Microsoft Open Call Project highlights 9 new themes in the Windows Gallery

Microsoft’s Open Call Project released a new set of themes from for Windows 8. This set of themes bring varied and spectacular photographs from all around of the world to your desktop. Every theme photo is provided with a reference to the photographer. The project has so far published around 230 wallpapers, and 120 theme featuring the art work submitted by the photographers worldwide.

Check out the nine newest themes in the gallery!

The first theme by Australian photographer Tracie Louise including a tour around beautiful Queensland, including stunning color photography and moody monochromatic studies of shorelines, forests, farmland, and cityscapes.

Theme by Tracie Louise is a veritable rainbow of birds, featuring gorgeously colored rosellas, lorikeets, honeyeaters, and more.

New Zealand photographer Brian Lai’s first theme is a quietly poetic exploration of nature’s grace; including small details such as a shell on sand, emerging flower buds, and golden light shining through the leaves of a tiny sapling.

California photographer Tom Mansfield’s debut on the Personalization Gallery beautifully captures the dramatic silhouettes and vivid tangerine skies of nightfall in Sierra Sunsets.

Light and Dark 2 is a follow-up to photographer Nick Boyer’s Light and Dark theme, and also shares a distinctive aesthetic with his Garden Seasons theme.

Indian nature photographer Rangan Das brings His raindrops theme focuses on lucent jewels of water on leaves and petals.

Garden Glimpses 4, ventures into the garden again for the latest in the series.

Theme from German photographer Thomas Freiberg showing new dragonflies theme complements the butterflies

Collection from German Summer showing the fields and meadows of Brandenburg to see the busy insect life and lush grasses and wildflowers of summer.

The Open Call Project is a photography initiative from Microsoft where it allows users to send in their own photos and images. Explaining the selection process of theme wallpapers, Microsoft wrote in a blogpost that only 5% of photos are chosen, and it takes around six months to bring the photos on the personalization gallery.

A panel of reviewers’ assesses every single photo submitted in the contest before making the selections and publishing them. Microsoft has its own set of photography standards for selection of the personalization gallery which include – an original point of view, unexpected use of light and shadow, or the impression of having captured a unique moment in time.

These are the qualities what Microsoft Open Call Project looks for:

Artwork and photography must be original (must have been created by the submitter). Details should be crisp and sharp. Images must be of high quality (high resolution and not blurry, pixilated, or over-processed). Colors should be rich and naturally saturated, not grayish or washed out.
Images should be dramatic, beautiful, interesting, or serene, not dull, depressing, or controversial. (For more information on subject matter, see the guidelines).
Landscape photographs should give a feeling of depth and dimension, with foreground, mid-ground, background, and sky.
We look for compositions that provide drama and interest instead of looking flat, static, or like a snapshot.
Images should not be so busy that they are distracting and make it difficult to read icons and other objects on the screen.
Effective use of depth of field and/or selective focus can add interest to an image that might otherwise feel a bit ordinary, by drawing attention to the focal area while allowing the rest of the image to recede in a dreamlike way.

Have any other questions about the Open Call project? Take a look at the frequently asked questions page.

If you want to submit your images for publication on the Personalization Gallery and share your work with a global audience, The Open Call Project is a nice chance to opt-in.

ShiwangiPeswani@TWC