I didn’t edit any of my Instagram posts for a week

Here’s what happens when you leave the Valencia filter behind


A couple of weeks ago when I was scrolling through my Instagram feed, I had an epiphany: none of this is real. This is something I’d witnessed before when I have been out to eat with friends and they take pictures of their food before even trying a single bite. Sometimes they even realize they don’t like the food, but the picture goes up anyway.

I am not quite on that level, but I am guilty of spending more time than I would like to admit setting up flat lays or presentations for photos. From there, I take a huge range of photo options and then it goes through the intense filtering process. After realizing this, I saw that I needed to lay off this artificial photo style and try to see my life with no filter.

Day 1

I was unsure what to even post the first day I did this challenge, but I wanted to show a less glamorous side to my life and packing isn’t exciting (despite the fact that the destination is). My suitcase didn’t even end up looking pretty. Cringe-worthy, but mission accomplished.

Day 2

I was dying to put a filter on this one, but I stayed strong…

Day 3

What I learned this day is that food doesn’t need a filter. However, I normally still would have still usually adjusted the positioning of the food (multiple times) and then taken a variety of different angle shots.

Day 4

When my new laptop sleeve arrived, I knew that it was Instagram-worthy. But, when I began to take pictures I had a frustrating shadow and was forced to upload it without removing it, sigh. I still think the colors are stunning and clearly my followers agreed as this is the most liked photo of these five!

Day 5

At the airport, I knew that I needed to take a picture of this Benefit Cosmetics cart. However, uploading it without adjusting the exposure and contrast nearly killed me. It would have looked so much better my way…

After completing this challenge, I began to wonder, who am I posting for? What am I posting for? Likes? Attention? I decided that both of those are desired, but I also like to use it for myself as a way of documenting. Now, I look back on my Instagram like my parents look at photo albums. I can’t even imagine the day that Instagram is no longer up and running, which is why I have been trying to make sure to have copies of my photos.

As far as the results from doing this challenge, I gained my usual amount of followers during the week and did not lose any. I got only a little less than the usual amount of likes that I normally get. However, the keyboard photo was more than average, which made me realize how my followers care about my content and captions rather than my thought out photography planning. Even though I take pride in my photography and editing skills, they are not entirely necessary to achieve those likes.

So why do I do it? Because I want the world and myself to see something that I felt needed to be captured in the highest quality possible. Sometimes, it takes multiple tries to capture the beauty of what is right in front of you for a photo. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m sketching out how I will set up my Instagram displays for the week.