Instagram has been updated to allow users a couple new content creation tools that some of you creative out there might find useful.
The social media platform now lets users have access to several creative tools that are supposed to improve their ability to make their content more dynamic. Instagram described these in a blog post this past Tuesday.
The full range of new features for IG involves several different additions that include the following:
New fonts, text animations and effects in reels and stories
Being able to add text and stickers to photos and carousels
The carousel limit being increased to allow up to 20 photos and videos in a single post
The most notable features among the above are the ability to add text to posted images and the ability to layer images. As the blog post explains,
“You can now add text — including our newest fonts — and layer images via stickers, to your photos and carousels. This gives you the creative flexibility to make your content stand out and explore new, more entertaining, storytelling with photos and carousels.”
Users can access IG’s tool for adding text to images just by tapping the text button on a photo they select from their gallery.
Layering images in posts is possible by tapping the gallery button along the top right of the screen. Users can also tap on the sticker for their overlaid image to change its shape too, with options for square, circle, heart or star shape.
As for the platforms other updates, they include a bunch of new fonts and animation effects that you can add to reels or stories.
Finally, users can expand their carousel in IG from the previous limit of 10 to include as many as 20 images or videos in a single post. This might be useful for creatives trying to showcase more of their work in one single content posting.
These updates basically take Instagram further in the direction of imitating the giant upstart social media platform TikTok, which lets users cram as many as 35 images into a single post.
While TikTok is much more commonly used for really short videos, it’s become more popular for sharing photos too.
These admittedly handy updates aside, Instagram has on the other hand seen a surge in complaints about the seemingly, increasingly crappy nature of its algorithms for sharing content.
I myself, speaking purely from the POV of what I’ve personally noticed with the platform, see less content being revealed to followers while the content also posted by people I follow is much less visible than before, instead being supplanted by algorithmic ads and “suggested” posts.
The platform has also seen an explosion in AI spam content and advertising posts apparently being given unwanted preference on user’s feeds.
Image source: Instagram
