macOS Bliss
The most recognized photograph on Earth gets the macOS treatment.
Bliss is probably the world's most recognized photograph, seen by billions of people across hundreds of millions of devices. Shot by Charles O'Rear in 1996 in Sonoma Country, California, Microsoft later purchased the rights to the image in 2000, which used the image as Windows XP's default wallpaper when the operating system launched in 2001.
The wallpaper features a gently rolling sunlit hill on a background of soft & small puffy clouds against a vivid blue sky. Microsoft's command of the marketplace in the early 2000s and the success of Windows XP helped propel Bliss to becoming the most viewed photograph on earth. Bliss is unquestionably hallowed ground.
What I wanted to do in this project was create a wallpaper for the Mac inspired by O'Rear's Bliss photograph in the minimalist styles of the macOS Big Sur/Monterey wallpapers.
To accomplish this, I booted up Sketch and got to work inside of the Mesh Gradient plugin, selecting colours and contours respectful to the original Bliss photograph. At times the work was a careful choreography, slowly manipulating the mesh to find a precise blend, whereas, at other times, it was me wildly swinging around the anchor points in a desperate attempt to find something... anything... that looked good. Craft & chaos intertwined.
This is a look at the mesh framework under-the-hood of the macOS Bliss wallpaper.
The final result is an interpretation of Bliss for the Mac that I am very proud of. Sharp, flowing lines dissolve into subtle gradients that unite the legacy & colour palette of the original Bliss wallpaper with the gradients and minimalist aesthetic used to showcase macOS Big Sur & Monterey.
With the Bliss wallpaper completed, I sat back to savour the feeling of having completed another project only to be interrupted by the thought: "people are going to want a dark mode." So back to the drawing board I went. And a while later, I sat back in my chair, sized up what I had created, and felt content with having created a night version of the Bliss wallpaper that would perfectly complement the original. My work was done, and once again, I paused to savour the feeling of having completed another project.
But then another thought interrupted this second moment, this time wondering, "what would it take to create multiple versions change throughout the course of day?" For years, Apple has been doing this: macOS Mojave had 16 shots of their dynamic wallpaper, while macOS Catalina & Big Sur each had 8. I have always wanted to create a dynamic wallpaper to this effect, but the challenge in such an endeavour was creating multiple versions of a design that all looked stunning. So back to the drawing board I went. I cut my ambitions in half and designed two more versions (for a total of four) of the macOS Bliss wallpaper, adding a sunrise and a sunset variation to complete the set.
The final step was to place all these wallpapers into Dynaper to generate a .heic file that changes based on the time of day. Two versions were created: a standard light/dark mode wallpaper that changes from Day to Night depending on the display mode of your Mac and a dynamic wallpaper that rotates through all four versions depending on the time of day.
The macOS Bliss Wallpapers are designed for all your iDevices - iPhone, iPad, & Mac, although the dynamic wallpapers are only currently supported on the Mac at this time. I think you're going to love these designs. And if you feel inclined, I’d love to see photos of your devices and setups with these wallpapers.
macOS Bliss Day
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Mac (up to 6K) | iPhone | iPad
macOS Bliss Morning
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Mac (up to 6K) | iPhone | iPad
macOS Bliss Evening
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Mac (up to 6K) | iPhone | iPad
macOS Bliss Night
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Mac (up to 6K) | iPhone | iPad
Bonus: Rainy Day Bliss
August 08, 2021: Here's a unique drop of the macOS Bliss wallpaper. After months of record-breaking temperatures, blistering heat warnings, smoky skies, & zero rain, the clouds have finally rolled in, and it began to rain. The grey, dreary sky over me today inspired this wallpaper, providing a much-needed reprieve from the unbelievably scorching summer we've had so far. And the colours selected for this wallpaper are directly from a picture I took during my afternoon walk. Enjoy.
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Mac (up to 6K) | iPhone | iPad
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