The Apps That I Use To Create My Instagram Photos

I get messages asking me how I create the background of my Instagram photos—or where did I find them—more often than I am asked any other question.

The answer is—yes, I created them by editing. I don't own the photos of the "flowers" that are on my images but I turned them into poetry backgrounds with a bit of editing.

I had planned on writing the must-have apps for creating social media posts but then, I left it for some other day. Let me know in the comments if you'd be interested in that one as well.

So, back in 2018, BLISS sent one of the Instagram feeds and advised me to create something similar. His advice has always turned out to be a gem for me. Of course, I didn't have such beautiful flowers around me and my photography skills couldn't do justice, I chose to give editing a try.

Note that stealing self-clicked or edited backgrounds is as bad as stealing the written pieces. So, I took inspiration from that feed and looked up on Google for flowers with plain backgrounds.

Honestly, it was so hard to find them. I had to try searching for as many relevant keywords as I could think of. But when I found one, it became easier to find the others and that's when my first app comes into the scene:

PINTEREST

Pinterest is a store-house of images, information, inspiration, and what not? After I found one flower with a plain background, I used Pinterest's similar image search feature to look for more such flowers.

It took a while. It was not easy but over a few days, I had a collection of about 10-15 flowers that could be used as backgrounds.

Now, the problem was, I could not add text to a background that was mostly taken up by the flower itself. Almost all the flowers covered most of the background. So I had to edit them to make space for adding text to them. Hence, I went to my go-to editing app:

PICSART

Picsart is one of the best photo editing apps once you know how to use its tools and features.

I tried creating the backgrounds I wanted a couple of times with various editing techniques but I failed each time. So, I gave up and decided to click a few pictures using marbles and petals I had fetched from the decorations of our then dining table. I liked those background images, I didn't love them.

A few weeks later, I thought of giving the editing another try. And as if the editing technique came to me on its own—I created exactly the images I wanted! It took a few tries to apply the technique correctly but I got hold of it soon. That technique was—cloning.

I put the flower image on a blank canvas, then cloned the flower background colour onto the blank canvas to make the colour uniform all over the image.

I prepared a collection of as many backgrounds as flowers I had and then saved them to an album titled Backgrounds for easy access while preparing my Instagram posts in my next app that is:

PHONTO

Phonto is an app that allows you to add text to your photos. I LOVE THIS APP and have been using it since the day I made my first Instagram text-post.

Do I need to say more about it? It's the app I use daily to add my poems to the chosen backgrounds and this app has never disappointed me.

You can even download and easily add as many fonts to it as you want to.

And after preparing the photo in Phonto, the last that step comes is:

INSTAGRAM FILTERS

I never made a post without using an Instagram filter and there's a weird reason for that which I have explained later in this post.

I add the same filter to all my posts with the background (with flowers) but I adjust the filter opacity according to the original photo background shade so that all my posts look almost similar. I hardly ever use a filter with full opacity, it gives a different touch to the photos.

Now, the reason for always putting an Instagram filter—when I add a filter, my edited photos get saved as new on my phone after the post is published and it also gets saved in the album 'Instagram' automatically.

So, I delete the original photos from my phone and keep the edited one for re-share or reuse.

It's easier to find a picture in thousands of photos from the 'Instagram' album than to look for them in ten-thousands in the camera roll.

And I am just too lazy to add them to the album separately each time I make a post. Does it sound weird? I just think of what would make my work easier in the long run.

These are the apps that have helped me the most in creating my Instagram posts.

Tell me in the comments which is your one go-to app for editing or creating social media posts?

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