Social media is a great place for people to show off their photos with Instagram being one of the favorites among photographers. But sometimes sharing photos one by one can be boring. We’ll show you a few ways you can spice up your Instagram profile. 

There are plenty of ways to make your Instagram profile stand out. We already wrote about how to add borders and avoid having your photos cropped to a square on Instagram. This time, we’re going to look at some creative ways you can improve your Instagram profile. 

Collages

If you want to share multiple images from a single shoot, you don’t have to be limited by the 10 photos per post limit. Simply combine two or more photos into one collage. 

This can be done in few clicks in the Print module of Zoner Photo Studio X. Go to the Print module, select Collage, and create a new project. At the top of the right panel, click the drop-down menu to adjust the size and select Custom. 

Set the size to 1080×1080 pixels. This resolution is ideal for square posts on Instagram. If you stick to this size, you avoid compression while uploading. If you want to create a collage in portrait orientation, 1080×1350 pixels is your best bet for resolution.

Drag photos from the bottom filmstrip to your collage and edit it. Collage settings are found in the right side panel. The most important to you will be: 

• Layout (how the photos are arranged)
• Photo Placement Mode (if the photos are stretched and cropped or inserted with a border without cropping)
• Layout Style (frame color, borders)

When you’re done, click Export, name the image, and choose where to save the finished image. 

You can add multiple photos on top of each other, but to make them truly stand out, it’s a good idea to crop them to a very narrow aspect ratio, or go straight to portrait format. 

Scrolling collage

You may have already seen posts on Instagram where a photo is split in half and each half takes up the space of one photo. This creates a scrollable post that allows you to show greater detail, like in this post. It is an effective way to liven up your feed. You can also do this in its basic form using various mobile apps, like Panorama Crop and others.  

We want to go a bit further and create a photo collage that we will later split in half to create a scrolling post. To do so, we’re going to need Zoner Photo Studio X. So you know what we’re talking about, take a look at the following post. 

For this, it’s better to use the Editor module, because this type of collage is too advanced for the Print module. For the background, you can use one color or like I did, a photo from the same series. Crop it to a 2:1 aspect ratio because you need to make two squares. Open Crop and Rotate (C), then in the right drop-down menu choose Free ratio, and enter the appropriate values into the fields for width and height. 

You may want to blur the background photo to make it stand out nicely. Click the Adjustments button above the layer thumbnails and choose Blur. The settings window opens like in the picture below. Adjust the blur. When you’re happy with its intensity, click Apply.

Now you can add photos to your collage using the arrow next to the + Add Layer button and choosing Paste from File. When you add a photo, the Move and Transform (V) function opens. You can use it to adjust the size and position of the photo. 

When you’re done, you can either save the collage as an image and split it up using an app on your phone (like Panorama Crop), or save it as two squares. If you choose the second option, use Crop and Rotate (C) again and choose an aspect ratio of 1:1. First, crop one half and save the square, then go back using Ctrl + Z and save the other half. Since you had set the aspect ratio to 2:1, you get two seamless squares.

Don’t forget to shrink the photos to the right size. A square should have the dimensions 1080×1080 pixels. If you saved two squares, shrink them to this size (Ctrl+E) in the Manager module. If you saved the whole collage, the longer side should be twice as large, 2160 pixels. This way, you avoid compression and loss of quality when uploading to Instagram.

Add borders

In the article Editing Photos for Instagram—Add Borders and Avoid Cropping, you’ll find a tutorial for creating borders that can help you avoid Instagram cropping your photo to a square. It involves adding a color border (or blurred photo) above and below the photo. But sometimes you can add borders to the sides as well. 

Use the Batch Filter (Ctrl + Q) in the Manager module to do this quickly and easily. Use the  Add Filter button to add Canvas Size to your batch filter. Then, enter different large values that are larger than the original photo. Just make sure the width and height are the same because you most likely want a square. 

You can use the eyedropper to pick a color from the photo for your border. This way, the border’s color will match the photo and the border won’t stand out too much. 

When you’re done, you can save the photo, reduce it to the standard 1080 pixels, and share. Remember that resizing and adding borders is destructive. Only make these adjustments on copies of original photos. 

Spice up your Instagram today 

If you like this style, give it a try! Don’t be afraid to get creative and take it a step further. We’ve shared a few basics, but the options are endless. Download Zoner Photo Studio X free for 7 days and get started right away!