Bonnie & Norma: How I Edit My Instagram Photos

The time has come.

You know, it's funny? My Instagram used to be a trainwreck. I have, like, three accounts. And if you go to my first page (probably created in 2012 - what a terrible year) all of my photos are low-quality with those terrible, generic Instagram filters.

I'm OCD so my obsession with organizing my social media presence is soothing for me. I don't understand how people can bear to have mismatched photos circulating around the internet. Here I am, on my lunch break at work, eating my chicken sandwich, and deleting photos I deem unworthy.

My best friend first introduced me to keeping a theme on my Instagram. Her aesthetic is far different from mine of course. She smokes tons of pot and lounges on her patio in California; she's the type of woman you see posting clips of her billowing smoke from her lungs after taking a hit from her pornographic bong. God, I love her.

But I'm not like that so my account isn't filled with color (like it used to be) or tie-dye (like I somewhat wish I could pull off). I had to create my own look. Which, as it turns out, is actually very common and ridiculously basic compared to my dope-fiend of a best friend.

If you're not following me on Instagram, first of all, I'm offended, and second of all, you should because I put a lot of hard work into it. (Link at the bottom of the post!)

I guess I should start off by saying that I'm obsessed with mom blogs. And it's not only because I desperately want to be a mother (come on; how cute would a mini Mikaela be? I imagine her with dark hair and pig tails, running around, drawing on walls, and sporting a matching beret with her mother. Yes, you admit you want it for me too.) but because this new wave of blog moms are, like, made of super geniuses.

These women dedicate their lives to simplicity and pretending they have it all put together when, let's be honest, we know they don't. But they do it and it's hypnotizing and I want to be them when I grow up. I follow so many of them on Instagram and vicariously live through their posts; beige walls with gorgeous, handmaid, straw brooms and decadent wreaths of banana plant leaves or something only they could pull off. And I'm sitting here in my room full of Star Wars paraphernalia thinking, "Like...what?"

Okay, so I'm obviously envious of these women with their stupid, perfectly braided hair, and their supportive Instagram husbands only I could dream of having. And I adore their freckled face, brunette children who wear stylish, peasant clothing, while taking walks in the English countryside.

So I try desperately hard to be like them. So what? Except I'm not married, a mother, and my house is full of clutter. I have pine floors for the love of God. ("Pine is the wood of poor people." -Schmidt from New Girl)

I make an effort - I really do. And I'm just glad I'm not where I began. I've improved; I know I have. I don't have grain on my photos (unless manually added - which I hardly do anymore). I don't do fake light-leaks like I did back in 2014. And thank God I found a color scheme I can work with (finally).

Anyway, here's how it works.

1. Step One: Get the apps

I am begging you, on account of my OCD, please get quality apps. I don't care if I have to pay for them. I am sick and tired of seeing Instagram filters.

All joking aside, these are the apps I use (with the exception of ABM and rarely do I dabble with Color Story - as their filters are way too expensive).

I first downloaded Afterlight after I found out that one of the girls I was obsessed with in high school used it (guilty as charged - granted, she's a professional photographer and very good at that). I was awe-struck when I found out all the stuff it could do. Remember when doing that whole white border thing was cool? Yeah, they were one of the few apps that had it then.

The thing about Afterlight is that, well, you have to buy a lot to get the true experience so I say that's a con. And the app isn't free like VSCO (*sighs dreamily*). Buying this damn app when it first came out was basically my first ever quality purchase.

VSCO is my favorite. Said dope-fiend, best friend from before told me to download it with a knife at my throat. I was a dedicated Afterlight fan before this and was like, "Eh...nah..." but then I took the plunge and mama's not going back.

What I freakin' love about VSCO is that most of the filters that come with it (without purchase) are super nice. And the app is free. THE APP IS FREE.

I downloaded Color Story, swiped through the app, and immediately deleted it. Don't waste your time. VSCO has all of their filters - most of them for free.

2. Step two: VSCO

Super easy to use, a minimalist grid - VSCO is basically my secret weapon that's not really a secret at all.

Like I said - pretty easy to use. You press the little addition button on the top left corner and pick a photo from your camera roll. Whatever. No one's dumb enough to mess this part up.

Pick a photo obviously. I'm using this one of Lark (my sober BFF and business partner) that we took the other day. When taking a photograph for Instagram, I like to use negative spaces, greenery, or neutral walls for the background. This is all apart my aesthetic of course so you do what you want.

I'd also like to point out that I have an iPhone 7+ so the quality of my images are better than, say, those with Androids or iPods or even iPhone 6s. Until last week I had only an iPod and I still made it work so...you know.

As you can see, natural light plays a huge part in the process. I always have my subject facing the sun instead of away or even to the side (this is also very prominent in my selfie snaps). And, let's be real, wardrobe matters when posing whoever it is you're shooting. If you had someone wearing a neon t-shirt and sweatpants against this background then, well...just don't. For my nerves. Thankfully, Larkayla doesn't believe in colors as a part of her wardrobe and neither do I.

So you open the photo on VSCO and see the filters. A lot of these were bought (a luxury I'll admit but well worth it) but like stated before, VSCO is pretty generous with their freebies. (There's also a free trial for all of the filters so...consider that.)

My go-to filter is A6 which mutes color but also brings out greens. And because I'm obsessed with green for some reason, I adore A6.

But I also like C1.

And C6.

Now I know what you're thinking: "Mikaela, literally all of these look the same."

But alas! They don't.

A6 mutes colors with a slight saturation to greens whereas C1 vividly brings out greens and pink midtones. C6 is almost the same as C1 except it's not as saturated as a whole. These are the things you have to look out for. I'm a bit more anal about the technicalities of it (I have a keen eye for detail - maybe it's my Aspergers). Basically, feel out the filters and see what you like.

I decided to go with C1 for this photo because, I'm not really sure, it just looked better. On my Instagram I posted the picture with the A6 filter and, looking back, I'm regretting it.

Anywho.

I am a firm believer in contrast especially with this photo because it brings out Lark's hair and the shrub behind her. A lot of people don't like a lot of contrast but natural selection will take care of them.

I do what feels right. Just swipe the little button until your image looks like something posted on Anthropolgie's Instagram account but not enough contrast to look like Ian Somerhalder's.

Next is brightness, which I always like to do after contrast. Blah, blah. And then exposure.

I don't do exposure with every photo, mostly because it's just not something I'm into. But sometimes there's a need. This was a need.

I feel like cropping photos isn't as popular anymore now that Instagram has that fancy "whole photo" option when posting. But I like to do it whenever I'm unhappy with feet or concrete.

So...

Ta-da! Bright, green, and contrasted. My favorite.

To upload on Instagram is super easy and always make sure to save at the maximum size.

That way you get this:

And that's VSCO. The love of my life.

3. Step three: Afterlight

I'll be honest, I see Afterlight as sort of a mess now that I use VSCO religiously. You'll see why.

Anyway, Afterlight has a lot more options for filters than VSCO but still you have to pay for the app itself. And, honestly, a lot of them are overhyped. But whatever; I paid money for this and I'll use it when need be.

There are four subsets of filters on Afterlight.

I like the Wander set mostly just because of the contrast and colors. But the Seasons set is pretty cool too because you can choose filters that go well with a summer sun or winter's dull lighting.

I ended up using the Seasons set for this one. I'm pretty sure Equinox is a fall filter but I could be wrong. Not that it matters.

I've found that with Afterlight there's a lot of doctoring with the filters until I get the result I'm looking for. The filters are nice and all but there's always something missing from them on standalone.

Like always, contrast first.

Brightness second.

Temperature is something I don't do normally but there was too much warmth in this filter for my taste. I brought it down to about -7 to get a cooler hue.