winter blast? This is 24 years. Veteran. Yeah, I started in 1999
And what do you what do you come for?
Right now for pictures. So I used to shoot fireworks, my knees got bad. Now I shoot fireworks with the camera. And I just I just have a passion for the things that we see with our eyes to properly represented in pictures. A lot of times I don't see good firework pictures. I'm trying to spread that. And so this is a this is a group that I've known for many years. I have a lot of friends here. A couple that with passion that I have for for photography and for fireworks couple them together. It's hard to be
That's awesome. Yeah. When When did the switch happen between you shooting? It's hard to phrase that but shooting and shooting
between between lighting the fuse in hitting the shutter that was about eight years ago, six to eight years ago. But I used to shoot with professional groups used to shoot firework shows.
And what would you say the differences between fireworks Pyro and explosives?
Well, explosives are there to separate things into their primary components. Right? Make little rocks out of big rocks, pyrotechnics is like the art or you combine the that visceral sudden release of energy into this incredible beautiful colorful display. coupled that with the noise and the smell. You know, in trying to do that in it's just this very three dimensional four dimensional because you feel it kind of art form. And it's fleeting.
So remember
these things burn for three, four or five seconds and that's it. You know the thumped lasts for a quarter of a second you feel it and it's gone. It could have taken somebody days, weeks or months to build something like that and it's gone in just a matter of seconds. But with this group, what we do here is we're building this stuff not only for us, but for everybody else that can appreciate that. And so these are things that we can still talk about 1520 years later, remember that shell that somebody built, you know, and that kind of thing, and that's what we're allowed to do here is to express that art form
and why why is it difficult to express it elsewhere because of like regulation and stuff like that or regulations.
It needs space. It needs allowance for noise I mean, you know as we're recording this, the noise is is overwhelming and not everybody's in favor of loud noises. But when these things go, we have to allow for enough space for safety. There's legal requirements for us to do that. Sometimes we needed a little more and then there's also this perception of people that put these things together that they're a danger to society. They don't want these people close and what we're saying is no, these are people you need to be friends with. You know, they know what is dangerous, and they know where to keep it away from people. So
what's the Yeah What's the like culture of pyro? Like if you're able to describe it? Yeah, many people are familiar that it even exists as a subculture. Yeah,
it's I mean, there's an international group that meets in the United States once a year. There's also in different states. There's different groups in Texas, Florida, Missouri, Michigan, there's all different smaller groups and it's just to cater to this and it brings people from diametrically opposite ends of the scale on religion and politics and philosophy. And you know, how do you talk all this stuff but we all have this singular love for for pyro? And it's what kind of brings us all together
and is there I guess Yeah, is there like a particular like, culture where you would describe the people that generally band together for Pyro I don't know. It's like young people old. It's Ed Weller rule.
It's all over the map, literally what you described and more. I can't nail it down to any one demographic, or even gender. You know, some of the most beautiful shells built that I've ever seen were built by women. And so we've got throughout this weekend, you'll see a couple groups one called the cherry bombs, and it's a group of women and they all put on a show. And the older generation as we are aging out, they're realizing we need to pass this on. So we have a thing called pit Pireaus in trading. And it's young kids and they're designing shows using fireworks that you would buy at a fireworks. Oh, nice. So they're combining it with music. They're figuring out the timing. They're figuring out how to safely do that. And as they grow older, then they start saying, Well, I would like it to do this. Well, let me show you how to do that. And so a lot of the older people are passing this knowledge, trying to keep that alive, it's alive and books. There's lots of resources. But another thing of what we do here is you know, during the daytime is a lot of the seminars. So this information is being passed on.
That's awesome. Yeah. Anything else?
It's just a freaking blast.
What? Maybe this is an answerable question what what can Pyro teach us about life?
It is interesting that like some of the people here would walk right past other people that are here at any other time of the year if they were not involved with pirate because we have nothing in common. So when I want my So you find that one singular thing that could bring us all together and it kind of breaks those barriers down like that, you know, in fact, we have a guy here that is blind. He's putting on a seminar out of field for life.
Do you know what time that is what I was looking at one o'clock, one o'clock.
And I've helped him with stuff and he's trying to get people who are sight challenged. The experience of what some of pyrotechnics is all about. He used to like fireworks and he is slowly lost his sight over a period of time. And so he's here he's going to be building some fire shells and he wants to work with some people to design a show. And he's blind. That's
awesome. Thank you so much. How much long you're gonna stay here tonight?
Not too much longer. It's freaking gold. It's cool. Yes, I am.
