Upload
The upload window allows you upload photos and videos, write captions, tag users, set cover frames, crop and resize, share to linked accounts and much more.

To begin creating a new post:
- Right-click a photo or video in Finder and select the
Open with… > Flume
menu item.
Flume has support for drafts through its own
.flumedraft
document type. Drafts save the following information:- The photos or videos to post.
Prior to Flume 2.8.6, the Flume draft file extension was
.flume
.Flume versions older than 2.8.6 will not be able to open newer
.flumedraft
drafts. Flume versions 2.8.6 and later can still open older .flume
drafts.To create/save a draft:
- After selecting your photo/video and making all necessary edits, close the upload window, or use the
File > Save Draft…
menu bar item. A save dialog will appear to select a save location and filename.
If you make edits to a previously opened draft, changes will be saved to the same draft file and no save dialog will appear.
To open a draft:
You can select up to 10 photos and videos into a single post, otherwise known as a carousel or multi-post.
Carousel posts can be either all square items, all horizontal, or all vertical. It is not possible to mix-and-match square items with horizontal or vertical items. Flume will use the aspect ratio of your first item in the Carousel Post, in order to force cropping of all subsequent items to the same aspect ratio. If you wish to create a square carousel post from a photo or video that is not originally in square aspect ratio, you should first crop the photo/video before toggling the carousel post option. If you drag-and-drop multiple files to create a new carousel post, Flume will automatically display the cropping window for you for the first item.
When dragging/opening multiple files to create a carousel post, Flume will sort the selected files by filename to ascertain the order. The first item in your carousel post determines the kind of carousel post (square / horizontal / vertical) Flume will create. If you wish to override Flume's default filename ordering, select your first item for upload manually, then add the remaining items after converting from a single post to a carousel post. Once all items are added, rearrange them by hovering over the item thumbnail and drag-and-dropping them to a new position.
To create a carousel post directly:
- Select more than one photo/video in the macOS open panel that appears after choosing
Select [Photo|Video|Draft]…
in the upload window. - Drag more than one photo/video directly onto an empty upload window.
- Right-click more than one photo/video in Finder and select the
Open with… > Flume
menu item.
To toggle between an individual and carousel post:
- Click the carouselbutton.
To adjust the order of the items in your carousel post:
- 1.Hover the mouse cursor over the thumbnails in the carousel item list until the drag-handle appears.
- 2.Click-and-drag the drag-handle up/down to reorder the item.
You can apply filters and make adjustments to your photos and videos easily right inside Flume.
The Scale adjustment is only available on photos.
Tagging users in videos is not currently supported.
Video filters and adjustments are not available on macOS Yosemite 10.10

To edit a selected photo or video:
- Click the editbutton.
To quickly preview your edits:
- Click the previewbutton.
To apply a filter to a photo or video:
- Click on the filter preview.
After selecting a filter, you can adjust the its intensity (default 100%).
To make adjustments to a photo or video:
- Click and drag the respective slider to set a new value.
- Use the
↑
(UP) and↓
(DOWN) keyboard arrows to move between adjustments, and←
(LEFT) and→
(RIGHT) to set their value.
The color adjustment requires you to first select a color to apply as an overall tint to the photo or video.
The tilt shift adjustment requires you to set the two focal points. Click the
Adjust
button and follow the prompts to set the points on the photo or video.To reset all adjustments:
- Click the clearbutton.
When a video is selected, additional video settings will also appear in the editing area.
To mute or adjust the output volume of the video:
- Click and drag the volume slider to set a new volume level. To mute the video, slide the value left until theimage is visible.
If the video file contains no audio, the volume slider is disabled.
You can add an optional caption to your posts. When typing a
#
or @
character, your keyboard input will also search Instagram for matching hashtags and users until you select an item from the popover, press the ESC
key, or press another space.URLs, hashtags, and mentions can be clicked as links in captions - simply long-press/click on the link for a preview to appear. If your caption text contains duplicate URLs, hashtags, or mentions, the link will display in red.
Flume can use embedded metadata (EXIF/IPTC) inside your photos and videos to pre-fill your caption with a specific format.
You can include up to 30 users to tag in a post. The tagged users can be viewed in the details view.
Tagging users in videos is not currently supported.


To add a tagged user in a post:
- 1.
- 2.Click a position where the user is located.
- 3.Type in the search text field to find the relevant user.
- 4.Click on a search result to confirm the user tag.
To remove a tagged user:
- 1.
- 2.Hover the mouse over the user tag you wish to remove and click it once.
To reposition a tagged user:
- 1.
- 2.Hover the mouse over the user tag you wish to remove and click-and-drag it to a new position.
You can tag your photo and video at a location that displays on the details view and links to the recent media tagged at that location.

To add a location on a photo or video:
- 1.
- 2.Type to search for the location to tag, or click the
Nearby Places
button to search locations close to your current position. - 3.Select a location from the search results. If no search results could be found, the results popover will disappear.
If the photo or video contains geotag location information, Flume will automatically search for the GPS coordinates where the photo or video was taken. You cannot tag exact GPS coordinates on Instagram, and all tagged locations must exist as Facebook Places. To add new locations, see Instagram's Help Center.
To edit a location on a photo or video:
- Click the name of the location, and select the
Edit Location
item.
To remove an existing location on a photo or video:
- Click the name of the location, and select the
Remove Location
item.
When uploading a video, you can choose a custom cover image that will be used to represent your video's thumbnail image.

To set a cover image:
- Click the cover imagebutton.
Use the video scrubber in the cover image view or Touch Bar to select a position in the video as the cover image.
By default, Flume will use the frame at 0.5 seconds into your video as your cover image. If your video contains a solid colour fade-in transition, your cover image will be the solid colour. To avoid this, set a custom cover image.
When you select a photo to upload that exceeds the aspect ratio requirements, you have three options:
- Scroll the photo's cropping region to a desired area using your mouse/trackpad. The region of the photo not visible will be cropped from the upload.

To crop a photo:
- Click the cropbutton.
Click-and-drag the resize handles to adjust the cropping region, and click-and-drag the rectangle to adjust the cropping position.
You can toggle between common aspect-ratios, or use the aspect-ratio of the media, by clicking on the
Aspect Ratio
button and choosing from the pop-up menu. This enforces the dragging rectangle to maintain the selected aspect-ratio.To resize a photo back to its original dimensions:
- Click the resizebutton.
If your selected photo exceeds the aspect ratio requirements, you can use the
Resize to Fit
option to resize the entire photo to fit inside a square, with the ability to also choose a custom border color (default: white).This ensures your landscape or portrait photos will not be cropped, by adding in either vertical or horizontal borders. The border colour chosen is saved for future cropping/resizing edits.

When you select a video to upload that exceeds the aspect ratio requirements, you have three options:
- Scroll the video's cropping region to a desired area using your mouse/trackpad. The region of the video not visible will be cropped from the upload, and the original aspect ratio will be maintained.
- Resizing the video to fit into a square. Like above, scroll the video's cropping region to a desired area using your mouse/trackpad. The region of the video not visible will be cropped from the upload, and a 1:1 (square) aspect ratio will be maintained.
When selecting a video that is already 1:1 (square), the options to crop or resize will be disabled.
To crop a video:
- Click the cropbutton.
Click-and-drag the resize handles to adjust the cropping region, and click-and-drag the rectangle to adjust the cropping position.
You can toggle between common aspect-ratios, or use the aspect-ratio of the media, by clicking on the
Aspect Ratio
button and choosing from the pop-up menu. This enforces the dragging rectangle to maintain the selected aspect-ratio.To resize a video back to its original dimensions:
- Click the resizebutton.

Videos posted to Instagram must be within 3 and 60 seconds in duration. You can perform some fine-tuning to the length of your video directly inside Flume. To trim a video:
- Click the trimbutton.
- Click the Share to Favoritesbutton.
Sharing allows you to cross-post your upload to a linked account. You can also share existing posts at any time.
To share a post to a linked account:
- Click the
Share
button.
Choose at least one social network to share to.
You can also save your sharing options, so that the previously enabled options are remembered for your next upload.
To adjust advanced settings on your post:
- Click the
Settings
button.
To switch the account to post with:
- Click on the profile picture and select an account.
If you are a Flume Pro user, you can use Flume to edit your photos and videos, adding filters and fine-tuning with adjustments, but export the items for use elsewhere without uploading to Instagram.
To export your edited items:
- Click on the actionsbutton in the titlebar area of the Upload window, and select the
Export Edits…
menu item.
A dialog will appear asking you to choose the location to export your items.
If you need to post some items in a series, such as 3 photos in a row with the same theme, you can make use of the unique sync all upload windows feature, which will copy and replace the caption, location, tagged users, sharing settings, and advanced settings to all currently open upload windows. This allows you to write and set the details once, and apply it to all the other open upload windows instantly.
To sync all upload windows:
- Click on the actionsbutton in the titlebar area of the upload window, and select the
Sync All Upload Windows…
menu item.
Last modified 3yr ago