Cat Meffan

Tips for Instagram Photos of Pretty Prints

When you find yourself with a few awesome pairs of adidas leggings, the only thing to do is take yourself to the streets and lofts of London with a photographer to capture said leggings in all their printed glory! That’s exactly what I did last week with photographer Gary Morrisroe, as part of my adidas #WorkIt campaign.

I’m a big fan of a good simple pair of black leggings, BUT I’m like a kid in a candy shop when it comes to prints on my pins. I know that many of my readers are bloggers and instagrammers themselves, so here are my top tips for Instagram photos, specifically for getting the perfect photo of leggings that have a lot going on.

1. PICK YOUR BACKGROUND

Personally I think that the cleaner the background, the better for printed leggings, as they’ll stand out more. That being said, when we took to the Southbank to show them off, even a London backdrop worked well. I think the reason for this was that it was a stormy grey day (with A LOT of rain!), so the sky almost blended into the stoney walkway, giving us depth, but keeping similar tones.

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2. MAKE SHAPES

I throw myself around in all sorts of shapes for photos and so can you. Even if you can’t headstand, handstand or do some of the bendy moves, use a plain brick wall (a white one works well) and place your legs against it creating cool shapes. Yes, anyone looking at you might think you’re a little odd, but trust me, I’ve been there, in the corner of my gym, lying on my back with my legs against the wall, looking like a bizarre creature who can’t work out how to stand up!

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3. THINK OF YOUR INSTAGRAM PAGE AS A WHOLE

I’d like to say I have the time and patience to do this all the time, but sadly not, as I do like my Instagram page to still be organic and spur-of-the-moment. That being said though, sometimes if I know I’ve got a few pairs of crazy leggings to feature, I’ll think of the page as a whole and how the images will complement each other when all lined up. I make sure that I don’t have just two lines of legs in weird & wonderful positions, so I’ll separate them with other images and will take photos of the leggings from different angles, in different poses.

 

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4. GET CREATIVE

I don’t particularly like Photoshop and its place in the media and sadly even on Instagram, with beautiful girls sadly feeling the need to photoshop their bodies before uploading a photo, but I do love to get creative with it in a different way. When I say ‘I’, I mean I come up with an idea and then ask a very talented person like Gary to use his photoshopping skills to put images together like the one at the top of this post. Yes, these shots are by a professional photographer, but anyone with a camera can take the photos, you just might need a friend who’s a whiz at editing to help you out after.

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SHOP MY OUTFITS HERE:

Main Image (Top to Bottom)

Purple & pink leggings

Orange leggings

Black & white leggings

Grey & mustard leggings

Long-sleeved yoga crop top

Other Clothing

Orange sports bra

Black & white jacket

Black ultra boost trainers

Keep you eyes peeled for more fun exercises from me over on the adidas UK social channels. Like adidas Women on Facebook and follow adidas UK on Twitter & Instagram.

Let’s #workit together! x 

All photos by Gary Morrisroe.