Instagram Stories
Instagram has traditionally been an app for adding a filter to your most beautiful and fun photos and sharing them with your friends. The app is now much more than that: it is a social network where everything revolves around images. In addition to the regular timeline, you can share what you do in a day via Instagram Stories, also called Stories.
- What are Stories?
- To look at
- To make
- Edit and share
- Links
At iCulture we regularly create an Instagram Story, which you can view via our account @iCulture.nl. If you follow us on Instagram, you will immediately see all the Stories and experience what happens behind the scenes!
What are Instagram Stories?
Instagram Stories is part of Instagram. It allows you to share a series of full-screen photos and videos with your friends. You decorate the photos and videos with filters and stickers and they are then visible for 24 hours. You can also add polls and hold quizzes with your followers. The length of videos in a Story is 15 seconds. However, you’re not limited in how many videos you put into your story, so you can post multiple 15-second videos in a row.
The Stories feature once only existed in Snapchat, but nowadays you can find this or a similar functionality in many apps. It has proven to be a great success on Instagram, while it is less popular in the form of a WhatsApp Status.
View Instagram Stories
Your friends’ Instagram Stories appear at the top of your Instagram timeline. You see them immediately when you open the app in the form of a row of avatars of your friends. If you tap someone’s profile photo, the Story will start playing. You’ll see all the photos and videos that this person has shared one after the other. You will then automatically move on to your next friend’s Story. You can also view someone’s Story by tapping an avatar on a profile page or on a posted photo or video.
Whether your sound belongs to a Story depends on several factors. If your iPhone is on silent and you have not connected headphones, you will not hear any sound. If your sound is on or you are using headphones, you will hear it. However, videos in a Story may not contain sound, because you as a creator can turn this off.
The order in which your friends’ Stories are shown is determined by Instagram’s algorithm. However, you will always see all (new) photos and videos from a friend one after the other in chronological order. No friends are filtered: if you have viewed all the Stories, you have really viewed them all. You can optionally disable the Instagram Stories of specific accounts if you no longer want to see them. You will then continue to follow him or her on Instagram.
You can always watch stories again that you have already viewed by clicking on a friend’s avatar at the top of your timeline. By scrolling left or right in this list of avatars, you can see who has created a Story. Friends with new items in their Story will have a purple circle around their avatar; for Stories that you have already viewed, that circle is gray.
Options while viewing a Story
While watching a Story, you will see one or more bars at the top that fill up while you are watching. Each bar represents one photo or video. This allows you to see how far you have gone in looking. You can navigate through stories by tapping or swiping. You have these options:
- Navigate through the items within a Story: tapping the right side of the screen will take you to the next photo or video. If you tap on the left of the screen, you will go to the previous one. At the beginning or end of a Story, you automatically move on to the next friend on your list. This looks like turning a cube a quarter turn.
- Navigate between Stories: Swiping left or right takes you to the previous or next Story in one go. You then skip the other stories of the current person completely.
- Back to your timeline: swipe down or press the cross at the top right to go back to your timeline.
- Reply to a Story: Tap the text bar at the bottom or swipe up and you can send a message to the creator of a Story. This will not be publicly visible, but will be sent as a private message via Instagram Direct. You can respond with a photo or video by clicking on the camera icon at the bottom left. Some accounts have disabled this option for their followers.
- To go to a friend’s profile: click on his or her avatar in the top left.
- Report spam and inappropriate content: press the three dots at the top right and then tap Report.
- Open links: Swipe up when you see Show more text. Companies and celebrities can add links to articles, for example, to their Story. If you swipe up, the link will open in a browser.
- Clicking on texts: texts, hashtags and locations are clickable. You can also click through to someone’s profile if he or she has been tagged. You can recognize this by the fact that his or her name is underlined. There are also polls and quizzes that you can participate in by tapping.
Create Instagram Stories
To add an item to your Story on Instagram, swipe left from your timeline or click the plus symbol at the top right. The camera opens full screen with some buttons and options on the screen. This camera is specifically made for Instagram Stories, so you can’t use it for regular photos that you want to add to your timeline.
You have several options when adding a photo or video to your Story. You can just take a photo, but there are also functions to make a video with music. For example, it is possible to film hands-free or make a collage. If you are in the camera, tap the down arrow on the left to show all options. We think it’s best to give them a try to find out what suits you.
Scroll up in the Stories camera to select photos and videos from your camera roll. You can also post this on your Story.
Here are more options to make your Instagram Stories special:
- This is how you make a collage in your Instagram Story with multiple photos
- Add music to your Instagram Stories
- Livestreaming on Instagram: this is how Instagram Live Stories works
Options within the Instagram Stories camera
Whichever option you select, you will always see a record button. In normal mode, pressing this will take a photo. If you want to make a video, press and hold the record button for as long as you want to film. You will see a bar around the button filling up. When it is full, a next story is automatically created so that they play one after the other.
Within the camera you have a number of options. With the two arrows to the right of the recording button you can switch between the camera on the back of your iPhone and the selfie camera. However, this can also be done by tapping your screen twice. You can turn the flash on and off with the lightning symbol at the top. You can also set this to automatic, recognizable by the A next to the lightning symbol. If you use your iPhone’s selfie camera, your screen will light up to serve as a flash.
With the round buttons at the bottom you can add all kinds of (crazy) filters. Swipe horizontally to select the filters. Scroll all the way to the right to open a special search function. You’ll be amazed at how much is available.
Edit and share Instagram Stories
Once you have taken a photo or video (or selected it from your camera roll), you can further edit it with stickers and texts or by drawing on it. If you want to share a video without sound, click on the speaker symbol at the top right. Please note: if your iPhone is on silent, you will not hear any sound while editing your video. This will nevertheless end up in your video, unless you disable it via the speaker symbol.
Options for stickers, gifs, and quizzes can be found by tapping the sticker symbol in the top right. You can recognize this by a post-it note with a smiley face in it. You can search and scroll for anything and everything here. Some companies also have their own stickers and gifs, such as KLM and Pathé.
If you want to delete the photo or video, click on the cross at the top left. To add the item to your Story, click the plus button at the bottom that says Your Story. For posts just for your closest friends on Instagram, tap the appropriate button at the bottom right. Read more about this in our tip.
Would you like to know more about Intagram? We have a big list of Instagram tips so you can get even more out of the app!
