Bliss (image)
| Bliss | |
|---|---|
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| Artist | Charles O'Rear |
| Year | 1996 |
| Type | Landscape photography |
| Location | Sonoma County, California, United States |
| 38°15′00.5″N 122°24′38.9″W / 38.250139°N 122.410806°WCoordinates: 38°15′00.5″N 122°24′38.9″W / 38.250139°N 122.410806°W | |
| Owner | Microsoft |
 "21st Century Bliss" by Tony Immoos (2010) reportedly "closely resembles the 1996 photograph" but was taken about 14 years later from nearly the same spot. |
Bliss is the name of the default computer wallpaper of Microsoft's Windows XP operating system. It is an unedited photograph of a green hill and blue sky with clouds in the Los Carneros American Viticultural Area of Sonoma County, California, United States. Charles O'Rear originally sent it to Corbis in 1996, and Microsoft bought the rights to the picture in 2000.
Former National Geographic photographer Charles O'Rear, a resident of the nearby Napa Valley, took the photo on film with a medium-format camera while on his way to visit his girlfriend in 1996. While it was widely believed later that the image was digitally manipulated or even created with software such as Adobe Photoshop, O'Rear says it never was. He sold it to Corbis for use as a . Several years later, Microsoft engineers chose a digitized version of the image and licensed it from O'Rear.
Over the next decade it has been claimed to be the most viewed photograph in the world during that time. Since it was taken, the landscape in it has changed, with grapevines planted on the hill and field in the foreground, making O'Rear's image impossible to duplicate for the time being. That has not stopped other photographers from trying, and some of their attempts have been included in art exhibits.
In January 1996 former National Geographic photographer Charles O'Rear was on his way from his home in St. Helena, California, in the Napa Valley north of San Francisco, to visit his girlfriend, Daphne Irwin (whom he later married), in the city, as he did every Friday afternoon. He was working with Irwin on a book about the wine country. He was particularly alert for a photo opportunity that day, since a storm had just passed over and other recent winter rains had left the area especially green. Driving along the Sonoma Highway (California State Route 12 and 121) he saw the hill, free of the vineyards that normally covered the area; they had been pulled out a few years earlier following a phylloxera infestation. "There it was! My God, the grass is perfect! It's green! The sun is out; there's some clouds," he remembered thinking. He stopped somewhere near the Napa–Sonoma county line and pulled off the road to set his Mamiya RZ67 medium-format camera on a tripod, choosing Fujifilm's Velvia, a film often used among nature photographers and known to saturate some colors. O'Rear credits that combination of camera and film for the success of the image. "It made the difference and, I think, helped the 'Bliss' photograph stand out even more," he said. "I think that if I had shot it with 35 mm, it would not have nearly the same effect." While he was setting up his camera, he said it was possible that the clouds in the picture came in. "Everything was changing so quickly at that time." He took four shots and got back into his truck. According to O'Rear, the image was not digitally enhanced or manipulated in any way.
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