2007 sees Sound By Design’s fifth year supplying audio services for the end-of-season fireworks at Legoland Windsor, working for SGA Productions. The system, designed by engineer Dave Shepherd, covers four distinct areas of the theme park and has been designed to both deliver the required impact for the audience, whilst minimising the disturbance to local residents on the park’s perimeter.

Over the last two years, Sound By Design has upgraded the main “Miniland” system from Meyer Sound’s M2D array to the more powerful Mica, and following a recent purchase of Meyer 700-HP subwoofers, have introduced these in to the design as well. The 700-HPs were bought fully weather-protected for this purpose as they are left outside for three weeks and would be subjected to a hammering from the elements (and birds) over this period.

This year, the whole main area was driven from a Meyer Sound Galileo 616 loudspeaker management processor, allowing one unit to process the Mica arrays, 700-HPs and various fills as well as send a stereo delayed signal 250m to the entrance of the park.

For the control of the fireworks, Dave used a PC for the pre-show music and introduced a Mackie SDR24/96 hard-disc recorder to provide playback for the story and fireworks. The Mackie provided a stable playback source that was also capable of giving separate timecode sources to the three Kimbolton firework computers that were used to trigger the display.

With four separate outdoor areas covered by audio that were all linked and time aligned together, Sound By Design introduced a new range of 8-channel multicore cable into their inventory with IP67 rated (waterproof) connectors. Seeing as some cables ran along and under train tracks in some places and up through the trees in others and could not be accessed following installation once the park was re-opened, it was crucial to have reliable infrastructure that could withstand being exposed to adverse conditions for such a period.

For the first time in servicing this event, Sound By Design were also asked to provide a stable communications system that connected the two main show areas. For this we called on the expertise of Lincoln Parkhouse at Tech Hire. The solution allowed us to have both wired and wireless fully duplex comms in areas that were in excess of 200m apart.

“The sound we had at the Legoland fireworks event this year, provided by Sound By Design for the 5th year, was their best yet. The clarity and quality was amazing and the equipment they advised us to use and provided was robust, reliable and perfect for the job, making the whole show process calm and easy. I never had any doubt the event sound would be perfect and that was down to Dave Shepherd and his team”.