Social Media for Creatives: Creating Flatlays

1. Introduction: Hi, I'm Anny McGee. Ammen illustrates an embroider. Been working in digital marketing for last seven years in today's class on social media. For creatives, we're going to be looking at creating flat lace flat lay photographs are a food piece of social media content. I love taking these photos. They're simply photographs taken from above, and I tend to use things that I have around the house after things on my desk or items will be using that day. I like each photograph to be able to tell a story to my followers, to let them know what I'm up to at the moment to see what projects I'm working on, or even simply to just show them the tools that I love to use every day every object tells a story on. By showing your everyday items in a stylized way, we're going to create a flat lay that is unique to you and ready to share across your social media channels. So grab a few of your faith titans from around the house and let's get snapping 2. Class Project & Equipment: For this class, you'll be creating a flat lay photograph to share across your social media channels. It's completely projects. Gothia Props and share a photo of your hold in your class projects arranger layouts and shows your before shot. For feedback, Edit your final flatly image and show the photo to your class projects. The equipment you need for this class are camera phone on various items that you use and you created work on a daily basis. Yes, that's the basics. As you take more flatly photographs, you could think about different backgrounds and adding some plant life, such as fresh flowers or even dried flowers. Like the pop Yuri I've got here in this class will brief look at editing our photos on our phone. These are my three go to apps for mobile photography, snap seed, Call a story and convert. They are all free to download, but they do have optional extras within the APS. To purchase for this class, though, would just use in the free elements. Pause the video, download the apse, and next up we'll have a look at creating our very own brought box 3. Creating your Prop Box: as I mentioned in the last lesson, As you get more comfortable with taking flatly, photographs will start to build your own prop box. The lights keep an eye out for interesting wallpaper samples of D. I Y. Shops that I can use those backgrounds. I also have a bit of a habit of collective knowledge stationary like sharp knives and razors or any 1000 school on it or Israel's gold. It's also fun to include nature in your photographs, so it's a great excuse to treat yourself to a bunch of flowers or pick up some dried or artificial foliage. Next time you're out shopping, you're probably spot. Some of these items keep popping up in my flat lays. They tell the viewer a story, and that's what I'd like you to consider. As you curate your own prop box. We fill our spaces with items that represent us, so select a few small items that say something about your personality. In this image, for example, I added a soft texture to the flat lay by adding my chiffon scalf that measuring tape is a vintage one from a mom sewing box on the rolls gold items. I'm a favor Eiffel Tower Sis's my watch. On some small clips. I even save some rose petals and boots, which I keep in a small bowl. That much is a popular dish. Although these items could be viewed a standalone objects, they all contribute to this flat lay by color, texture and theme. The flat lace style could lend itself to any theme. In the next lessons, you'll see me arrange objects with the painting theme, a sewing set up under cozy but reading layouts. Look around your home, your death space, even that corner next year. So far were items of no place like together. I guarantee you'll find something that tells the story of you. There's no good versus bad objects when it comes to fight lays. Just remember to stay clear of anything reflective, like mirrors or glass frames. And if something is in a package or it's in, give it some freedom for our photo shoot and take it out if he can. You can also consider the color of your props while she run the hunt. My brand colors are few shipping concern. Quite so. I always like to include items with those coolers, collects around 5 to 10 items include a hero objects, Something you've made yourself or you sell. If you're taking this photo for your creative business on snap a quick photo to post it T class projects. 4. Staging your Flatlay Photo: when it comes to staging are Flat Lake. We need to make sure we have some really nice lighting. Now. Don't go thinking you have to jump on the Internet in order a massive lighting rig set. Just find the sweet spot in your house where you have nice light coming through the window , avoiding direct lights as it could be too harsh. I often say photos by the patio doors in my house, but sometimes I could get away with snapping a few pictures in my craft room at the front of the house. Be sure to consider that the time of day on local weather can have an impact on this. But don't worry if you're working on a gray day. A bitter photo editing later. Rampal help us out. Now let's have a chat about staging our props first up background. If you have a LA minute or wood floor, a nice clean death surface or even something like the wooden tray you saw just a moment ago , they all make great back grounds on which to place our props. Another option is to find some wallpaper samples. I like to use the lighter backgrounds that feature this fig ward or chipped paint texture. You don't want a background that will overwhelm and swallow your objects for this sewing themed flat lay. My main item, our Hero Objects, is this sewing pattern that I plan to stitch. It comes with a lovely instructional booklet, so I've taken out with a packet and placed on top so adept to the flatly. Next, I want to bring in my rose gold dressmaking scissors, as I mentioned earlier, my fondness for rose gold items andan increasing since the collection can be seen in pretty much are the most aged photos that regular use of the same colors becomes a photographic signature. And hopefully when my followers spot a photo of mine with pink, turquoise and rolls golden, the recognises, such without having to check the name on the photo the next proper loud in here is this measuring tape. This one was a freebie in the magazine, so careful in this instance not to show the branding on the tape. I'm spreading out only slightly to avoid that on again instead of lying it flat. The folded nature of the tape adds a bit more debts to the flat lay For now, I'm gonna place in the middle, but I can always move props around later, as we had more objects to our set up. Now this cheeky chappie is my cactus pincushion, which I made on my embroidery machine. I'm going to post this image on my sewing, a machine embroidery, instagram account scavenger Ronnie. So I always like to feature an embroidered item wherever I can. He fits our story perfectly because I do use them every day. They're so as a pin cushion. Speaking of which, let's just show that by sticking a few pins in Little Fella position in the pins a slightly odd angle so that when I take the photo from above, the heart shaped heads of the pins will still be visible. For my next item. I have a marking pencil. It's brand new, so it's still in its packaging. So let's take it out with There is We don't want any light reflecting godly off the plastic cover. It is a bright yellow, so I'm not too sure if it'll make it to the final photograph. But I'll leave in there for now. It's time to add some bobbins to this sewing flat light again. I just grabbed thes from my sewing stash on about in three of these, as I think group in items in threes always looks nice in the photo. The last items go in is this fabric board. It needs folding nicely with the pattern showing on the right side. So I've just had a quick look at the layout as it was about to take a picture with my phone on. I've made a few adjustments. I've taken out some of the items as they didn't fit the color theme of this photo, or they didn't really add anything to the telling of the story that I want to portray in this image. I've added my rose gold embroidery, scissors, placing them on top of the pattern packet to replace the instruction booklet that was there before so we could still keep some depth in the image. These are nice is they have a cute bird character on them, and I do use them when I'm sleeping. The long threads one sewing. I've moved the measuring tape, this horizontal position instead on below the pattern to create a bit more space between the objects on do use more of the background. I've also changed the colors of the bobbins so that the threads echo the colors we can see in the fabric on that helped bring it all together. I do have a little bit of space at the bottom, so I'm going to pop in a cluster of heart shaped pins grouped in a set of three. Like the others, I've got Cirque wise, my Branca here on this yellow pin to bring in that mustard shade that you can see in the fabric from this camera angle. It may look a bit odd, but what I'm going to do next to see how the flat lay looks through my phone camera. The phone I'm using for this class is the iPhone seven. You can see that I have the camera set to the square photo option, as I intend to post this to Instagram, which uses this size and farmers with the iPhone seven. You get these cross hers that show up when I tap the camera screens focus. I align the white cross over the Yellow Cross, which tells me that I'm directly above my layouts. If you're an iPhone seven user, you can also tap to focus, then where you see the tiny son icon, just slide your finger open down the screen to adjust the brightness before you take the photo. I like to set it just before I can see. A noticeable change in the brightness is too much can wipe out the flat lay and just make the objects blur into the background. It's best to have a few tries at this until you get the brightness. How you want it. Every time you talk to refocus, you'll have to remember to adjust the brightness level again. All that remains now is to take the photo. So we've gone through quite a bit in this lesson. Feel free to revisit this video again. I work long in time to the class when taking your own flat lay photo. My top tips for staging a flat way to arrange a props in a way that feels natural to you. If you have your lights coming in from the side, place your Tyler or thicker objects on the opposite side so they don't cast a shadow over your flat lay. Just have a play around with few arrangements when taking your photo on a phone. Always tap the screen to focus the image. So arranger objects snap a photo on. Be sure to share it to your class project. Next up, we'll look at editing. 5. Image editing: if you happy with the look of your photo, the next step is do a bit of editing the three APs that I lights use snap seed color story in camber. They're all free to download from the APP store, and you can get them for the android phones as well. You are, of course, welcome to use your favorite photo editor naps or try out the ones I use in this class. First up are going to snap seed with this screen you tap anywhere to open a photo or who used it. Previously, you might have the last photo you edited on there, so tap open in the top left corner. I open my image and you get a scrolling set of pre group filters called Looks Across the Bottom. If you like any of these, give them ago. But I lights were just the settings manually for each of my images. I'll just quickly show you a couple of these weeks, see what the like. So I tap on tools and then tune image to adjust things like brightness, shadows and ambience just slide left or right, so just thes settings. Each element of this menu is accessed by keeping your finger on the screen on siding up and down. I particularly like the ambiance setting, which adds atmosphere it light to dark pictures or vice versa. If you're editing a light photograph, if you're new to these APS, just have a play around. So you find a bachelor settings that you're comfortable with. There's quite a few different actions. Try, but try not to go crazy and apply all the effects. Just a one vote. So the best way to learn what you could do with photo editing apps like these is to simply experiment. Using different types of photos I also liked upon rotates straight in the image and cooperative I need to reduce the area around the flat late props. All that's left is to save the photo by tapping on exports, and you then have the option of saving is the original image or making a copy. I also like to use the coolest story app, which allows you to apply filters to your photos. There are packs to purchase with more filters in this up, but I just use the free ones. After a while, you'll find that you have a favorite filter set, and keeping consistent with these will help your social media feed appear cohesive. An curated to find your photo Suppan albums Select your image from the camera. Roll on the first set of icons help you to do things like resize your image crop. It's or straighten it. I often use the second icon when I'm posting to instagram on. My image isn't quite a square size. You can crop and resize your photo by moving the crop handles to where you want them to be . When you happy with the placement, just tap on the tick when you're ready, SAT. Continue and then filters. The 1st 2 groups of rate use Anna called Essentials and good vibes. Just tap on the filthy alike. Use the slide to adjust the intensity and then tap on the tick. To set those levels. You can layer a couple of filters or just use the wall again. Save your photo by posting directly teary instagram feed. If you've connected your account to the app or save it, see a camera roll the final lap. I uses camber. This is available as a more by a lap on also a desktop version The APP is brilliant for templates for things such as block posts and social media banners. And also, if you want to water, mark your image with your name, your business name or account name, there are loads of different options to scroll through on the START menu, and there's a section called My Designs On in There. You can find any of the projects that you've previously don't, because they get saved this section because I've done this before. I got all mine listed here, and I could easily just tap on one of these, make a copy of it on, switch out the image for my new one. Now I'm editing my photo for Instagram, so I'm going to choose that option at the top and select the blank template. I then just sat screen at my image from the camera roll on. Then you can add text graphics or change the layout or colors. If you do at anything from the templates menu, be sure that they listed is free. Anything which you have to pay for will have an icon that looks like a stack of coins in the bottom right corner. The same thing goes for the preset text, graphics and templates that you can access by tapping the plus sign in the bottom right? I'm going to write my account name, so I tap at some text of your own. I write in Scavenge Ronnie. I'll choose my fonts again, keeping it consistent with my previous posts and photographs. Just adjust the size on place attacks where I wanted to go. You can also adjust the coolers, but I am happy with that. When you're happy with how your image looks, just tap on shirt in the top right corner and you'll be presented with your various save options. I saved my image to my camera roll on those copy in the my design Section two within the APP, so I'm ready to post cross my social media accounts. 6. Uploading to Instagram: So now you should have your final photo ready to post to social media. I'm going to go into Instagram. It's like the plus. I can't to open up my camera roll on. First up in the library is the image we've just edited again. You've got the option of more filters within instagram itself, but we've already made enough adjustments in the three aps that we've used. So let's click on next, and it's time to consider our caption. Be sure to create an engaging caption to explain to your audience more about your image. It may help to consider the three W's of what, where, and why. If you've used a certain brand or bought from a business, give them attacking you. Caption as they may share your image and send some followers your way. Finally, don't forget those hashtags. You may have a set that you regularly use, but mix it up from time to time. As with the new algorithms with instagram, you want to make sure that it doesn't think you're an automated baht account. Include them in your caption and use around 5 to 10 tags that have mid level numbers of posts to allow your image to be seen and not get lost in the millions of the same tag post . When posting to Social Media, you may already have a schedule in place, or you may just post directing on the go flat. Life photographs are a nice way to provide a Paul's in your account feed. I like to mix it up with all the types of photos, but there are some accounts out there that only post this type of image. If you have a business account for Instagram, be sure to make use of the analytics just up on the Biograph. I come it up and you can use that to George when the best time to post is. There's also various social media management tools out there that provide detailed information on best posting times. Andi, your audience groups. We want to make sure as many I see your fantastic new flat life photo. After all, be sure to add your final photo to your class projects as well, so we can all see the difference from your holder props to the staging of your final flat lay on. Lastly, the editing feel free to attack at Northern bird designs Andi skill share in your flat lay photo that you've produced in class. When you share it on social media, I'd love to see what you come up with. Include the class tag hashtag NBD flat lays so I can repost and give you a shout out in my stories. Using this tag also lets other students see you work too. Social media is all about connecting with the community and there's not as welcoming as the creative community on Instagram. 7. Final Thoughts: If you followed along with the class videos, then you should have a phone flat lay photograph that tells us a little more about you. Should have a nice stash of photo props with items that reflect your story and personality foraged from around your home. Remember to keep a lookout for new objects to add CIA prop box. When you're out and about, you'll then have them already. For the next time you create a flat lay photograph. In this class, we considered things like using different backgrounds. Achieving the best lighting and setting up a flat lay photograph is that you'll have a piece of social media content that will help you engage with your followers and online community. We also looked at some 100 new APS to help you edit refuge photos on Breathe lots of how we can find out the best times to post on our social media. When you post your final image to your class projects, be sure to include the link to your social media accounts where you've posted your image. It be great for us to connect if you have any questions or would like feedback. Be sure to common in the class discussion with a link to your projects. So congratulations on finishing the class. Thank you for joining me. And I look forward to seeing you next time in my other classes on social media for creatives.