Global Moxie

Nnngh, the iOS 4 wallpaper change makes me crazy.

Don’t get me wrong, after 24 hours of casual use with the new iPhone operating system, I love it. It’s fast, edges have been smoothed, and nearly every change is for the better. I have a few niggles, but on the whole, the thing is a terrific evolution, with subtle care and thinking throughout. It’s saying something that my one serious quibble so far is an aesthetic one.

But eesh, it’s an aesthetic issue that seriously hampers usability. The new OS replaces the once-black background of the iPhone home screen with an image background. The black void of yore served a useful purpose, making the app icons pop with a gemlike glow. Now the app icons have to compete with noisy background textures.

I know, I know, I’m an elitist snob, but I shudder to think at the photo and texture atrocities being inflicted on innocent handsets around the globe. Pretty much any background photo makes my melon ache. Apple anticipated this by including some new, relatively dark texture images, but even these have too much contrast.

To stop the madness (or at least prevent my own), I grabbed this dark wood texture and built a simple low-contrast wallpaper:

Feel free to use it yourself:

Looking for something a little different? Give these a spin:

• Marco Arment whipped up a low-contrast leather wallpaper
• The gang at Effektive have wallpapers for wireframe enthusiasts
• Poolga offers up a dark, cartoony number
• Geordie-Boyo at deviantart has a dark basement pegboard vibe
• Jason Kottke has a very, very, very tranquil wallpaper indeed

Tags: apple, design, graphics, ios4, iphone, wallpaper