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How to use Video on Instagram

Christopher Park

Christopher Park

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Facebook and Instagram released Video on Instagram today. While Twitter’s Vine supports 6 seconds of video recording, Video on Instagram allows up to 15 seconds. While 9 more seconds doesn’t seem like a big difference, creative users will appreciate the extra time.

How to use Video on Instagram

Instead of releasing a standalone video app, this update expands the usability of the Instagram app. Both iOS and Android are receiving the update at the same time today, but iOS is getting one exclusive feature: Cinema stabilization, which will stabilize video shaking. It’s easy to tell that Cinema stabilization was implemented on iOS because of standardized devices.

The same steps as taking an Instagram photo

Taking video with Instagram is basically the same as taking a photo. After you launch the app and your feed has refreshed, you will see the Instagram photo icon. There is the new, red video camera icon next to the main photo button.

After tapping the camera button, Instagram will enable video recording. The Instagram icon to the left of the record button will take you back to the photo menu. When you’re ready to take video, hold down the red camera button to record.

Add a filter and cover

Instagram gives users 13 new filters to apply to their videos. Unlike the photo filters, the video filters are a little harder to differentiate from each other, but this will probably depend a lot on the recorded video.

Once you apply the filter, you choose your Cover Frame. This is the image that will be shown in your Instagram feed. The slider will scroll though the entire video so you can pick your favorite image.

Share online

With your video recorded, filter applied, and cover frame selected, sharing the video is the same as sharing a photo. Enter your text and choose the different social networks to share to. Once you press “Share,” the video will upload. The time for the upload to complete will depend on your connection. After it’s uploaded into your feed, all you have to do is tap on the cover frame for the video to play.

Facebook versus Twitter

Right now it doesn’t look like you can tag people in video like you can with photos, but this may be a possible update in the future.

Video on Instagram is the logical next step for the app. Users on Vine have been able to create some impressive short videos. Instagram’s 15 seconds will allow users more time to create interesting video.

This update puts both social networks head to head again, but Facebook was smarter by releasing identical updates for both Android and iOS simultaneously, instead of Vine releasing a very basic version for Android compared to iOS.

Christopher Park

Christopher Park

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