Introduction: How to Make an Instructable Using the New Editor

By
About: I'm just a lady who likes making stuff. I got my degree in engineering but also enjoy cooking, sewing, knitting, gardening and backpacking, among other things.

As you may have noticed, there's a new Instructables editor around here! Even though change is good, change can also be hard, so I made this handy dandy guide to help you get the hang of the new editor and take your Instructables to the next level! Let's get started!

Step 1: Where Is It?

To use the new editor, click on the "Create" tab at the top of the page. From there, a drop down menu will appear with the options of "Create Instructable" or "Create Collection." Whether you want to create a step-by-step, photo instructable, or video instructable, click "Create."

You will be brought to the new editor and a window will pop up where you can enter the title of your Instructable and the category it belongs in. Once you have entered this information, you can click "Begin" and you will be taken to the next page.

You can always change your title and category later!

Step 2: Adding and Removing Images

After you have entered a title for your Instructable and selected a category, a window will pop up for uploading images. You can drag and drop your files into the window or click browse to find them on your computer. Once you have the images that you want to add to the Instructable, you can click "Upload." There will be a green progress bar showing the status of your uploading images. Once your images are uploaded, they will be in the bar at the top of the page. From there, they can be dragged and dropped into any step in your Instructable.

If you want to use images from your image library, simply click on "Image Library" to access them.

To remove an image from a step, click on the image you want to remove. There are three buttons underneath the image. Click on "Remove Image from Step." This will return the image to the top bar, it will still be in your image library and you will be able to add it to a different step if you want.

To upload an image directly to a step, click on the little camera icon at the top of the page.

When you have clicked on an image, you can also add notes to it to draw attention to important aspects of the image, or clarify instructions. You can also use Pixlr to edit images within the editor by clicking "Edit in Pixlr." From there, you can rotate, crop and adjust pictures, all without having to leave the new editor! For a more in-depth guide on using Pixlr, check out this instructable.

To add images from your image library, click on "Image Library" and you will be able to see all the images you have uploaded before. You can sort them in different ways, including by tag, so it can be helpful to label your pictures by project so you can find them more easily. Select the images you want to add to the step and click "Done."

Step 3: Adding, Deleting and Reordering Steps

If you want to create a step-by-step instructable, you will need to add steps. To add a step, you can click on "Add Step" from either the main page where you can view all the steps together, or from the previous step. When adding a step from the page where you can see all the steps, the added step will be added at the end of the instructable. When adding from an individual step, the new step will be added directly after the step it was added from.

To delete a step, you can view all steps and hover your curser over the lower right hand corner of the step you wish to delete. A red "X" will appear. Click on the "X" and a dialog box will pop up confirming that you want to delete the step. If you do, click "delete," if you don't want to delete the step, click "cancel."

To reorganize steps, view all the steps together and hover your curser over the step you want to move. An icon that looks like three lines will appear in the upper right hand corner of the step. You can then click on this and drag and drop to change the order of your steps.

Step 4: Creating Links

It can be extremely useful to include links in your instructables, whether you are linking to other instructables or places to get materials, including links is a great way to make your instructables more readable and polished looking.

To include a link, simply highlight the word or phrase that you want to make into a link and click on the icon that looks like a chain (because a chain has links! Get it?! Hey, I didn't invent the icons of the internet.) When you click on that icon, a drop down menu will appear with two options, "Insert link" and "unlink." To create a link, click on insert link and copy and paste the URL you wish to link to into the line that says "URL." Then click "Insert link" and your link will be inserted.

To delete a link, simply click "Unlink" in the drop down menu, or just delete it with your backspace key.

Step 5: Embed a Video

Videos can be super useful to include in your instructables whether you want to include a video of how you made your project, or a video of your finished project in action. You could link to a video, but it's really easy to embed a video and makes your instructable much more readable.

To embed a video, click on the icon in the top bar that looks like a "play" icon (see picture notes) and a drop down menu will appear. One option will say "Upload Video (coming soon!)" which you don't have to worry about, you want to click on the other option, "Embed Video." Copy and paste the URL of the video you want to embed into the text field and click "preview." A preview of your video should show up. If it's correct, you can then click "Done" and your video will be embedded in your instructable.

If you want your video to be included in the body of your instructable instead of at the top of the step, you can simply copy and paste the URL of the video into the body of your instructable then hit the "enter" key on your keyboard. It should automatically embed a video into the body of your instructable.

I have included videos of my friends singing as an example since these are the only videos I have on my youtube account. As you can see, there is one at the beginning of this step and one at the end. The one at the beginning was embedded using the video embedding button and the one at the end was added by copying and pasting the URL directly into the instructable.

Step 6: Uploading Other Types of Files

You can add files to your instructable to include additional information that can be downloaded for users. A lot of users will include cutting or printing files for laser cut and 3D printed projects. Even projects like sewing and paper craft can benefit from printable pattern files. To upload files, click on the paper clip icon at the top next to the icon for embedding video. A drop down menu will appear with two options, "Upload File" and "Embed File." Click on upload file and you will be brought to the usual uploader which you can drag and drop files into or browse files on your computer and upload them. They will be added directly to the step that you are on.

If you click on "Embed file" you will be able to copy and paste the URL of the file you want to embed and it will be included in your instructable.

Step 7: Other Resources

Photos are one of the most important aspects of your instructable. This collection has tons of helpful tips and techniques for practically any type of photography you can imagine!

A guide for creating an all-around great instructable can be found here. This instructable was written by the founder and CEO of this site, so this is straight from the horse's mouth!

If you are going to put all this effort in to writing up your projects, you probably want people to see your instructable! A great way to get more views on your instructables is to give it a good title and key words that will draw more internet traffic to your projects. You can find more information on key words and titles here.

Want to get your instructable featured? We have some things we look for when deciding what to feature, and you can see that here for things to keep in mind while you're documenting your instructable!