Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom. Nicholas Carlson Instagram announced a new feature today called Instagram Direct, which lets you send photos and videos directly to up to 15 friends at once.

Here's how it works.

When you take an Instagram photo or video, you can select a group of your friends to send it to. You can only send the message to people who you follow on Instagram and if they follow you back. After the photo is sent, you can send text messages to each other about the photo or whatever else you want.

If someone you don't follow on Instagram tries to send you a photo, you'll receive a notification and you can decide whether or not to accept it. If you deny the photo, you'll never hear from that person again.

Click here to see Instagram Direct in action >>

Instagram Direct is part of the regular Instagram app. It'll be available today for iPhone and Android.

We covered Instagram's announcement today in New York. You can check out our live blog below to see the news as it happened.