9 Best Instagram Editing Apps For Special Effects

In our last Instagram Tips article, we listed some of the best apps to make your photos look beautiful. This week’s post is dedicated to the best apps for adding special effects, such as white space, lens flares and even unicorn horns (if you wish so!) to your photos.

Here’s the best 9 Instagram editing apps to take your feed to the next level:

1. Whitagram: Yep, it’s that app that allows you to add white space around your photos. By controlling the balance between positive and negative space, Whitagram adds a certain aesthetic to your feed.
Download to: Post images that don’t suit a square format.
Price: FREE

2. Diptic: This app lets you to put several shots together into a collage in a simple, intuitive way. All collages you see on @So_Nailicious Instagram are done in this app. Also, I use Diptic to make collages for the blog (ie. the image for this post) – it’s much easier than doing it in Photoshop. There are several templates available and you can customize widths, colors and border edges to your heart’s content.
Download to: Make Andy Warhol-esque portraits
Price: $1.29

3. Color Splash: This app allows you create cool images by isolating the color in a selected area of the photo and desaturating everything else. ColorSplash is intuitive, very easy to use and correct mistakes without having to start from the beginning.
Download to: Post images of colourful nails on black and white background.
Price: $1.29

4. Mirrorgram: This app is fashion bloggers’ favorite. A boring photo with too much black space is transformed into a piece of Instagram art, like I edited an editorial image for @CrashingRed‘s Instagram. Particularly great for outfit and portrait photos.
Download to: Make cool kaleidoscopic images of your hand holding a cocktail.
Price: FREE.

5. Line Camera: A great app for those who like making funny photos. Add a beard or a smiley face to a portrait, play with cool filters for your images, or use the painting and text tools for a more advanced photo editing. Line Camera is a Japanese app and it has the most options and effects on the list. Fun guaranteed!
Download to: Transform your cat into a unicorn. Even if no one will ever see that photo.
Price: FREE!

6. Superimpose: This fantastic app for making funny images. Superimpose app lets you easily swap faces or change the background of an image and blend images—your imagination is the limit.
Download to: Pretend you photographed that nail polish on Mars.
Price: $1.29.

7. Tiny Planet: Tiny Planet has an out-of-nowhere, extreme fisheye–looking effect that turns any image into a tiny planet. With Tiny Planet, you can capture landscapes or interior in their entirety, as @JosephPole did in this image of Red Square, Moscow or Grand Mosque Interior.
Download to: Surprise everyone with a photo of some crazy futuristic planet consisting of your nail polish collection or lipsticks.
Price: $2.49.

8. LensFlare: As great as Bokehful app with all it’s light hearts and bokeh effects was, it’s time to move on (if you haven’t yet) and we switch to a more sophisticated LensFlare. It comes with over 50 effects to allow you create an image that looks like it was shot under the bright sun.
Download to: Make your nail art shine bright like a diamond.
Price: $2.49.

9. Slow Camera Shutter Plus: Have you ever seen those amazing photos painted with light in the air at night like @lovethywalrus‘s photo of himself spinning the steel wool. It’s not magic, it’s just an app! Grab a couple of glow sticks or torches and use the Slow Shutter Cam app to take long-exposure images with your smartphone.
Download to: Take a photo of a light painting done with glowing in the dark nails. Because, why not really?!
Price: FREE.

Have you used any of these Instagram editing apps? Which one are you keen to try?

– Maria, xx

P.S. If you haven’t yet follow @So_Nailicious on Instagram, so you can share all your beautiful images with us!

Want to learn how to grow your Instagram and improve your photos?

Here’s a list of of useful posts:

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Comments

Tine @ Beautyholics Anonymous says
July 8, 2014 at 1:00 pm
Ooh good recommendations! I’ve only just tried Diptic and Colour Splash. Will check out the rest. I’ve been loving the one from The Beautiful Mess. I want to get the Little Moments App from Fat Mum Slim but it’s not available on Android yet so will have to wait for that one.
- Maria @SoNailicious says
  July 9, 2014 at 1:22 am
  The Beautiful Mess is a great one for adding text! The fonts are amazing. Superimpose and Line Camera are super funny, if you like things like that. Not necessary for posting those images but just for fun with your friends and family :)
Lisa Evans says
July 17, 2014 at 7:15 pm
Oh, love all these. Thanks so much for sharing x