Instagram is changing, and fast. But what remains consistent is how it provides a platform to share more than just images and videos. It offers you an opportunity to curate your media to tell great stories about your life and what you're into. When you're on a Instagram, what you might come across is collage formatted stories with multiple images layered together in different shapes. Lots of different apps can help you to design your Instagram stories to engage your audience, but Unfold specialises in just this, and it's clean interface helps you to focus on your crafted posts.
Here's 4 ways how Unfold helps you to create compelling Instagram stories:
1. Built-in templates
When you open Unfold, you’ll be greeted with a library of built in templates. There's a great set available for free, and you may never need more than this. But there are other sets available for a small cost. Select the template you like the look of, or choose a few to create a story. Then, all you have to do is double-tap the placeholders to add your image or video, resize to fit your desired look, and save. It’s worth remember that the templates work for video too - lots of people tend to overlook that, especially if like me, you’re more used to posting photographic stories
2. Simplicity and consistency
In a world where we have so much media available, it can hard to see the wood for the trees. There is just so much stuff to see. How can we express ourselves through social media platforms without just adding to the white noise that we are all exposed to but just don't have the chance to digest and appreciate? The templates in Unfold are minimal and elegant in design allowing for a balance between your images and the text you add, whilst allowing for your to tailor and tweak the diagnostic to express your individuality and set yourself apart.
3. Classic fonts, clean lines, and geometric shapes
Some apps are so full of options. That might be good if you have the time to become immersed, explore the features available and develop your own style. But if you're not careful, you can end up taking a bit of a ‘whatever works’ approach and you don't really take the opportunity to develop your own distinctive style. By actually limiting the choices available, Unfold helps you to focus on a clean, spare and professional style to order for your to deliver the same look in your Instagram Stories.
4. Create Story Highlights
The app also has to option for you to be able to create collections of Story posts in your Story Highlights, all adopting your consistent style.
I tested the free templates but also used the CS3 (99p) and Filmtype (£1.99) templates packs too. There’s some fiddly stuff that doesn’t work as well as it could. Occasionally, the photo in the placeholder looks like it should work ok, but when you post it, some of the photo seems to get cut out. So, its a bit frustrating when that happens. But most of the time, it works just fine.
In summary, if you're after a minimalist look for your Instagram Story game, using clean black or white templates using elegant design and classic fonts to narrate your story, then Unfold could be the app to help you focus just on what you want to communicate without drowning in all the options that might be available in other apps. Or, you can upload your story creation into other apps to jazz them up and add more. The choice is yours.
Conclusion
What do you think about Unfold? Do you think it might be useful for you in your story telling using your images and video? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below.
Download Unfold (Free with in-app template purchases):
I’m Sarb Johal, and I take a lot of photographs. i I’ll be posting a blog Photography tools and apps blog column weekly, every Tuesday.
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