Instagram's first purchase is video-stabilisation service Luma

Instagram has made its first acquisition over the weekend and it’s a wise move at that. The Facebook-owned image editing application has picked up both, the team and technology of a Y Combinator company called Luma. The service provides stabilisation for video capturing, a feature that will do well when integrated with Instagram’s newly-acquired video services.

In a blog post announcing the acquisition, the team over at Luma wrote, “Eighteen months ago, we embarked on a mission to make capturing and sharing beautiful videos easy without expensive software or heavy equipment. By joining the exceptionally talented team at Instagram, we’re taking another big step towards realising that mission. We’re incredibly excited to be able to help make a product that is already used and loved by millions of people even better.”

Sold!

As part of the deal, Luma is shutting down its services by December 31, 2013. Of course, the service will not be taking any new members and has pulled its app from the iOS App Store. It will, however, continue to provide support to existing users till the deadline. In case you were on Luma and had shot videos on it, you can download all of them here.
Besides image stabilisation, Luma had also ventured into the area of video filters, a technology that will be the icing on the cake for Instagram. Facebook-owned Instagram already allows for filters to be added to videos after they’ve been shot. Using Luma’s know-how, Instagram could let you shoot videos using a filter and then change or remove them after you’re done shooting.

It looks like Instagram is dedicated towards winning the battle of short videos against Twitter’s Vine. This new acquisition will only help Instagram bolster its video shooting capabilities. Hopefully, the service will work on bringing Instagram video to more phones soon.