Follow Us On Instagram
A Great Way To Keep Up With Our Photography
Follow Kevin Raber on Instagram HERE
Are you on Instagram? Are you following Michael Durr and me? Maybe you are not a big social media person. I can understand that. Social media and all the platforms can quickly take away your valuable time as well as drive you crazy with all the ancillary crap that is on it. How you use Instagram makes all the difference in the world.
I would like to encourage you to think about using Instagram the way I do, to follow your friends and their photographic exploits. As you can see from my Instagram page, I have around 3100 followers, and I follow around 1400 photographers and friends.
Instagram is, for lack of a better term, a photo-sharing platform. Posting a photo is simple, and you can then add a caption. Also, you can add hashtags if you want. These hashtags serve as tags for interests, places, and other information. Many people search Instagram by putting a hashtag in a search.
For example, say I share a photograph of Iceland at sunset. I would then decide on what hashtags describe the photo. These might be #Iceland, #Iceberg, #Icelandiceberg, #glacier, #waterfall, and so forth. Anyone searching any of these hashtags will see this photo in their search results.
It’s pretty cool and allows you to see how other photographers have approached similar scenes. Some photographers are very popular, with hundreds of thousands of followers. It’s hard to believe that these are true followers, though. One of the things about Instagram (and I refuse to do it) is that you can buy followers. There are numerous sources on the internet that will add 100,000 followers to your account in a matter of 24 hours. These, of course, aren’t real followers. They are created by using robots to sign onto your account, follow it, and every now and then, to add some legitimacy to it, leave comments, most likely in the form of emojis.
People do this because, if it looks as if they have a lot of followers, certain companies may be willing to pay them for posts or be interested in having them become a spokesperson for a brand. It’s quite a racket, and as you dive into it, it can make your head spin.
I use Instagram to share photos. I can do this better here than on the photoPXL site because my photos there are usually part of an article. I try to post a new photo on social media every day. Sometimes, during my evening cocktail hour, I go through my images and find a few that are good candidates. I work on them with any needed enhancements and then put them in a folder for posting. Then, usually with morning coffee, I post to both Facebook and Instagram. I’ll share some tips about Facebook in another article.
Follow Michael Durr on Instagram HERE
On the photoPXL site, in the upper right-hand corner, there are social media sharing buttons that with one click will take you to our different social media accounts. I try to keep my posts to photography and keep politics out of things. A week or so ago, I posted an image of President Trump made by a sculptor friend of mine. That was a mistake. While I said nothing about my political affiliation, I guess it was implied by the photo, and I found out who my friends were and who they were not. Needless to say, I unfollowed a number of “friends.” I was really disappointed to see that some close friends prefer those who share their political affiliation.
The political divide in this country right now is something I have never seen before in my lifetime. I am shocked at how sensitive things are and how strongly people feel one way or the other. This is not healthy as this is a great country that is being divided needlessly by certain individuals. I hope we can find a way to get back to what really counts in the not so distant future.
In any case, please click on the link to visit my Instagram page and follow it. I post a wide variety of photos on it and love sharing my passion of photography with the world. And, for the record, no more Trump photos will ever be published, just good ole fun and interesting photos.
Some Worthy Instagram Accounts To Follow
clemens_vanderwerf
andy_biggs_safaris
williamneill
david_m_milstien
joemcnallyphoto
karen_massier_photography
petermckinnon
professorhines
smathiaphoto
nickpagephotography
hughbrownstone
ignacio_palacios_ip
Kevin Raber
June 2020
Kevin Raber
Indianapolis, IN
Photography is my passion and has been for 50 plus years. My career in photography has allowed me to travel the world, meet some of the most interesting people on the planet and see things I could never have dreamed of. My goal is to share the passion of picture taking through photographs and teaching with as many people as I can, hoping it brings them as much joy and happiness as it has me. I do this through photoPXL.com, this site, as well as Rockhopper Workshops, and other projects, as well as teaching as Artist In Residence at the Indianapolis Art Center.
