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Instagram Inspirations: Creative Accounts You Should Follow

BY SIMON GERAGHTY

 Written by Simon Geraghty.

The visual internet

We’ve written a few times about the future direction of Twitter, a platform that seems torn between trying to emulate Facebook and thriving in its own, albeit 325m user, niche. Here we look at a Instagram going from strength to strength, currently at 430m users.

Instagram was bought by Facebook for a jaw dropping $1bn back in April 2012, the company recently up-dated its logo and while not to everyone’s tastes the platform itself continues to thrive. According to IPSOS MRBI 22% of Irish adults aged 15+ have and account and 48% of those use it daily.

We’ve written previously about how to set up an Instagram account for your business, and how to use it; this piece showcases some Instagram Inspirations, accounts that give good visual food food for thought.

Much of the visual internet has been driven by the parallel smartphone and connected revolution making it easier than ever to take and share images.

  • 90% of the information transmitted to our brains is visual
  • Visuals are processed 60,000 times faster in the brain than text
  • 40% of people said they respond better to visual information than text

Instagram enables our twin basic needs of taking photos and our desire to connect.

For marketers

  • 65% of senior marketing executives believe that visual assets (photos, video, illustrations and infographics) are core to how their brand story is communicated
  • 55% of marketers plan to prioritize creating visual content
  • 46% of marketers say photography is critical to their current marketing and storytelling strategies
  • 39% of marketers believe that more of their budget should be allocated to the acquisition or creation of compelling visual assets

(And as a slight tangent Infographics are Liked and shared on social media 3 times more than other forms of content!)

So let’s look at our set of Instagram inspirations.

Instagram Inspirations From Fashion and publishing…

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.36.25Sir Shane Miller, 2,795 followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/sirshanemiller/
w: http://www.sirshanemiller.com/

We are not suite sure where he was knighted but this editorial and fashion photographer is based in NYC. He uses Instagram as the main outlets for his work. His images are presented in his feed thematically in groups three-piece mini series. Triptych – good things come on threes.

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.34.08Galerie Magazine 1,386 Followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/galeriemagazine/
w: http://www.galeriemagazine.com/

Galerie magazine invites you “to experience the splendid world of artisitc living” with the accompanying hefty price tag that entails! The newly launched magazine covers art, design, home, architecture, people and destinations.

Full disclosure they recently featured our own friend the incredibly talented Irish based lighting designer Niamh Barry, represented by Todd Merril Studios in NYC. Galerie Magazine’s Instagram feed presents featured items beautifully often using all three panels to display and item, more triptychs, and even going so far as using 6 and 9 tiles in glorious mosiacs.

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.38.48Rebirth of Cool, 2,156 followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/rebirth_of_cool_dublin/
w: http://www.rebirthofcool.ie/

Closer to home Rebirth of Cool, or ROC, is a dublin based clothes shop which I’m quite partial to myself. Sell modern classics such as Fred Perry, Penguin, Farah, Ben Sherman and Merc for the smart dressed boys and girls around town. The shop’s Instagram account mixes pop culture icons, publicise events of interest to their customers and followers, with customers fashion and potential outfits of their clothes and shoes. They often use their own staff as models.

…To Individuals showing their creative sides

Selfie‘ was selected as the word of 2013 by the Oxford English Dictionary’s. Aeon magazine presented an article recently about the presentation of the self, literally via slefies. Which they describe as part of  “a manifestation of the basic human need for self-presentation”. Here are some creative and engaging accounts, proving that the tools in our hands can lead us to do many interesting things.

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.41.17Floors, no doors: ParisianFloors 80.9k followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/parisianfloors/

Sebastian Erras describes himself as one, guy, one city, one perspective. Each shot is accompanied by a snazzy set of brogues … our hero simply takes images of amazing tiled floors all over paris. One shot per day, all from a similar vantage point. The strength of Sebastian Erras’ account is that beauty is right there in front of all of us, in this case all he needed to do was look down occasionally!

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.42.50Food & Travel blogging: Girl Eat World, 325k followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/girleatworld/
w: https://girleatworld.net/ 

Melissa Hie is an Indonesian girl living in Singapore. Her instagram account is a travel blog documenting the delicious treats she eats while on her travels.

Hie started travelling in 2009 when she moved by herself to Singapore; in 2010, after a short trip to Thailand, Hie knew that she was hooked, and has been travelling ever since.

This instagram account again uses a similar perspective for each shot comprising her hand, the food item and a backdrop. Don’t look at this account if you haven’t had a holiday in a while and especially if you’ve skipped breakfast, elevenses or lunch! #Salivating!

Screen Shot 2016-05-19 at 16.49.25Satire, social observation: Barbie Saviour 93.2k followers:

i: https://www.instagram.com/p/BERW7Vvsffu/

“Who needs a formal education to teach in Africa? Not me! All I need is some chalk and a dose of optimism. It’s so sad that they don’t have enough trained teachers here. I’m not trained either, but I’m from the West, so it all works out. Good morning, class!!” Barbie Saviour

Barbie Saviour picks up where Hipster Barbie (1.2m followers, now RIP) left off.  To begin at the beginning, Socality, or Hipster Barbie was an account that lampooned ghastly vain behaviour on the platform, the account started as a way to poke fun at all the Instagram trends that she thought were ridiculous. The captions and hashtags were as interesting at the images themselves.

Barbie Saviour goes one further parodying volunteer selfies in Africa. “I took the road less traveled, I forged my own path, I went where no one has gone before…but the question remains….who is going to take my photo?”

Instagram has been described by one of it’s founders,  Kevin Systrom, as “a meritocracy. If you take good photos, then people will follow you.”

We’ve shown you some Instagram Inspirations, so now its your turn to get eating, traveling, moving, prop gathering, snapping and your own creative juices flowing!

Sources:

http://mashable.com/2016/05/13/instagram-new-logo-opinion/?utm_cid=mash-com-fb-main-link#8DMUMhYvD9qk
http://ipsosmrbi.com/social-networking-tracker-january-2016/
http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33423/19-Reasons-You-Should-Include-Visual-Content-in-Your-Marketing-Data.aspx#sm.001aphsur113f9110yg2rjikigysa
http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/visual-content-marketing-strategy#sm.001aphsur113f9110yg2rjikigysa
http://neomam.com/interactive/13reasons/
https://aeon.co/opinions/why-watching-people-take-selfies-feels-so-awkward
http://techcrunch.com/2015/07/24/its-time-for-the-visual-internet/
http://www.lostateminor.com/2015/08/17/this-instagram-will-make-you-obsessed-with-the-beauty-of-floor-patterns/
http://www.boredpanda.com/food-around-the-world-sweets-travel-girl-eat-world/
http://designyoutrust.com/2015/09/this-hipster-barbie-account-perfectly-mocks-every-annoying-person-on-instagram/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/white-savior-barbie-hilariously-parodies-volunteer-selfies-in-africa_us_570fd4b5e4b03d8b7b9fc464