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Bliss (image)
Encyclopedia
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Windows bitmap
The BMP File Format, also known as Bitmap Image File or Device Independent Bitmap file format or simply a Bitmap, is a Raster graphics image file format used to store bitmap digital images, independently of the display device , especially on Microsoft Windows and OS/2 operating systems.The BMP...
image included with Microsoft Windows XP, produced from a photograph of a landscape in Sonoma County, California
Sonoma County, California
Sonoma County, located on the northern coast of the U.S. state of California, is the largest and northernmost of the nine San Francisco Bay Area counties. Its population at the 2010 census was 483,878. Its largest city and county seat is Santa Rosa....
, southeast of Sonoma Valley
Sonoma Valley
Sonoma Valley is the birthplace of the California wine industry and often called The Valley of the Moon. Sonoma Valley is home to some of the earliest vineyards and wineries in the state, some of which survived the phylloxera epidemic of the 1870s and the impact of Prohibition...
near the site of the old Clover Stornetta Inc.
Clover Stornetta Inc.
Clover Stornetta Inc. is a dairy company located in Sonoma County, California, which is located near the coast in Northern California.-History:...
Dairy. The image contains rolling green hills and a blue sky with cumulus
Cumulus cloud
Cumulus clouds are a type of cloud with noticeable vertical development and clearly defined edges. Cumulus means "heap" or "pile" in Latin. They are often described as "puffy" or "cotton-like" in appearance. Cumulus clouds may appear alone, in lines, or in clusters...
and cirrus cloud
Cirrus cloud
Cirrus clouds are atmospheric clouds generally characterized by thin, wispy strands, giving them their name from the Latin word cirrus meaning a ringlet or curling lock of hair...
s. The image is used as the default computer wallpaper
Computer wallpaper
Wallpaper is an image used as a background of a graphical user interface on a computer screen or mobile communications device. On a computer it is usually for the desktop, while for a mobile phone it is usually the background for the 'home' or 'idle' screen...
for the Luna theme of Windows XP
Windows XP
Windows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...
.
The photograph was taken by professional photographer Charles O'Rear
Charles O'Rear
Charles O'Rear is an American photographer best known for his photos of wine country and the image Bliss that was used as a standard wallpaper in Windows XP....
, a resident of St. Helena
St. Helena, California
St. Helena is a city in Napa County, California, United States. It is part of the northern San Francisco Bay Area. The population was 5,814 at the 2010 census....
, Napa County, for digital-design company HighTurn. According to O'Rear, the photograph was not digitally enhanced or manipulated in any way.
O'Rear has also taken photographs for Bill Gates
Bill Gates
William Henry "Bill" Gates III is an American business magnate, investor, philanthropist, and author. Gates is the former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen...
' private Seattle stock photography
Stock photography
Stock photography is the supply of photographs licensed for specific uses. It is used to fulfill the needs of creative assignments instead of hiring a photographer. Today, stock images can be presented in searchable online databases. They can be purchased and delivered online...
company Corbis
Corbis
Corbis Corporation is an American company, based in Seattle, Washington, that licenses the rights to photographs, footage and other visual media...
and Napa Valley photographs for the May 1979 National Geographic Magazine article Napa, Valley of the Vine. Although O'Rear's focus was on photographing winemaking in the Napa Valley, the hill in Bliss didn't have grapevines when the photograph was taken in 1996, 5 years before the release of Windows XP
Windows XP
Windows XP is an operating system produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops and media centers. First released to computer manufacturers on August 24, 2001, it is the second most popular version of Windows, based on installed user base...
. The photograph was taken on the side of the highway 12/121
California State Route 121
State Route 121 is a California state highway in the Wine Country that runs northerly from its junction with State Route 37 at Sears Point, past the Tolay Lake basin and across Tolay Creek near Infineon Raceway, veers east at a junction with State Route 116 and Bonneau Road at Schellville, runs...
by a hand held medium view camera
View camera
The view camera is a type of camera first developed in the era of the Daguerreotype and still in use today, though with many refinements. It comprises a flexible bellows which forms a light-tight seal between two adjustable standards, one of which holds a lens, and the other a viewfinder or a...
. The approximate location is 3101 Fremont Dr. (Sonoma Hwy.), Sonoma, CA. The coordinates for the hill are 38.250124,-122.410817.
O'Rear's photograph inspired Windows XP's $200 million advertising campaign
Advertising campaign
An advertising campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme which make up an integrated marketing communication...
Yes you can, by the San Francisco division of New York City advertising company McCann-Erickson. The campaign was launched on television on ABC (America) during one of ABC Sports's Monday Night Football
Monday Night Football
Monday Night Football is a live broadcast of the National Football League on ESPN. From to it aired on ABC. Monday Night Football was, along with Hallmark Hall of Fame, and the Walt Disney anthology television series, one of the longest running prime time commercial network television series...
games of the 2001 NFL season
2001 NFL season
The 2001 NFL season was the 82nd regular season of the National Football League.Following a pattern set in 1999, the first week of the season was permanently moved to the weekend following Labor Day...
. The television commercials included Madonna
Madonna (entertainer)
Madonna is an American singer-songwriter, actress and entrepreneur. Born in Bay City, Michigan, she moved to New York City in 1977 to pursue a career in modern dance. After performing in the music groups Breakfast Club and Emmy, she released her debut album in 1983...
's Ray of Light
Ray of Light
Ray of Light is the seventh studio album by American singer-songwriter Madonna, released on March 3, 1998 by Maverick Records and distributed by Warner Bros. Records. After giving birth to her daughter Lourdes, Madonna collaborated with Patrick Leonard and William Orbit in developing the album...
song, whose TV rights cost Microsoft about $14 million.
In November 2006, artist collaboration Goldin+Senneby
Goldin+Senneby
Goldin+Senneby is a framework for collaboration set up by artists Simon Goldin and Jakob Senneby; exploring juridical, financial and spatial constructs through notions of the performative and the virtual....
visited the site in Sonoma Valley where the Bliss image was taken, re-photographing the same view ten years later. Their work After Microsoft was first shown in the exhibition "Paris was Yesterday" at gallery La Vitrine in April 2007 and has later been exhibited at Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo
São Paulo
São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...
, and 300m3 in Gothenburg.