Oh the black bars will be gone, it'll be 100% coverage. It's a known issue on this tablet that I just resolved.
There wasn't a deep process behind that design choice. I tried sold colors, subtle gradients, strong gradients, and none felt right. I also couldn't find a single color pallet that I liked and was generally uninspired. I have a similar wallpaper on my desktop (it cycles through a folder of wallpaper) and I saw it and thought it might work. It was different and colorful enough to be unlimited in the possibilities. I was originally just going to use it for he top bars but put it on the homepage and liked it. I have designed so many beige and blue or muted primary colors lately and I wanted to stay as far away from that as possible This whole time I'm taking graphic design and they're all questioning motivations and process and all that bs. Sometimes you just like something and move onto the next one
I won't annoy you with process motivations, that wasn't my intention. But maybe this color palette from today's Design seeds will help? I think they would fit with the current wallpaper. http://design-seeds.com/index.php/home/entry/mental-vacation...