If you could design cakes any way you wanted, what would you do? Below are a few ideas I had, all 200g because...I don't know. I guess I was in 200g mode. And partially to make 200g more like 500g cakes, with nicer effects and more variety.
[Update: I have been told that 4th Of July Spectacular and Home On The Range (and perhaps others) are 350g cakes, not 200g, which changes things a bit. I certainly wouldn't be against using350g, though it would raise costs a bit, potentially to the point where you wouldn't have much advantage over 500g in terms of price. Even so, I'd still like to see these cake designs in a 200g version, I think they could still be pretty cool.]
First are big-bore 200g cakes, specifically 9-shot ones. There are a few 7-shot cakes by Brothers such as Home on the Range (vid), Scarecrow, and Attack, Kellners exlcusives like Las Vegas Nights (vid), Yahoo, and Sudden Storm. Tail Gator (Boomer, vid) is an 8-shot and Beihai's 4th Of July Specatular (vid) is an old standby. Seven or 8 shots is too few to really be cost effective, but 9 I think is a good compromise between shot count and larger 500g-type breaks. Part of the problem is many of those mentioned above have a wooden base and are then packed only six to a case, which makes them pretty expensive. I think with 9-shots you could make them sturdy enough to not need a base, allowing them to be packed 8 to a case. The shells would likely be 1.5" spherical for nice symmetrical breaks. Anyway, here are a couple ideas I had.
[Damn I'm good with MS Paint. Oh, I forgot, I'm not this guy after all.]
#1 - The first shot would be colored glitter with a palm pistil, like the main breaks in Cold Fusion (Megabanger, vid). The second shot would be a colored chrysanthemum like those in New Dimension (Golden Bear, vid). Third would be a color palm to crackle, like the first shots in Gamma Glow (Brothers, vid), but fewer and thicker palms. This patter would then repeat with new colors for the next three shots (4-6). The last three shots would be fanned out and fired all at once, with drooping gold willows like the ones in the original Baby Boomers (Brothers, vid).
#2 - This one is meant to be less pretty and more noisy. The first shot would be a multi-color peony with crackle like in the 4th Of July Spectacular video above, then a multi-color chryanthemum. This would repeat with new colors for shots 3-4. Shots 5 and 6 would be crackling flowers like in the new version of Baby Boomers (Brothers, vid). The last three shots would be fanned and fired all at once, all with popcorn crackle breaks like the other half of Baby Boomers.
The other two designs are for higher shot count 200g cakes which make more use of angles. I tend to be of the opinion that more angles are better, and I'd love to see cakes Wild West (Brothers, vid) or City Crasher (Pyro King, vid) remade to fire at angles. [Update! Somebody just posted a video on PyroReview of the Dominator Cake 5x5, which has exactly the effect I'm talking about. Vid here]
This one is sort of a hybrid of Fireworks Fiesta (Winco, vid) and City Crasher. The first two rows fire the same tailed color stars as FF left to right in about 7 seconds, basically just speeding up FF a bit. Then the three shells fire one at a time at angles, each a different color chrysanthemum. This repeats for the rest of the cake, then the last five shots fire all at once, three white chrysanthemums and two crakle.
Well that's it for now, tune in next week for more fun.
Not really, I'm just making stupid titles and posting a couple things that I've been meaning to get up for a while. One of those things was an "Armed Forces Tribute" by the Crackerjacks at a recent shoot, but the video won't play correctly in Windows Movie Maker (yeah I'm ghetto and poor and don't have anything better) to cut out the clip. There are some cool mine to scrambling comet effects I wanted to show and another fun thing (that is indeed intentional, you'll see what I mean when you watch the movie) that happens about 2:30 into the show. Anyway, click here for the full 5min/40MB file.
Anyway, Malta, the small island south of Sicily, is well known in the pyro world for fireworks, with their two specialties being large multibreak cylindrical shells and irdieden, basicallly moving set pieces (how's that for an oxymoron?).
The picture above is obviously from Freakpyromaniacs (but I found it hosted on a Maltese fireworks company site), so give them some love, even if the site is mostly in Dutch and they have a silly name. If only I spoke Dutch...
Fireworks are very important in Maltese culture, and are used for religous festivals as well as general celebration. They have annual fireworks festivals as well as companies that do shows and competitions all over the world. Wikipedia has a bit on Maltese fireworks here.
Shells like the one above have some rather distinctive breaks because of the cylindrical design rather than ball/spherical shells, resulting in breaks that often look more like a flower than a sphere of color most people are used to seeing. This effect can then be played on using different types (both color and effect) of stars to create effects like the one above. Another common shell effect is basically a ring shell with colored salutes (called "beraq"). The pictures below show some large multibreak shells and a shell under construction, filled with beraq.
The other part of Maltese fireworks tradition is the irdieden. They are made on frames that move with gears and motors, then covered in various colored lances. The frames can be made in various shapes and move in many different ways, resembling flowers, spinning balls, and other patterns. It is a very cool effect, though not one suitable for large crowds the way shells are. The pictures below show one in the day and one in action at night
Looking at Wikipedi a a little more, I found this video linked to, showing Mexican "Castillos de Torre" (Castles of Fire), which are basically the same thing. the ones in the video are even larger and more elaborate than the Maltese ones I've seen!
It must be noted that all the above photos come from Malta Fireworks, so I suggest you check out the site for more info and a lot more pictures. The irdieden video below also comes from their site.
These clips of shells come from this site. "Colourful Variations part 1" is mostly beraq shells and gets old pretty fast, "part 2" has many more shells and is certainly worth watching.
More Malta videos can be found at FPM, I'll post links later...
Less precisely timed effects can be done quite easily with 1.4g candles, here is a clip of crossing with 288 Comet Over America (Golden Bear) candles. I would have spread them out a bit more, but it looks great!
Girandolas are a rather rare type of firework due to the complicated nature of the manufacture. They are basically a flying horizontal wheel, that rises and spins at the same time. A basic diagram can be found at the bottom of this page.
This video is a single girandola from one of the US masters, Tom Perigrin, well known for his book on girandolas and his excellent book for beginners in pyrotechnics, Introductory Practical Pyrotechnics.
Now imagine 85 at once, all whistling to peony breaks (sure, nice thick charcoal/glitter tails are better, but whatever). Here is the description from the guy that put it together (comment copied from his post on Pyro Review):
"I'm the "respected member" who put that flight together. It was a blast to do, and I thank all of those who helped out. The girandolas were from a cake called "Flying Saucer", and about 75% of them had been broken in transit from China. We repaired them and flew them all at once. Yes, there really were 85 of them! Thanks so much for posting this video - I saw the flight from a very different angle - I'm the spot of white light in the first part of the video...."
Video here!
Falling leaves are a wonderful and elegant effect in pyrotechnics that are great for a slow, quiet segment. Unfortunately most times I've seen it done, they only put up a few at a time and the effect is a little underwhelming. Here is one of the best examples I've ever seen, the red followed by the sudden burst of blue and green is perfect, and if you are going to do it, do it right!
First of all, Vox sucks at integrating YouTube videos into posts. Instead of using the URL of a video you already have, you have to search for it through the Vox thing. If you can't find it, too bad. You should just be able to embed the player...
Anyway. On to the stupidity.
This kid deserved it. Hopefully he can't reproduce...
"Do Not Hold In Hand"
The classic Butt Rocket. Most people just use bottle rockets. Luckily(for us) this idiot used something bigger.
They just keep going...
As a side note, I love seeing Ebaums videos hosted on YouTube. Ebaum just steals shit from other sites and sticks their name on it, so it's nice to see stuff taken from them and used elsewhere so they can't benefit...
But what can be done? The thing is, there are a lot of stupid people in the world and you can't stop all of them. But here is my idea. Make all 1.4g fireworks legal at the state level (you couldn't get every county to lift their restrictions) but create a better permit system for buying. In order to buy 1.4g, you should have to be over 18 years old and attend a training course. After passing a short test, you would get your permit that you must show to purchase fireworks.
It would solve a lot of problems, but never really work because most people buy only once a year and would not make the effort to get a permit, basically killing most fireworks businesses. At this point the best bet is just to find a fireworks friendly state or a tribal reservation...
I copied this article from PyroPlanet.com, so click here for the original... (emphasis and links in the original) And yeah, I know this post is really long, but I haven't found out how to do a cut...
Dear Winterblast membersI would like to open a short discussion regarding the direction I believe the fireworks industry in the United States appears to be heading. First I would like to acknowledge that many of you have been in this industry much longer than I, and I am by far no expert on these matters. Therefore I welcome and hope to gain from the responses to my comments from those in the club whom have been in this industry and "seen it all".As some of you may know I represent La Rosa from Sicily here in the US and I sell exotic fireworks from Japan and Europe (and some Chinese). As I have expanded into many parts of the US, I deal with, sell to, and see displays from a lot of companies here. What I am finding throughout the country are responses that are similar everywhere I travel. That response, and I quote from companies, is the same: "we have to use the cheaper product to compete around our area". Now I find that when they say "cheaper", they really mean it. So many companies seem to think in these terms. Another term I hear is: "the general public does not know the difference".It is my opinion that these views are flawed and opposite of the truth. As I view displays they all seem to appear the same anymore. It seems as though you can go to any club display setting and see five displays in a given week and the only difference (with a few exceptions of mine and comet use) is one may have a lot more product than the other, or one or two scenes may be applied in a different way, and here comes 1000 salutes then the end. Generally, if you have seen one, you have seen them all. I see the same in big public displays as well. The art has escaped us.I want to tell you that the general public notices this as well, especially after they have seen a really great show. I have personally proven this theory time and time again. And I am NOT the only one out there proving this. Some of the more successful companies out there that have been around a long time know this and do the same. What I have noticed is that those companies that only apply average product to there shows do not grow outside of their "back yard" without a lot of expensive marketing. The truth of the matter is that most entities purchasing displays can buy what I call a "Liuyang City" fireworks display usually within a three hour radius of there location. So the only way companies seen to think they can compete is price wars. This is destroying our industry folks!!!!! This causes a company to use twice the product needed, twice the equipment, twice the man power, and have TWICE the risk exposure. And no one really makes a profit. Anywhere I travel I see the same thing. Companies that work with this train of thought end up back biting each other constantly and in financial trouble in five years or barely making it. But, those companies that refuse to turn to 100% average product do very well. In Europe, Parente' from Italy, Caballer from Spain, and La Rosa from Italy work displays around the world. You simply do not hear of these companies bad mouthing each other and their displays are fabulous!!!!!!! The same could be said here in the US about Rozzi fireworks, one of the few remaining American manufacturers and they recently took second place in the Montreal competitions.In closing, I was recently in Germany at the international symposium. Parente' displayed a show on the closing night and were followed by a show using inexpensive low quality product, but twice the amount. Each display was 10 minutes. The thousands of public attendees walked away in amazement and awe of the Parente' display and I doubt they can even tell you the name of the other company. You could have walked up to any public attendee there and stated " the first show had 1000 shells, the second had 2000, which show would you choose for your city display"? The response would have been "I don't even remember the second display"!! So I challenge all of you to give the "high quality" concept a try. Do your homework and get out there and look for that extra special product to buy. Produce a few shows with that product and see where it takes you.Sincerely,
While this is mostly true, and I wholeheartedly applaud attempts to improve the quality and artistry in US fireworks displays, you can't take it too far or you run into another problem. This letter is from a letter to a paper (I think, maybe wrong becasue I can't find the original) about the PGI Grand Finale at the 2006 convention. Here is the thread it was posted in, with a lot of additional discussion, background adn elaboration, since I can't find the original (emphasis mine this time).
Tom Handel column: Thanks for feedback on fireworks finaleDear citizens of the Fox Cities and surrounding area,
Thank you for taking the time to write and otherwise communicate with us and provide us with feedback on your visit with the PGI at the Wisconsin International Raceway in Kaukauna last Friday night.
I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say that we’re sincerely sorry that some of you were disappointed in the fireworks display that evening.
I believe that the sentiments you have expressed are shared by many who we have not heard from. I also believe that you have done us a service by pointing out errors in our ways and thereby providing us with an opportunity for correction.
I cannot now change Friday evening’s display, but I would like to take this opportunity to explain to you why and how I believe we failed to meet your expectations.
First of all, we did ourselves no favors and pretty much guaranteed we’d disappoint at least some of you by not informing the media of scheduling changes that occurred after our published schedules were printed. Indeed, our own members were not made adequately aware of these, compounding the problem. The media, in turn, did its job well and, relying on our printed schedule and interviews with our members, reported accordingly.
Had we done a better job of public relations, you would not have been set up quite so much for a disappointment. We have learned an important lesson from this.
There is another issue that deserves some comment, and it has to do with the display itself. To do this justice, I have to provide a little background.
Fireworks displays are always a trade-off between quality and quantity. Given a fixed budget, one can buy a relatively large number of low-quality shells or a relatively small number of high-quality shells. For example, it’s just like buying wine. On a fixed budget, you can have a lot of “box wine” or a much smaller amount of a fine vintage.
Those who buy most fireworks displays generally understand that they aren’t experts in quality as a metric of a display, but they all know they can count shells. Thus, most of the displays that most members of the general public see, such as your hometown July 4 display or the one you see after the minor-league baseball game, lean heavily toward “quantity” — typically a display with a relatively large number of cheaper, relatively low-quality shells fired quickly and on top of one another to disguise their shortcomings in the quality department by distracting you with sheer firepower.
This type of display is so common that it naturally shapes the expectations of most people for what they’re going to see when they go to a “fireworks display.”
With this kind of display, to both the buyer and the audience, “better” comes to mean “longer,” “faster” or “louder,” or some combination of the three.
There’s nothing wrong with this kind of display. Fireworks people like this kind of display, too. But, as connoisseurs of the art who are versed in quality, they also have an appreciation for other, different kinds of displays.
Friday night’s display was of such an entirely different type. It strongly favored quality over quantity. It involved a smaller number of considerably more expensive, much higher-quality fireworks (rarely seen outside venues such as the PGI), shot at a pace that allowed their exceptional beauty to be appreciated, and choreographed with consummate taste and artistry to complementary music.
Because it was this “different” type of display, it didn’t meet the “long” or “fast” or “loud” criteria for being “better” in the eyes of the public audience.
We in the Guild knew going in that Friday’s show would be this kind of display and indeed chose it precisely for that reason. The provider of the display, Aaron Mayfield and AM Pyro of Buffalo, Mo., is in no way responsible for your disappointment. Aaron provided exactly what we asked him to, and spectacularly exceeded our expectations.
Your comments, however, help point out that we in the Guild may have made a scheduling mistake. We would perhaps have been better advised to choose a more conventional — longer, faster, louder — presentation for our Grand Public Display, saving the one you saw for a night less well attended by the public. We will certainly consider this lesson in the future.
Thank you again for your feedback — it’s very useful to us — and, again, I regret that some of you were disappointed. I hope this explanation helps at least a little.
Tom Handel is the first vice president of the Pyrotechnics Guild International. He can be reached at pcletters@postcrescent.com.
I have only gotten around to watching the video of the display once (I should watch it again for a reminder, but I have too many other videos still unseen!), but there is certainly a lot of truth to this which counters the first letter a bit. I also find the backhanded apology part that I bolded rather amusing. The quality of the shells used were top notch and they did some amazing things. The biggest problem, that would have avoided some of this mess, was there was essentially no finale to the show, it just ended with a small salute barrage. If you do a nice big finale with cheaper shells, you can satisfy a good part of the crowd and do whatever you want the rest of the time (for the most part). The format of the show was basically: volley of similar shells, pause. volley of similar shells, pause. It worked great for showcasing each effect, but moved a little slow for the general public that showed up and didn't necessarily feel as coherent as it could have been.
Video of the display in four clips: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 (.avi files, each about 40MB)
So basically, the battle of quality vs. quantity continues. Part of the problem is that we don't have enough fireworks in this country! Now I would say this anyway, because I obviously like fireworks, but it is relevant here because if people only see a large display once a year (Independence Day, some on New Years), they don't have much for comparrison. As a result, there is less understanding of the art and less demand for it. This is of course reinforced by US junk food/fast food/reality television culture. A quality show takes work and often more money (although there are certainly many improvements to be made in show design independent of cost), so it becomes hard to put on a show that isn't just a bunch of cheap shells all thrown up at once. Because fireworks in this country are so seasonal, I don't see this changing much, but perhaps the larger display companies can step up and make more of an effort. With any luck, the public will notice and it will be good for business.
This happened a while ago (Oct 7), but I never got around to posting about it. At PyroU we organized a little get-together for those in the WA area, hosted by bcfireworks1, who owns a stand up near Ferndale with a lot of good product. Because we were on a tribal reservation, we were under Federal instead of State law, making all our fireworks fun perfectly legal. It's nice not to have to worry about that sometimes... PyroU members got good deals on stuff, which is certainly appreciated because retail stand prices are high! Click the pictures for a larger view. I don't know why it puts such large spaces between pictures, it's kind of annoying.
Outside view of bcfireworks1/Steve's stand.
My brother came along and we drove up from Portland, stopping in Seattle to get my gear (shell racks, plywood, ignition supplies). Driving time was about 5 hours total, but it was worth it!
Click here for videos of my board (three combined clips, I don't have the whole thing) misslinglink's Excal rack, and the big show.
I was very happy with my first board. The whistles in Hardway were a bit annoying, but those cakes were really just filler anyway. The willow section came out nicely, even if there was a bit of overlap with the earlier group of cakes. The finale of my board worked perfectly, made a lot of noise, and filled more sky than I expected.
My reaction to the box of Excals I fired was a bit mixed. The lifts are extremely loud, as are most of the breaks. One the effects side (the most important part) however, I felt about half were nice while half were decent, and some were fairly unimpressive. I would have liked to film every shell for review, but didn't have the space on my camera. Overall they are still good shells, especially for a finale because of the noise, but I wouldn't use most of them for standout effects shells.
As for Lamrith and rapidshot, they definetly put on a good show. They had a lot of good stuff and it was intense, but I felt it was a littl too fast and chaotic. They typically had two or three different things going at a time with different effects, making it harder for any one thing to stand out. Big Troops (Golden Bear, vid) and the Critical Acclaims (World Class, vid) were certainly noteable and visible, but much of it was hard to differentiate and didn't feel very planned out. I take my cues from some of the better (in my opinion) professional shows and think of designing a show in terms of distinct segments, which they didn't really seem to to. Despite this point, it was still very cool to watch.
Finally, I even took a few things home with me!
So that's it for now. An extremely long post, but at least it has pictures and videos! Future posts will include plans for my stash, dream show designs, show design discussions, and sweet clips from both pro shows and the 1.4g/consumer/class C world...
My highly mature (hey, I was caught up in the moment) celebration of the Republican defeat in the 2006 midterm elections... The word at the start was my giving the name of the cakes (two Great Grizzly Under Fire) that I meant to edit out and missed part, I'm too lazy to go back and fix it.
Here is a little welcome video from the 2006 PGI convention. This clip is the end of a short but intense show from John Sagaria and set to a song by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Be sure your speakers are turned up to hear the music...
I will continue to post video clips and fireworks related rambling and inspiration, time, and bandwidth limits (I can only upload 50MB per month, weak...) allow. I haven't decided how to handle cross-posting and public/private issues with this and my existing LJ account.
