing social network. It launched in 2010 as a mobile device app and was acquired by Facebook two years later. It primarily stands out because it confines photos to a square shape and features filters.How does it work?
Sign up
Instagram is almost exclusively meant for mobile devices. You must therefore download the iPhone or Android app in order to register an Instagram account. Once you download the app, you can easily login through Facebook.
After signing up, you can change your profile picture and edit your information, which includes a brief 150-character summary and the ability to link a website. All Instagram accounts are public by default but can be made private.
Navigation
Every time you open and load Instagram, you will automatically be brought to your news feed, which is filled with photos and videos from people you chose to follow on Instagram. Along the bottom of all the app is a menu bar.
The menu bar has five tabs: Home, Search, Camera, Activity, and Profile. The Home tab take you to the news feed, while Search is for finding people and discovering trending photos or other accounts you might be interested in.
Camera is where you'll go to post photos and videos (as well as edit them), and Activity is kind of like your notification center as well as a place you can go to see photos your followers might've liked on Instagram.
And finally, Profile is where you go to see your profile, edit your profile, and play with settings (found in upper right-hand corner). Settings has options for following Facebook friends, privatising your account, and more.
Engagement
There are three main ways of engaging with other users on Instagram: you can double tap on their photos to like them; you can press the chat symbol below their photos to leave a comment, and you can direct message them.
To direct message someone, go to the Home tab, then select the mailbox symbol in the upper right-hand corner, and tap the "+" sign to snap a photo and video message. From there, you'll be able to edit it and send it to a follower.
Keep mind you can also tag people in photos and reply to comments with tags. You can also add and use hashtags across Instagram (much like you can on Facebook and Twitter).
Posting
To post a photo or video (maximum length is 15 seconds), go to the Camera tab and either tap the blue circle to take a photo or tap the video camera symbol to start filming. You can also tap the camera roll thumbnail to upload media.
While getting ready to either upload or snap a photo, you will see three icons above the recorder button. The first icon brings up a grid for lining up the shot, the second one enables selfie mode, and the third turns on flash.
Once you proceed with a photo or video, you'll see a filter tray pop up, in which you can apply an effect. Double tap the effect to access a slider that'll let you increase or decrease the intensity of the filter. Each filter has a different effect.
You might also notice another three icons above the filter tray. The first one brings up the filter tray. The second one lets you adjust a special effect called Lux. And the third one expands all the fine-tune controls for brightness, saturation, etc.
After you're done editing, tap the next button on the top-right of the Filters screen.
Sharing
Upon hitting next on the top-right of the Filters screen, you will get to a screen that'll let you share your photo or video to either all followers or a direct follower. You can also tag people, name a location, add the media to a map, and more.
Instagram also integrates with Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr, and Foursquare, meaning you'll be able to share across most of the popular social networks with just one tap (but make sure you also tap the blue share bar at the bottom).
What do the filters do, exactly?
Before we move on to the next section, we thought we should go over each filter (including the separate Lux effect) and what they actually do to your photos and videos:
Normal - No filter applied
Lark - Desaturates reds and increases blues and greens
Reyes - Adds a dusty, vintage look
Juno - Tints cool tones green, amps up warm tones, makes whites glow
Slumber - Desaturates the image, adds a haze, emphasis on blacks and blues
Crema - Adds a creamy look that both warms and cools the image
Ludwig - Slight desaturation that also enhances light
Aden - Adds a blue/green natural look
Perpetua - Adds a pastel look
Amaro - Adds light to an image, with the focus on the centre
Mayfair - Adds a warm pink tone, subtle vignetting, brightens at the center
Rise - Adds a glow to the image
Hudson - Adds an "icy" illusion, heightened shadows, cool tint, dodged center
Valencia - Fades the image, increases exposure, warms the colors
X-Pro II - Increases colour vibrance with a golden tint, high contrast, slight vignette
Sierra - Adds a faded, softer look
Willow - Adds a monochromatic look, subtle purple tones, translucent white border
Lo-Fi - Enriches color, adds strong shadows, warms the the temperature
Earlybird - Gives an older look with a sepia tint and warm temperature
Brannan - Increases contrast and exposure and adds a metallic tint
Inkwell - Goes straight to black and white
Hefe - High contrast and saturation, similar to Lo-Fi
Nashville - Warms temperature, lowers contrast, increases exposure, adds pink tint
Sutro - Burns edges, increases highlights/shadows, focus on purple and brown
Toaster - Ages the image by "burning" the centre and adds a dramatic vignette
Walden - Increases exposure and adds a yellow tint
1977 - Increases exposure, adds a red tint and faded look
Kelvin - Increases saturation and temperature to give it a radiant glow
Lux - Transforms photos that are underexposed or lack contrast
Are there any tips and tricks?
Now that we've covered the basics of how Instagram works, we'll get into some tips and tricks:
Go directly to camera roll
If you want to save time and get straight to uploading a photo whenever you launch Instagram, just hold down the Camera tab on the menu bar. From there, the camera roll should immediately open and let you select a photo.
Edit captions
Gone are the days of typos and feeling embarrassed when you accidentally post a photo with "your" in the caption when you really meant to write "you're". Instagram launched an update earlier this year that enabled editing captions.
Go to the post, then tap the three-dot symbol in the bottom corner, and select Edit. You'll then be able to edit the caption. As far as we can tell, people won't see how (or even how many times) you've edited the caption.
Reply to comments
You can reply to a comment without having to enter the person's handle/tagging the person. Instead, select the comment, then swipe left, and click the gray arrow. The person's handle will then appear in the comment box.
Delete your comments
While replying to a comment, you might've also saw the trash symbol. It allows you to delete a comment. So, go to the photo, then click comment, and swipe left to see and tap the trash can. That's it.
Remove a tagged photo
If want to remove a photo under your tagged folder (furthest right option just below your profile description), you can either hide the photo from your profile or remove the tagged photo altogether.
Go to your Instagram profile, then tap the tagged folder, and select a photo you’d like to remove. From there, tap the button on the bottom right with the three dots, then select Photo Options, and Hide from My Profile.
That'll hide the photo. To completely remove yourself from being tagged in the photo on Instagram, tap More Options, and then select Remove Me from Photo. Simples.
Manage filters
If you ever want to hide some filters to make it easier for you to decide between a specific few rather than the whole lot, you can slide to the end of the filter tray, and then tap manage filters in order to hide or show certain ones.
Adjust cellular data settings
Instagram videos are designed to play automatically on your feed, which can be taxing on your data when not near a hotspot, but you can change your cellular data settings so videos load slower and thus less data is consumed.
Just go to your profile, then tap the Settings icon, and scroll down to Cellular Data Use. And finally, tap Use Less Data.
Save originals
Instagram uploads photos to its network at 612 x 612 pixels in size. If you want to access a higher resolution version (like for uploading to your website), you can save the original photos to your device.
Go to your profile, then tap the Settings icon, and scroll down to Save Original Photos. From there, toggle on the option.
Embed your photos on the web
In order to get the embed code to share an Instagram photo on the web, you first have to find the post via Instagram on the web, then click the three dots symbol in the bottom corner, and choose Embed. You're then free to copy the code.
Hide Instagram adverts
Instagram adverts are defined by the “Sponsored†label in the top corner, but you don't have to scroll by annoying ones in your news feed. Click on the three-dot symbol at the bottom of the advert to either hide it or provide feedback.
Change the layout of photos
Many people like to give their photos white borders or compile them into collages before posting to Instagram. Although there are several third-party apps that let you do this prior to posting, Instagram recently launched its own app.
Appropriately titled Layout, the new app not only lets you easily combine multiple photos into a single image, but also create one-of-a-kind layouts by remixing your photos. You can read more about it here.
Create hyperlapses
First of all: Time lapse or time-lapse photography is a cinematography technique whereby frequency at which film frames are captured (the frame rate) is much lower than that used to view the sequence.
Hyperlapse is an iOS-only app from Instagram that lets you create time lapses from your phone. It also has built-in tools for smoothing out shaking video, meaning you could use it to Instagram footage taken with a Go Pro.
You can learn more about Hyperlapse here.
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