This hill is ubiquitous, but surprisingly hard to find in reality.
Windows XP’s iconic default desktop wallpaper of a rolling green hill under a clear blue sky is one of the most viewed photos in the world, but its overall pleasantness has long baffled internet residents as to its actual location – and some believe it’s not an actual photo .
The SFGate editor-in-chief recently took a look at the earthy subject of the computer background and discovered it covered in wine grapes, just across the street from an alpaca farm and Highway 12 in Sonoma, California.
The photo even has an incredible backstory: Charles O’Rear took the now legendary photo of what’s known as “Bliss” hill on a Friday afternoon in January 1996 while driving to see his now-wife.
“A majority of the people who saw that photo, billions of people, thought it wasn’t an actual photo,” said O’Rear. “When you drive through the Sonoma hills in January it always gets a carpet of green grass, it’s beautiful. I knew that, and it was just the perfect light, the perfect clouds. “
O’Rear, 79, uploaded the photo to a stock photo agency. When Microsoft discovered O’Rear’s shot, the company paid an unknown, but reportedly six-figure amount for perpetual rights to it and promptly committed it around the world as part of a $ 1 billion marketing campaign.
Despite O’Rear’s prolific photography career for the Los Angeles Times, The Kansas City Star and, for more than two decades, National Geographic, he is well aware that his ubiquitous image of the “Bliss” hill will be what he is remembered for. will be.
“After 25 years of shooting at National Geographic, there will be no mention of Geographic on my gravestone,” he told the publication.
Despite the ubiquity and notoriety the image has brought him – he says “not a week goes by that there is an email about that photo” – because his legacy was tied to the technology company, it didn’t buy his loyalty.
“I became addicted to Apple,” he said.
