Check out the front page of Bloomingdales today, and you will see something really cool. Instead of a typical photo of a model, Bloomingdales is using aCinemagraphto promote a clothing line.

In case you haven’t seen this type of photography (aka animated gifs) yet, a Cinemagraph is a mix between a photo and a video - see the photo to the right from a popular fashion photography blog From Me To You.

In the startup world, apps that allow us to create these type of cinemagraphs, like Cinemagram,Kinotopic, andiCinegraph are just starting to take off. However, in the fashion world, this type of photography has been around since 2009, when it was created by visual graphics artist Kevin Burg.

According to Cinemagraphs.com, a trademarked term coined by Burg, the history of cinemagraphs is as follows:

“Visual Graphics Artist Kevin Burg began experimenting with the .gif format in this style in 2009 but it wasn’t until he partnered with photographer Jamie Beck to cover NYFW that Cinemagraphs were born. Marrying original content photography with the desire to communicate more to the viewer birthed the cinemagraph process. Starting in-camera, the artists take a traditional photograph and combine a living moment into the image through the isolated animation of multiple frames. To quote supermodel Coco Rocha “it’s more than a photo but not quite a video”.”
In June 2011, the Cool Hunting blog covered the trend of animated gifs, which is about the time when the consumer cinemagraph-creating apps started coming out. As big fashion sites, like Bloomingdales, and fashion blogs continue to follow this amazing photo trend, apps like Cinemgraph, Kinotopic, and others, are only going to get more and more popular among consumers. And for good reasons, this type of photography is truly magical.