Oh My Gawd, I Have Been FRAMED by Instagram!
Whenever someone follows me, I try to respond and look at their feed. And though I am eternally grateful for everyone who follows me, I do not do the follow for follow thing.
I made a pledge to myself that on Instagram I would be as authentic as I could be (without showing the grim stuff. So I do not schedule posts, or assess how each photo will affect my feed or 'gallery', and whether it will make it look unbalanced or cluttered, but instead I do it randomly as I get inspired or when in the mood. Yes I realise this is a bit old school, a bit in denial of how many great apps there are for analysing posts, when the best time to publish is, target audience etc... And I am not saying NEVER. I might do it one day. Perhaps.
And as for the Follow for Follow, and like for like... I only follow feeds that I really like or feel a resonance with. Is this nasty? I admit that sometimes I miss some feeds that I adore, and find them later. I admit that I am not as interactive as I could be, but I am scared of being sucked into a vortex of time lost.
Anwho, as I said, I do look usually at the feed of people who follow me. And I was doing just that a few weeks ago, when I stumbled upon HEY PRESTO FRAMES. And I was interested. I was intrigued. Because after a few exhibitions, and lots of trials of frame types and Blutac, I had still not found the perfect way to display my Instagram snaps. And these looked pretty fab!So I popped over to their feed. AND...
I made contact with @heyprestoframes, and was impressed when I found out that it is a little startup company, a Mum with a dream and ingenuity, pizzaz and a great idea. How cool! And Australian too! And with sass and some crowd funding, making dreams come true for her. Cool bananas. Awesome sauce. Inspiring. You can read more about them here... at HEY PRESTO FRAMES, and donate too if you feel so inclined.
So cut to a few weeks later, and I actually have one of the first batches of these frames in my hot (and I mean hot, it has been a bloody hot Summer!) hands, ready to decorate that bare white wall. YIPPPPEEEEEE!!! I had already ripped open the box, I had read the instructions, and even selected the photos I wanted to put in them.
Lucky for me, I have HEAPS of photos printed from my exhibition last year, and ones I love in general. I arranged them into groups of 9, played with them in a grid. I came up with at least 4 themes and combos I loved... So lucky the photos are easy to change, just sliding them out. I know I will change them over whenever I get an urge to shake things up a bit. More YIPPEEES!
choosing which photos to use
So I slipped them into the frames, and then stuck the clicky cool strips on the back, and then stuck them up on my wall. Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezey! I did not measure, just used my eye. If you were really fussy and particular, you could measure, but after years of framing stuff, I trust my own judgement. So it took about 15 minutes all up. AND I LOVE THE RESULT!
clicking the strips on the back
Do you think it looks cool? Well, I certainly do. And I am thinking about other photos to get printed in 6x6 size, like ones from recent holidays, family kid snaps. For this grid I used the photos I had which were 5x5, and on white card already that made them perfect for the frames. My daughter suggested I could also use them to put my artwork in, if I did them to the right size. Clever daughter.
So once again, as much as I do not always understand Instagram, and it poops me, frustrates me, confuses me... I have to admit being seriously thrilled to be part of its community. Because all negatives aside, it has helped me connect with some truly awesome and fab people, businesses, sites, products and places. So yep, I do love it. Framed by Instagram and happy to have been!
LINK HERE FOR Hey presto on Facebook too...
**NB**
And no, Hey Presto Frames DID NOT pay me to write this post. What they did do, is give me a chance to road test the first batch in production, but I am proud to say they did not have anything to do with what I have written, told me what to say, which picture to use etc. Just so you know!