Cinemagraphs - More Than A Photo, Less Than A Video

Fans of Harry Potter will recall the amazing moving photos that interacted with their audience whenever necessary. Now two photographers have come up with a technique to make it a reality - And while they are not as robust as the ones concocted by J.K. Rowling, they are pretty darn amazing.

Dubbed Cinemagraphs, they are described by inventors Jamie Beck and Kevin Burgh as 'More than a photo, but not quite a video' - And are essentially traditional still photographs, with a 'live' moment built in.

The two came up with the idea while trying to figure out how to document New York's fashion show in a more robust way - But using something more cutting edge than video.

With Kevin's extensive background in motion graphics and Jamie's stunning photographs, the two were a match made in heaven. What they ended up doing was editing an animated GiF so that only a portion of the movement was left. It took them about a year and a half to get it right, but the results as you will agree, are quite stunning.

Each photo takes a number of hours of painstaking editing before it become 'live' - In the case of more complex ones it could even take over a day. However, the artists are very picky, applying their magic only to photos, where a still image does not do justice to the essence of the scene. Now if only they could make them talk! To see more of Kevin and Jamie's fabulous work click on fromme-toyou.tumblr.com.

Resources: Huffingtonpost.com, dailymail.co.uk