Music Source Location

[Deanbc]

Can anyone give me some advice, guidance or opinions on where to place my music speaker for my show. This will be the first time I am adding music and I would like to know the best location to locate my speaker in relationship to my audience and the fireworks. Would it be best for the speaker to be in front of the fireworks, projecting towards the audience? Behind the audience or off to one side?
Any suggestions?
Thanks

[PyroJoeNEPA]

In front of the fireworks, facing the audience & not too close to the people so they don't get "hit in the face" with the sound [assuming your sound system is capable of that]. A little more info would be helpful---how large is your shoot site--how wide will your fronts be spread out, how large is your audience, is it 1.4, 1.3 or a mixture, what do you have for a sound system?

[PGH_Pyro]

in front of and all around spectators if you have the resources/cash to have that many speakers... immersive 3-D sound that wouldn't be as washed out from the pyro as a single speaker will be...

[Deanbc]

Thank you I will be using an Ion Explorer Outback 100 watt speaker. The site is about 30 acres. I’ll be shooting 1.4 product and we will have 50-75 people. The fronts will be spread at the wides5 point about 150-170 feet.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

In front of the fireworks, facing the audience & not too close to the people so they don't get "hit in the face" with the sound [assuming your sound system is capable of that]. A little more info would be helpful---how large is your shoot site--how wide will your fronts be spread out, how large is your audience, is it 1.4, 1.3 or a mixture, what do you have for a sound system?

Joe - At 1100W I'm assuming the system you spec'd out for me is capable of hitting them in the face. As such, how far away from the audience should I place the speakers? Will 20-30' be too far or not far enough?

[PyroJoeNEPA]

Thank you I will be using an Ion Explorer Outback 100 watt speaker. The site is about 30 acres. I’ll be shooting 1.4 product and we will have 50-75 people. The fronts will be spread at the wides5 point about 150-170 feet.

I looked up the tech specs on your speaker. Just like with fireworks, manufacturers use a lot of "sales hype" to make their product sound better than it is. Your speaker is going to be on the light side when it comes to providing music for you. Here is a little explanation of what "peak power" vs "RMS" power is--
Mean power, or root mean square (RMS) power handling, refers to how much continuous power the speaker can handle. ...
For example, a speaker with a 50W RMS rating but a peak rating of 100W means that speaker can comfortably run with
50 watts of continuous power, with occasional bursts of up to 100W.
Given the area of your shoot site I would recommend you take your speaker out there [now--not when it is show time] and run some music through it and walk the area. You are going to find it does not cover very well--an 8" speaker just can't give you the sound you will need: Depending on the type of music you are playing you will see a vast difference in reproduction quality--acoustic or classical musical will be reproduced much better than classic rock & metal or rap will be a distorted mess when you try to get some volume out of it.
Placing the speaker [since you only have one] dead center in front of the audience would most likely give you the best coverage for what you have to work with.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you can only get "so much" out of a system....that is determined by the system specs & design parameters.
I suggested you try tiso out now so you have time to explore other oprions for your sound source. If you think it will work out for you, then great. If not, you have some time to formulate an "option B" plan.
Good luck & let me know how you make out.

[PyroJoeNEPA]

Joe - At 1100W I'm assuming the system you spec'd out for me is capable of hitting them in the face. As such, how far away from the audience should I place the speakers? Will 20-30' be too far or not far enough?

HaHa--you not only can hit them in the face, you can rip their faces off! 20-30 feet is not too far. The farther back you go the better the music will spread across the listening area...but as you go farther back you have turn up the volume to compensate for the distance. You do want to get the speakers up in the air to where the horn is at least at head level --or slightly above--the audience.

[Deanbc]

Great feedback, I’ll do a trial run.
Thanks

[Rick_In_Tampa]

HaHa--you not only can hit them in the face, you can rip their faces off! 20-30 feet is not too far. The farther back you go the better the music will spread across the listening area...but as you go farther back you have turn up the volume to compensate for the distance. You do want to get the speakers up in the air to where the horn is at least at head level --or slightly above--the audience.

Joe - For whatever reason I didn't see your reply until just now. Grrr... Thanks for the feedback. I've been pondering a few options for the speakers. I'm concerned about putting them where people will be walking prior to the show and tripping over the extension cords and ripping everything apart. So my thought was to place them just outside of my neighbors house, facing the audience. My neighbor will be supplying the power for the audio system. That setup is depicted by the yellow boxes on the attached drawing. The preferred option would be down in the retention pond (my shoot site) facing the audience (depicted by the purple boxes). But that would require a long run of extension cords and it presents a tripping hazard as there will be many people walking back and forth in that area during the show setup and certainly afterwards. So I'm hesitant to put them down there. What do you think??

2947

[PyroJoeNEPA]

Joe - For whatever reason I didn't see your reply until just now. Grrr... Thanks for the feedback. I've been pondering a few options for the speakers. I'm concerned about putting them where people will be walking prior to the show and tripping over the extension cords and ripping everything apart. So my thought was to place them just outside of my neighbors house, facing the audience. My neighbor will be supplying the power for the audio system. That setup is depicted by the yellow boxes on the attached drawing. The preferred option would be down in the retention pond (my shoot site) facing the audience (depicted by the purple boxes). But that would require a long run of extension cords and it presents a tripping hazard as there will be many people walking back and forth in that area during the show setup and certainly afterwards. So I'm hesitant to put them down there. What do you think??

http://www.pyrotalk.com/bulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=2947&stc=1

Rick--the ideal position is where the purple markers are--BUT--safety being the issue--as well as not having a cabinet unplugged 5 minutes before shoot time & not knowing it----I would say that placing them [yellow markers] along your neighbors house would work out ok.
If you crank them up higher than usual--get the bottom of the cabinet at head level--then the people closest to the speakers will not get hit in the face with the sound. You might want to give that a "dry run" to check for stability & coverage before "the day of".
Joe

[Deanbc]

Rick, after seeing some of the responses to my original post and giving the whole issue more thought I have come up with two ideas. Since my speaker unit will be fully charged and doesn’t require a cord, I plan on having a helper place it in position just before the start of the show and then start with about 5 minutes of pre-show music which will give me time to adjust the volume and be sure the music is playing as planned. You should be able to adjust your fireworks scripting accordingly.

[Rick_In_Tampa]

Rick--the ideal position is where the purple markers are--BUT--safety being the issue--as well as not having a cabinet unplugged 5 minutes before shoot time & not knowing it----I would say that placing them [yellow markers] along your neighbors house would work out ok.
If you crank them up higher than usual--get the bottom of the cabinet at head level--then the people closest to the speakers will not get hit in the face with the sound. You might want to give that a "dry run" to check for stability & coverage before "the day of".
Joe

Thanks Joe. Appreciate the input as always.

[upNdown]

This is interesting to me - is there some conventional wisdom that says to have the speakers in front of the crowd, or is that just an opinion?
I tested my speakers out at my buddy's launch site a couple of weeks ago, to make sure they'd fill the space. I originally put them in front of the crowd, but my buddy suggested putting the music behind the crowd. His reasoning was that if the music is coming from behind and the visuals are in front, it's more of an immersive experience. I'm inclined to agree, and now I plan to put the speakers behind the crowd.

[PyroJoeNEPA]

This is interesting to me - is there some conventional wisdom that says to have the speakers in front of the crowd, or is that just an opinion?
I tested my speakers out at my buddy's launch site a couple of weeks ago, to make sure they'd fill the space. I originally put them in front of the crowd, but my buddy suggested putting the music behind the crowd. His reasoning was that if the music is coming from behind and the visuals are in front, it's more of an immersive experience. I'm inclined to agree, and now I plan to put the speakers behind the crowd.

There is a fancy word used in the audio world "Psychoacoustic Juxtapositioning" --ok, two words! Simple explination of what it means is if you are looking at something and hearing the result of it coming from a different direction your mind has difficulty processing it. Imagine a movie [stereo only--not surround mode] where the sound came from behind you but you see the people speaking in front of you.Your mind doesn't process it as being correct. That is the easiest way I can explain it. Now, with fireworks it is a different case since the fireworks are making their own sounds --and the music is an "accompaniment" to the visual aspect of the light and sound made by the pyro.
In a pyro musical the idea is to have the viewers mind sync the sight of the fireworks with the timing of the music..a difficult task that people discover when scripting their shows.
Now, if all you are doing is playing music while the fireworks is going off, then it is an entirely different situation.
The size of your audience, size of your viewing area, etc. are all factors that come into play.Your objective should be to draw attention to the fireworks-----did you ever go to a concert where the speaker stacks were flown in the rear of the field and not at the front where the band was? Attention focus---that is the point.
The bottom line is, have fun with what you are doing and if you want to put the sound behind everyone, there are no "audio police" that are going to bust you for it. LOL.
As a retired audio engineer having done sound for concerts for many national acts over the years and a lover of all things pyro I am just giving you my humble opinion [or conventional wisdom???] on why we do what we do.

[PGH_Pyro]

outside of what joe says which i agree with, i'd have as many speakers all around the crowd as possible.
the acoustics of the pyro will bounce off every surface and come in at all angles so it makes sense to immerse the crowd area with the music so it's cohesive with the pyro reports/sounds... ideally, anyway as obviously it could be pricey to have that much speaker coverage...