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 Montreal Fireworks Forum —› 2011 Display Reviews —› Canada - BEM Feux D'artifice reviews
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Posted: Jul 23, 2011 18:55:43

Hi guys,

Please post your reviews/comments of the Canadian display here.

There are isolated pockets of showers developing from southern Ontario (some thunderstorms there) to southern Quebec, but these are dissipating rapidly as the cold front pushes farther to the South to SE. Precipitation development should cease beyond 8:00 p.m as that area of high pressure advances. The gusty westerly winds should also gradually weaken in the coming hours, and the direction should change from westerlies to West-northwesterlies (WNW) to eventually northwesterlies by this evening. North-northwesterlies (NNW) are also possible by 10:00 p.m. More details in the weather thread.

Go Canada!

Trav.


Posted: Jul 24, 2011 00:56:10

I don't have too much time to write comments, but let me at least say that this was a beautiful display put on by team Canada - certainly a contender for a Jupiter. The colors were excellent, the product quality was high (some Italian product included, too, like the farfalles and shell of shells), and the diversity of effects was excellent. Some very interesting firing angles were also present, and there was good symmetry from top to bottom and left to right. The display ended near 10:33 (Molson time), but with a nice finale to follow! The only thing that bothered me in this display was the narration in between, but the overall performance, for me, was a success. Nice job, Canada!

Glad to also see that the weather played out accordingly as forecasted, especially in terms of wind tendency.

My finale video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRCb0bmKUd0

Trav.


Posted: Jul 24, 2011 10:29:16

That was a very traditional show by BEM. Synchronization was weak for most of the time but there are parts where the synchronization was pretty good. I'm surprised that they did not take advantage of the great rhythm of the music that they chose as some of those music would probably have been great for more one shot sequences. The firing patterns they used were all quite conservative and the repetition with the fanned cakes in 3 positions became apparent throughout the whole show. There are many big notes in the end of the songs which bem missed to put fireworks on, this is like in the finale when the fireworks stopped before the music actually ended with the big note.

The quality of their products are ranging from bad to a little above average. I noticed that some of their comets did not go up well specially in one of the one shot sequences which included many silver comets with different colored heads. This said, the most memorable effects they had were the igual looking pink strobes, farfalles, and their nautical pieces which looked like tourbillions rotating in the water. It seems like they never got to fire the anticipated nautical shells that they talked about in paul's report, this must have been due to the strong winds.

The finale started well but it's too bad that it did not get more intense. Overall this was not a bad show by BEM but personally i think that it is not good enough to earn a jupiter. The theme might have been very well presented but i can not tell because i can not understand the narration but even if i understood the narration i think that it wouldn't have made a difference with my overall appreciation of the show.

Here's my grading for BEM:
Effects: 8.5/10
Synchronization: 8.5/10
Music: 8.5/10
Technical Design: 8.5/10
Pyrotechnical/pyromusical Design: 7.5/10
Overall: 41.5/50 (83%)

Ranking:
1. Australia - Howards and Sons
2. Italy - Pirotecnia Morsani
3. Czech Republic - Flash Barrandov
4. Canada - BEM Artifice
5. China - Panda Fireworks
6. England - Pyro 2000
7. U.S.A - Zambelli Fireworks

After their great show in 2004, Lacroix is finally coming back! this should be an interesting show

Vander


Posted: Jul 24, 2011 21:37:40   Edited by: fredbastien

Étant donné les deux performances antérieures de BEM Feux d'artifice à La Ronde et celles des autres concurrents en compétition cette année, mes attentes étaient modérées à l'égard de ce spectacle. J'anticipais un "très bon" spectacle, mais peut-être pas "excellent" au point de mériter un Jupiter. En bout de piste, j'ai vu à peu près ce à quoi je m'attendais: un très bon spectacle qui ne nous fait pas rougir de voir nos concitoyens en compétition, comme c'était trop souvent le cas dans les années 1990.

Les amateurs de musique classique ont été bien servis avec un second feu cette année reposant entièrement sur ce répertoire. Il faisait bon d'entendre à nouveau le Boléro de Ravel, une pièce tout à fait appropriée pour un tableau final. Contrairement à 2005, BEM n'a pas fait attendre les spectateurs une fois le décompte terminé. En fait, pour la première fois de mémoire, Michel Lacroix a amorcé son décompte en superposition aux premières notes de la trame musicale (Strauss) et la première bombe explosa au son du "UN!". La narration du récit entre Éros et Psyché est venue un peu plus tard. Celle-ci était une véritable création littéraire, fort bien écrite et lue par un acteur de talent (Raymond Bouchard) sur une intonation juste. Après le recours au même procédé en 2005, on reconnaît là une signature de BEM. Je laisse cependant le soin aux musicologues (Sébastian?) de nous dire si les opéras desquels les pièces musicales entendues étaient tirées racontaient véritablement des histoires similaires à celle narrée lors du feu. Il n'est pas clair, pour moi, que le scénario ait été véritablement traduit au plan pyrotechnique. (Sur l'histoire du Pied du Courant en 2005, la bataille entre les rouges et les bleus ne pouvait être plus claire!)

Au plan de la conception pyrotechnique, je qualifierais le feu d'un peu conservateur, ordonné, très "clean cut". Chaque chose était à sa place, arrivant dans le bon ordre et au bon endroit. Peu ou pas de faute à cet égard. L'espace a été assez bien utilisé. Les tableaux me semblaient bien construits. Contrairement à Vander, il me semble que le matériel pyrotechnique utilisé était plutôt de bonne qualité: les couleurs étaient raisonnablement diversifiées, les effets étaient bien rendus... Cependant, on ne peut pas dire qu'il était particulièrement sophistiqué, c'est-à-dire que la plupart des pièces ne produisaient qu'un seul effet, il y avait peu de pièces multibris, de bombes cylindriques, etc. Je m'attendais toutefois à voir des bombes nautiques de gros calibre, comme celles déployées en 2005. Elles ne sont pas venues. D'une manière générale, la conception pyrotechnique manquait un peu d'audace, d'originalité et de complexité. À mes yeux, c'est la principale raison pour laquelle la firme canadienne ne peut dépasser Howard & Sons et Pirotecnia Morsani.

La narration est un enjeu sensible. Aussi belle l'écriture soit-elle, sa présence, surtout en l'absence d'effets pyrotechniques, brisait le rythme de la performance. Un bris accentué par l'espacement considérable entre plusieurs pièces musicales. Il me semble que les performances continues sont davantage susceptibles d'entraîner l'auditoire dans une expérience plus captivante et divertissante. Une narration plus serrée aurait été préférable, à l'instar de l'approche adoptée par la firme française Féérie en 2007, qui racontait l'histoire de Roméo & Juliette: quelques mots à la fois suffisaient à situer le spectateur.

Pour ceux qui se préoccupent du chronomètre: 33 minutes et 55 secondes se sont écoulées entre l'éclosion des premières pièces pyrotechniques, au terme du décompte officiel, et la fin du spectacle; je compte environ 180 secondes de narration sans pyrotechnie; la durée nette du spectacle pyrotechnique a été de près de 31 minutes. Il n'y a donc pas eu d'entorse aux règles de la compétition à cet égard.

Mon classement personnel à ce jour:

1. Australie
2. Italie
3. Canada
4. Chine
5. République tchèque
6. Angleterre
7. États-Unis

Fred


Posted: Jul 24, 2011 23:37:54   Edited by: Smoke

Continued July-like weather prevailed for the Canadian team, with a few lingering cumulus cloud clusters, very warm late-evening temperatures repeated at 27-28 C, and borderline moderate-high humidity, making for more comfortable conditions for those seeking relief from the very high to extreme humidity levels experienced since July 20th. With an area of high pressure advancing from the northwest, this, consequently, put a close to the high heat and humidity advisory (unfortunately for me) that had been in place for about a half week’s time, formally establishing a prominent heat wave during this period. With a weak passing cold frontal wave over the course of the mid-afternoon hours, isolated pockets of showers developed, but, as expected, convection deteriorated completely beyond 8:00 p.m., and the air progressively had shown signs of stabilization even before that time. Wind speeds, as was the case for the United States, were gusty through the day but, as forecasted, had weakened to safer standards by evening, with occasional gusts reaching near 30 km/h and then quickly shifted to northwesterlies to North-northwesterlies (NNW).

While I thought this display was not sufficient enough to surpass both Italy and Australia, it is to my belief that it is, at this point in time, in contention for the bronze Jupiter. The theme was a complex one, being explained with narration at a few sections through the display when pivotal points occurred through the storyline (also causing the display to finish by 10:33-10:34, Molson time, or virtually 10:34, according to Fred). The nature of the theme also certainly created a very artistic design for this performance, which assisted, to some extent, in portraying its key attributes.

The general appearance of the display was good, as I thought the firing patterns from segment to segment were different in their own respective way, and the diversity of effects was high, as was the product quality, as also noted by Fred - in particular, I loved the double-ascension girandolas, and they took me by surprise when I suddenly saw them burst into stars upon completing their final ascension! Some of the effects were also intriguing and used where appropriate, most notably the horsetails, kamuros, shell of shells (I was not expecting these), and the farfalles. The low level effects were employed nicely as well, sometimes occupying all the available space, which was perhaps amplified by the breezy NNW winds. Other memorable effects include the fans of comets at low level that burst into an intricate set of colors, resembling a mixture of color on a paintaing board (around half way into the show, as well as just prior to the penultimate piece), and those nautical effects that moved erratically (I am not familiar with the name of this effect) on the lake surface were very captivating, around eight minutes into the show. I also found that the firing angles were equally interesting, especially with the cakes/z-cakes, crossed comets, mines (also the mines of screaming serpents were a good addition) and fireflies, providing the display an often wide look, although the width appeared, at times, disproportional to our right because of, again, the breezy winds. That said, the symmetry of the display from left to right (and vice versa) was good, and the balance was often well maintained from low to high level - the low-mid level fireworks were usually supportive to the high level shells, filling up the sky at all levels very well at multiple sections of the performance.

The display, for myself, was a success in its own right, but there are some negative factors that merit attention. While the overall conceptual design was good, I found that the theme was sometimes a little too complex to be effectively represented through the fireworks with a commanding appearance. Synchronization was also good but not always as distinctive as it could have been, and while there were some very interesting sequences, the note-tight synchronization was not too obvious. A few of the more successful and enjoyable pieces, in terms of sequencing, include the opening, as well as the segment that had started roughly 25 and a half minutes in.

As far as the structure of the display was concerned, every segment seemed to flow nicely from one section of the display to the other, but there were moments of redundancy in terms of certain effects, particularly with respect to some shells being relied on a little too excessively (such as the shells of white/beige at high level). The music selections were relevant, but I felt that there were a few segments that could have been a little better illustrated in accordance with the soundtrack - this is perhaps because, in part, the synchronization was not always so tight, and more activity could have been present. Although the fading period towards the conclusions of a few segments was a little too elongated (in terms of silence), the principal transitional points were elaborated nicely in this display (the narration helped with this, too), but given the theme’s characteristics, I did not feel the emotional delivery that I had previously envisioned, as compared to, say, what was witnessed with the dichotomy of Italy’s display. I was also awaiting some large calibre nautical shells, but these were not present. Finally, although it is true that the narration was necessary to convey such an intricate theme, I personally found that these pauses did take some of the enjoyability away from the display. As before, the finale was good, but I thought that the climactic point ended with insufficient intensity - it concluded, then, rather abruptly. That said, this final part of the show was nicely stretched (I timed it at roughly three minutes and twelve seconds). Some additional small observations include one or two brief periods of random silence, and a few shells had detonated early in between.

In spite of my criticisms, this was a good effort from team Canada, and, in my humble opinion, stands a fair chance for the bronze Jupiter at this point in time. With a good thematic framework, relevant soundtrack, good support at all levels of sky, and generally decent choreography, the performance receives mostly a good scoring distribution from me, although the aforementioned criticisms prevent me from placing the Canadian team beyond a bronze, given the level of complexity seen in both the Australian and Italian displays.

Let’s see what France, the final entrant, has to offer!

Trav.


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 07:54:23

It seems like they never got to fire the anticipated nautical shells that they talked about in paul's report, this must have been due to the strong winds.

Actually, they did get fired - they were the two shells of nautical tourbillons (from Grupo Luso). Would have appreciated more of these! The only other nauticals were some white strobes.

Paul.


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 08:10:34

they should have filled the lake with those! i've never seen shells like that before

Vander


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 08:13:43

they should have filled the lake with those! i've never seen shells like that before

Me neither! I was expecting further volleys of them but nothing happened

Paul.


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 19:13:42

Bonsoir

BEM une autre excellente firme du Québec a présenté un spectacle fort divertissant Samedi soir . Un bon thème assez bien exploité, une trame sonore bien faite mais pour développer leur concept j'estime qu'ils auraient du pousser un peu plus loin la recherche. J'aime le classique mais certaines pièces étaient pour moi un peu ennuyantes .
Une mise en scène assez solide , évolutive bien gérée mais comme certains l'ont déjà écrit...sans trop de surprises pour le spectateur, peu d'éléments créatifs .On a joué "safe"
Une belle qualité de pièces bien présentées , lumineuses et riches en couleurs.Bonne synchronisation.
Le lac n'a pas beaucoup été investi par les artificiers.
J'aime bien aimé la finale sur la musique du Boléro. M. Panzera devrait surement regarder cela bien assis sur une chandelle romaine .
Très bon feu classique qui selon moi ne se classera pas dans les 3 premiers.
Reste maintenant la France qui pourrait brouiller les cartes.

Mon classement

1- Italie
2-Australie
3-Chine
4- Canada
5- Angleterre
6- Etats -Unis
7- République Tchèque.

Bonne soirée à tout le monde en feu

Roger


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 20:04:24

Bonjour à tous,

Voici mes préférences à ce jour:

1. Italie
2. Australie
3. Angleterre
4. Canada
5. Chine
6. États-Unis
7. République Tchèque

J'ai hâte à mercredi soir pour voir le feu de la France....sans doute un feu basé sur l'autodérision. Bien qu'il est vrai que les Québécois appellent souvent leurs cousins "Maudits Français", il reste que c'est une preuve d'affection certaine!

Bonne semaine à tout le monde!

Pierre


Posted: Jul 25, 2011 21:12:24

My report is here: http://montreal-fireworks.com/ReportBlog/?p=474 -a good solid performance, but will be battling it out for the Bronze Jupiter - if Lacroix-Ruggieri do as well as predicted, I think BEM will not be on the podium this year.

Paul.


Posted: Aug 29, 2011 05:11:46   Edited by: Admin

Hi!
That was a very traditional show by BEM. Synchronization was weak for most of the time but there are parts where the synchronization was pretty good. I'm surprised that they did not take advantage of the great rhythm of the music that they chose as some of those music would probably have been great for more one shot sequences.
 

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