Please post your reviews of the Swiss display here!

Cheers,

Trav.

The 32nd edition of the Montreal International Fireworks Competition took a turn tonight, both in terms of attendance and quality of the performance, with the first of the “3S” contestants (Switzerland, Spain, Sweden). For its second appearance in Montreal, Sugyp did an excellent pyromusical show, one of the funniest since a long time. The Swiss team - a crew of seven pyros including three women - powered this edition of the competition up to the world-renowned “Montreal standard”.

I have to say that I have been amazed by the capacity of Sugyp designers to achieve a significant departure from their debut display. The title of their new show, E-motions, had multiple layers. First, it evoked a range of emotions : happiness and joys, love, sadness, and even dramatic suspense. Second, the emphasized “E-” refered to the digital ways to express emotions through emoticons. Before the show, I also thought about a third potential layer, the world of “motions”. In 2012, their debut display Aérofolies told the story of aerospace, with a set-up plane moving on the lake, a shuttle launch and an unforgetable remotely-controled “helicopter” flying above the lake, displaying gerbs, stars and even a couple of mines. While it was not awarded by a Jupiter, it is a show that people still talk about (click here for reviews of Aérofolies). I hoped for a similar device this year, possibly with drones, which are increasingly used in mass entertainment, including in some fireworks shows. It was not the case. However, as soon as E-motions began, I forgot about it and I was totally fascinated by this brand new show.

There was a complex setup, with a huge number of shapes made of lances along the third ramp, and flame projectors on the fifth ramp, once again located very close to the audience. In contrast with the Canadian team, Sugyp used another device which allowed for multiple angles of flame shooting. The projectors shot note-synchronized flames during two serene segments, River Flows in You and The Tale of Viktor Navorski. The former began with these flames, then flares, fountains, and gerbs appeared on the third ramp as flames continued, thus creating a great depth effect. The latter segment was more enigmatic, and question-mark-shaped and exclamation-shaped lances appeared in background. Flames and lances continued as falls and horsetails burst above. There are different schools of thought regarding the use of flame projectors in this competition. Personally, I thought they were interesting effects and we should emphasize that other pyrotechnic products were added after a short period of time, so these were not “flame only”.





It is not a surprise that many emoticons appeared through shaped lances. The finale began with heart- and rosette-shaped lances (i.e., love Montreal), a veiled reference to their 2012 show (where these shapes were made with the flying helicopter). I was concerned about these devices since I read, in Paul’s interview, how many of these had been crafted for the show, and in Travis’ forecast, the weak speed of wind. These devices often produce a lot of smoke. Fortunately, it was not the case with these ones. That being said, I have been more surprised to see many other emoticons made of sequences of vertically launched stars, the highest points of each emoticon being shooted first. That particular design was similar to the one introduced by Jubilee Fireworks in 2015 (England, Gold Jupiter winner) during their Love Me Like You Do segment, where a heart then appeared a couple of times. In Sugyp show, we thus saw a giant heart, smiley and sad faces, as well as a smiley heart and something else which seems to be an exclamation mark made of blue stars.

While the colours were not as vivid as in the Chilean display, the Swiss entrant had good quality products and some innovative effects, especially what appeared to me as mouse-shaped shells. I saw countless fireworks shows at WDW and never saw a Mickey Mouse-shaped shell there, but I could see it in Montreal from a Swiss team! (However, the shape of these shells was not crystal clear, other people thought they were cats. I guess that an American psychologist who was sat close to me could conduct a perceptual study on this. ) The arsenal also included cylindrical shells of white comets, studatas, bright electric comets, and a good quantity of large shells (presumably 12 inches). On the music of Misirlou, I loved some shells of stars which were sequentially ignitated, as well as the sustainable barrage of HUGE nautical shells of comets (maybe some with a go-getter style).

In addition to some complex segments introduced by the flame projectors described above, many other parts of the display made the most of the firing area and featured interesting blend of effects. For instance, the penultimate segment began with cakes horizontally shooting purple and green stars over the lake, then combined to other cakes vertically shooting similar stars. The green and purple pattern continued with meteor-headed comets and shells. Then, we saw a rare shell of very dense gold comets with a bright blue pistil, followed by fast chasing sequences of comets along the firing ramps. That segment was as intense as a finale, but it was only the penultimate part. The actual finale featured a 180-degree cake of stars on the 4th ramp, complemented by two 90-degree cakes on each side of the firing area. Synchronized shells were followed by a long barrage of silver effects (shells of comets, mines, nautical shells, salutes) at all levels.

The synchronization was flawless through the show. The soundtrack was very interesting. While it was a traditional soundtrack with 16 segments without particular mixing, it featured a good balance between powerful and serene parts. The musical line-up was also diverse, including movie soundtracks, songs, classical musics and children-style sounds.

Minor criticisms may include the repetition of smiley faces and some minor technical problems, some of them being so small that I am sure that most people in the audience didn’t see them (e.g., I am not sure that all projectors properly worked during the initial flame segment ; Paul’s interview also announced that some structures with lances were going to move, which was not the case).

That being said, it was a fabulous display. Sugyp’s 2012 performance became famous owing to the plane and the flying helicopter which shot fireworks, but the remaining of the pyromusical performance was not as great as the one we saw tonight. At this stage of the competition, Sugyp is a strong contender for a Jupiter. This is the one to beat.

My ranking so far :

1. Sugyp (Switzerland)
2. Pirotecnia SPA (Chile)
3. Big Bang Fireworks (Canada)

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That was apparently a busy day on Sainte-Hélène island, thanks to a multicultural festival and the fireworks competition. Next to the Jean-Drapeau metro station, the bus driver advised people to walk up to La Ronde instead of using the transportation system, because traffic would cause a delay of almost 30 minutes, whereas La Ronde entrance is a 10- to 15-minute walk from the metro station. Indeed, the Macdonald road was jammed.



Once arrived at La Ronde entrance, it took 25 minutes to go through the check point and the turnstiles. Then, there were long queue lines for most attractions and food services I walked by. It was fortunate that I entered the grandstands early as some ticket holders had issues to reach the entrance as the midway was also crowded. One well-known person in this forum sat at 9:56pm!

We were fortunate to keep a good view on the fireworks display. While the westerlies oriented the smoke toward the audience, the velocity was good enough to clear the view through the show. I also imagine that non-smokey products and serene segments did help.

Fred

I agree with review of fredbastien. But, I have reason, it was not a mouse, it was a cat. this is the emoji that we saw in the sky: 😺 . ;-) Ears of mouse are different: 🐭

It was a fabulous display with good and interesting music segments. The synchronizing was very good and I saw new big pieces that I never saw.

During the show, I saw a light of laser in smoke of fireworks. It was probably from Jacques-Cartier's bridge.

My ranking is the same that fredbastien: Switzerland, Chile and Canada.

My report on this excellent display: http://montreal-fireworks.com/ReportBlog/?p=1174

My current rankings agree with Fred and Julien!

Paul.

Bob's video is up too now: http://burchcom.com/2016/164swiss.html

Paul.

Significantly more stable weather made an appearance for one of the most highly anticipated displays of the 2016 edition of the Montreal fireworks competition. Maximum temperatures of 24 C were observed through the mid-afternoon hours, and falling to 22-23 C by mid- to late-evening (22 C during the display) under borderline moderate to high humidity. Winds were somewhat breezy during the morning to early-afternoon period but became light to eventually very light in time for the display. Because the wind speeds were so light to occasionally calm into the late-evening, the directional tendencies were extremely variable from one location to another. From our vantage point, on Notre-Dame street, the flags were down most of the time (reminiscent of Hong Kong/China 2015), but whenever they were up, they appeared to be pointing in a SSW direction, suggesting that the smoke (at least from low- to mid-level effects) would be blowing mostly to La Ronde’s right to extreme right hand sections of the La Ronde audience. However, as both Fred and Paul previously noted, the smoke was pushed more directly towards the La Ronde audience, suggesting the presence of more westerlies closer to the park. I also saw someone in front of me smoking occasionally during the display, and the smoke drifted to my left, suggesting more local SSW winds. In all cases, though the wind was very light to calm, the smoke from the fireworks appeared near-stagnant! Here is a photo that I took of the persistently drooped flag on the building just behind us:

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b132/Rain12/DSC_1299.jpg

Luckily, as again noted by both Fred and Paul in their reports, more serene sections during the display combined with the overall choice of pyrotechnical material did not allow for too many opportunities for smoke to accumulate. I also believe that, unlike Hong Kong/China 2015, the lack of higher amounts of humidity helped to not lead to larger amounts of smoke buildup. During the final half of the display (but mostly the final third), however, we noticed the smoke drifting a little more to our left (La Ronde’s right).

Overall, this was a fabulously crafted performance delivered by the returning Swiss team! Although a very different design from their 2012 entry, I found this show to somehow be more enjoyable and moving, even with the absence of the key elements that comprised the 2012 display (such as the pyroplane). I thought synchronization was virtually flawless during the show, and the quality of the products was superb. The synchronization itself was also quite intricate most of the time and really defined a lot of the soundtrack used. I particularly loved the low-level sequencing of yellow flares (fired in angles that make up a fan). The firing angles themselves were very stunning and really, once again, highlighted some of the songs particularly well – this was already made evident once the enticing opening segment began (best opening/start of any display so far this year, in my mind) with flares of red, and rapidly sequenced angled gerbs and candles, terminating with a spectacular smiley face! . One of the most mesmerizing segments, and my personal favorite part of the display, was the one that was only salutes-based! That was a very energetic and loud section, and it seemed like it wouldn’t end! Roars and cheers of delight followed this particular piece! Another VERY definitive part of the display was when those massive nautical shells erupted, producing vivid thunderous echoes (especially off the bridge)! I thought that “Beautiful Creatures” offered some of the best choreography experienced so far this year, especially considering that the way mines literally looked like they were dancing with the drums in the music!

Although I did not really enjoy some of the musical selections, most of them were audibly pleasing and were suitable to establish the correct emotional feel of the display, which, I would imagine, is mostly the purpose the designated theme. Indeed, I did feel emotionally tied to this display, at times, but I thought that this was most notably achieved from “Beautiful Creatures” to “River Flows In You”. Once again, the one-shots in “River Flows in You” in conjunction with the piano heard in that particular song was extremely well done, and I felt a distinct emotional link to the display during this point. The overall pyromusical design was superb, and very effective use was made of the firing site (great vertical and horizontal depth), and symmetry was very often sustained, given the complexity of some sections! The formation of various facial expressions to terminate various segments was breathtaking and really captivated the audience. The various smiling-face shells were neat (as always), and the apparent Mickey Mouse-patterned shells were neat, too, although, to be honest, I thought they there neither Mickey Mouse or cat-shaped shells but rather seemed like bunny rabbits (they still do, as I re-watch them)! The very low-angle shots of colorful stars that formed a sort of carpeting along the lake also was very appealing (at nearly four minutes remaining in the display). The bursts of stars above ramp five, just before the finale, were also nice, and the way this eventually became supported on the left and right with similar bursts was very engaging.

My more negative points about the display are few and mostly minor. I think the somewhat bigger issue for me was the lack of a richer and more brilliant overall color selection. Perhaps due to the smoke build up, some of the dimmer colors tended to drown away quickly, notably the light blue and light brown combinations. There were also a couple of segments that I thought could have also been better represented through the pyrotechnics, and the theme, while understood, seemed to be a little vague, at times, through a selected few songs. Some of the firing patterns with the shells were a touch redundant, While the finale was intense, it seemed to be somewhat eclipsed by previous segments (notably the salute-based segment), and I would have liked to see more color. Finally, I am also not too certain about the nature of the fireworks that went off around 9:59 p.m. (not a criticism).

All in all, a fantastic display that really captivated the hearts of the large audience! The display was well choreographed and showed great complexity. Definitely in contention for an award this year, and I am glad that the smoke did not ruin the performance!

Trav.

During the show, I saw a light of laser in smoke of fireworks. It was probably from Jacques-Cartier's bridge.

Yes, we observed this, too. I noticed the first occurrence after the initial salute was fired, at 9:24-9:25 p.m. Once the near-stationary smoke built from it, we saw this tinted green laser light up a section of the smoke.

Trav.

Indeed, I am late with posting my footage for this display, but here it is (video description provided):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0k-KvoIVhxo

I will try to have the remaining videos up as soon as possible! I very much miss Summer!

Trav.