History tells us that Charles O'Rear was in the right place at the right time to take a shot with his camera that changed his life. The result of that shot is Bliss, the image that was the wallpaper on billions of copies of Windows XP, and which today is impossible to confuse. 21 years later, O'Rear wants to touch the sky with his lens again, creating three wallpapers for none other than Lufthansa, under the campaign "New Angles of America".
The shot that changed everything
It was January 1996, and photographer Charles O'Rear was heading to his girlfriend's house, not ruling out the possibility of grabbing a couple of images along the way. At some point near the dividing line between Napa and Sonoma counties in California, O'Rear stopped, pulled out his Mamiya RZ67, and captured what four years later would become the most viewed image on the planet. It was Microsoft who gave it its final name, "Bliss", and apparently they paid so much for it (including creative and commercial rights) that O'Rear had to travel to Seattle personally to deliver all his material, because mail services couldn't insure the package.
New Angles of America
Two decades later, O'Rear is far from retiring, and he's back at it working for a campaign organized by Lufthansa, named "New Angles of America". Times have changed, as have the goals, and Lufthansa's idea is not to cover its planes with O'Rear's images or launch an operating system, but to offer a series of "sequels" to Bliss aimed at the billions of smartphones used every day.
The new wallpapers
Anyone interested can download the images above, or visit the official New Angles of America portal (link below) and get their copies. The resolution is 1080 by 1920 (vertical format), and personally I'll stick with "Maroon Bells". Lufthansa also organized a giveaway (unfortunately no longer accepting entries) that will award the winner on January 31 with two tickets to Los Angeles, a seven-night stay, and a "meet and greet" with O'Rear himself.
