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"The operative concept of Instagram is instant. Just shoot, filter and share. Now, Instagram has added features that make the\u00A0sharing experience perhaps a tad less immediate,\u00A0but certainly of better quality.\r\n\r\nIf you're the kind of mobile photographer who would\u00A0not dream of sharing a photo that does not look its best (just as you\u00A0would not be seen on the street\u00A0in your jammies or with messy hair), then\u00A0the new Instagram 6.0 update has your name on it.\r\n\r\nWith 10 new and seven updated tools, it's almost a new Instagram. Almost, but not quite. You can still use Instagram the way you always did, if you choose, and I suspect that many people will take their time dipping fingertips into the app's new features. But for fussy photo folks, Instagram now offers\u00A0a lot more help of exactly the right kind.\r\n\r\nFirst up, the new upgrade lets you adjust how much of your chosen filter you want to apply. And you can just stop right there. Or, you can tap on the brand new wrench icon to open up a new world of editing tools including\u00A0Adjust, Brightness, Contrast, Warmth, Saturation, Highlights, Shadows, Vignette and Sharpen that work with all of the app's resident filters.\r\nThese tools look and sound\u00A0classic, but\u00A0I found that, despite their simplicity, their judicious use had a positive effect on the images I tried to fix. Let's face it. It's easy to ruin a good image by overusing special effects or sharpening and it's very hard to salvage\u00A0a truly bad shot with software. However, for middling images that just need a shadow lightened or a little contrast boost or a bit more of the natural color that somehow got washed out of the scene, Instagram's new controls\u00A0readily did the job without much fuss.\r\n\r\n\r\nInstagram did a nice job in striking a balance between ease of use and advanced tools\u00A0for this update and in doing that, the app\u00A0starts to move into new territory, similar in certain\u00A0ways to more feature-rich\u00A0mobile photo\u00A0editors like SnapSeed, Aviary, or even VSCO Cam, which\u00A0give you multiple, complex editing capabilities on the tiny screen. Instagram is\u00A0not there yet, nor perhaps should it be, but it's laying down tracks in that direction. Even Apple, with iOS 8, is adding more granular editing capabilities\u00A0to its Photos app.\r\n\r\nThe trick for habitual Instagram users is that even if you choose not to\u00A0use filters, you don\u2019t have to keep your photo in a near-original state. And for the fussy, instead of resorting to the aforementioned -- or numerous\u00A0other photo editors out there -- you can now shoot with Instagram and apply nearly all of the fixes you need within the app itself.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nSimple sliders and a checkmark are used to adjust and apply most fixes. The improved\u00A0Adjust, which includes the Crop &amp;amp;amp; Straighten tools, offers more intuitive\u00A0handling by letting you do both processes together. Using the grid as a guide, just move your finger across the image to straighten\u00A0it. The rotate tool on the right side of the pane works with a tap.\r\n\r\nImprovements to the existing Lux, Border, and Tilt-Shift tools are similarly quick and intuitive. To add or remove a border -- which is now logically placed within the Filter Strength adjustment -- just tap to switch it on or off.\u00A0Simplified video uploading for iOS allows importing of a single video clip\u00A0at a time, making it easier to upload and share videos.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nConfession: I am a fussy photographer and share photos sparingly, so Instagram was never a go-to app for me. This new upgrade may change that. Yet, despite the\u00A0version\u00A06.0 overhaul, there's still something\u00A0that stayed exactly the same: Your pictures are still square.\r\n\r\nAlso see: Instagram introduces new creative editing tools to help you fine-tune your photos.\r\n\u27A4\u00A0Instagram:\u00A0Google Play\u00A0|\u00A0App Store"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://thenextweb.com/creativity/2014/06/04/hands-new-instagram-tools/>