I've got a set of divs and I want each of them to have different background color and while on hover to transition into a background image of chosen url. I have so far managed to find code for smooth color -> image transition but that requires an actual img code in HTML and I need those divs as I will be putting text in them.

Is there any chance to have a smooth 0.5s or less transition from background color to background url performed through CSS?

If you look at <http://loopedmag.com> you can see what I want to recreate in code but with the transitioned animation color->image.