More than a photo, but not quite a video. These stunning ‘cinemagraphs’ could well be the future of the animated gif.

During a recent trip around the blogs, on a research mission, we were fortunate to come across these beautiful images created by New York Fashion Photographers Jamie Beck & Kevin Burg. The subtlety and intrigue of these images amazed us all and we could not wait to start playing! It really was a genuine ‘why didn’t we think of that’ moment!

Animated gifs are nothing new and neither is video for that matter. What these images do is breathe new life into an old technology. The internet and modern browsers have improved so much since animated gifs were the only option for movement on a web page. Where we are most excited about these is their potential within email marketing – most of the popular email clients have recently started supporting gifs, and those that don’t will still display the first frame.

A quick search of our servers threw up a load of videos from Rob’s recent trip to China – the perfect starting point. Here are our early experiments with this new(ish) technique. Let us know what you think…