Hair Romance x Olympus collaboration
Find out how I shoot and edit my Instagram photos with this peek behind the scenes.
I’m continuing my Behind The Blog series and today I’ll show exactly what I do before and after I post on my fave social media platform, Instagram.
You’ve already had a peek at how I take my hair tutorial photos with my feet, but taking a daily hair shot is a little different.
Instagram has totally changed over the last few years. It’s always been my favourite platform because I’m such a visual person, but whenever the algorithm changes, it’s a bit of a pain. These days there’s nothing instant about Instagram anymore. I try and post daily hair photos, but lately I love sharing other hairstyles I’m being inspired by and pics from my tutorials.
The quality of Instagram images has also lifted its game and this means I rarely take photos with my phone and upload them directly. I prefer to take my photos with my camera (I use this one) and edit them before I publish. Here’s a video to show you exactly what I do.
How I shoot and edit my Instagram photos
Click here if you can’t see the video above
Who takes my photos?
I do!
Sometimes I can make Jim play Instagram husband but it’s just as easy to set up my tripod.
If I’m not shooting a tutorial, there’s no need to connect up my laptop and use the foot pedal. The Olympus Share app turns my phone into a remote control that also has Live View.
Fun fact: My signature “Hair Romance” pose where I’m looking slightly down started because that was where my laptop sat on top of a barstool. The same pose still works pretty well when I take a photo with my phone.
I use my Olympus E-M5 MK II camera’s WIFI to transfer the photos from the Olympus Share App to my phone’s camera roll and then use some third-party apps to edit them before posting.
How I edit my photos
Back in the early days, we would use so many filters and borders (#nashville), but now I don’t edit my photos much with the functions on Instagram.
The Olympus app has some filters and makes it easy to watermark photos too.
I always use Snapseed as my go-to editing app. It can seem complicated, but I love these features:
- Healing brush – to tidy up backgrounds
- Crop tool – either classic square or 5×4 portrait are ideal for Instagram
- Transform – to straighten the horizon or shift the perspective a little
- Tune Image – general edits like brightness and shadows (Insta can never be bright enough!)
- Selective – edit detailed sections to give more definition
Once I’m done, I save it as a new image and head over to Instagram.
To filter or not to filter
My favourite Instagram filters are Clarendon, Lark and Juno, but I rarely use them at 100%. I drop the strength down to around 10-20% just to add that Insta feel.
Caption this
I always have the intention of adding in a witty caption, but I can never think anything. I swear I’m funnier in real life! I do like to ask a question or get an opinion though, as the conversation is the best part.
#Hashtag strategy
Hashtags are important if you want people to find your photos. You can currently include up to 30 hashtags in a caption. However, instead of including them up front in the caption, I prefer to pop them in the second comment.
I keep a list on my notes app (saves time typing them all out!) and I just copy paste them in a comment below the caption.
#HairRomance and #CurlyHairRomance
It’s easy to miss an @ tag or mention on Instagram, so I love hashtags. You can use #hairromance and #curlyhairromance to share your hairstyles with me and for hair inspo too.
So if you‘re not already following me on Instagram, I’m at @hairromance and you should also follow @Olympus_au and check out #Olympusinspired for more photography tips and inspiration.
Remember to use #hairromance and #curlyhairromance so I can see your hairstyle photos! Share your Instagram handle too so I can follow you back.
Angie says
Please make more videos – love this series!
Hair Romance says
thank you Angie! Planning more in this series so watch this space xx
Amanda says
Do you take all your photos this way? Which is your fave lens?
Hair Romance says
Hi Amanda! Yes, pretty much every shot is like this. I keep my camera in my bag and shoot on the go or sometimes post photos from my tutorials once they’re on the blog. I mostly shoot with the f2.8 12-40mm lens but I love the 25mm f1.8 – it’s beautiful xx
Lily says
love the video! always love seeing behind the scenes
Hair Romance says
thanks Lily! x