My twitter timeline is being flooded with instagram photos. Thanks for this heavy deluge of serious photo editing, guys.

Not sure why everyone is so deep into this instagram business. I mean c’mon, after a few shots you’ve kinda seen it and it becomes somewhat repetitive, right? But even I must admit it can be a fun effect when used sparingly.

But here’s the thing: I don’t have an iPhone. Or an iPad. Oh yes, we do still exist—the people without all the iStuff—and we’re stronger than ever. Okay, so I do have an iMac… but still.

On the bright side, I’ve got photoshop… and I’m not afraid to use it. For those of you Appleless people out there, and for those who want more control over the instagram effect, here’s a simple way to create a similar effect in Photoshop.

Here’s my SOOC.

Now we need to give the photo that washed out instagram effect and remove some of the blown out highlights.

In your layers palette you open a Levels adjustment layer.

Drag the levels to the right, 25 should do. Now drag the output levels somewhere between 40 and 60. Of course this depends on your photo and what look you’re going for.

The photo should have a washed out, somewhat dull, look now.

Open a Curves adjustment layer. This is where the magic happens.

We’re going to tweak the blue, green and red curves. I’m starting with blue.

First, I’m placing three dots in the curve line to use as a point of reference. I’ll also do this for the red and green curves later on.

You’ll want to get more green into your photo. Drag the dots while keeping an eye on your photo. Here were my settings.

My settings don’t necessarily have to work for your photo!

Which gave me this greenish hue that I was after. I liked it.

I gave the green curve a really mild tweak.

And played around with the red curve a bit.

Until I was happy with the result.

You can leave it like this, if you like, or you can bump up the yellow/green hues a bit more to get the full effect.

I decided to go all the way and from the layers palette I choose the Photo Filter.

Red is the default color. Change the color, drag it into the yellow but make sure you get a slight green hue to it.

Set the opacity to your liking.

And here’s the effect you ultimately get.

You can take it anywhere you like. Choose any hue you like. Increase or decrease the washed out effect. It might be fun to create this effect and make it work for your particular photo than having to stick to presets.