Spectacular Drone Show Lights Up The Sky Over New York's Central Park
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Thousands of New York residents witnessed a mesmerizing kinetic light show on October 21, 2023. The performance, titled "Franchise Freedom," featured 1,000 illuminated drones. The autonomous machines formed synchronous patterns in the sky above the Central Park Lake in three separate, 10-minute showings. The drone "dance" was synched to music by Dutch composer and pianist Joep Beving.
"Franchise Freedom" was the brainchild of Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta. The Dutch artists fitted the drones with custom software programmed to mimic the flight behavior of starlings. Called murmurations, it involves large flocks of the songbirds twisting, turning, and swirling across the sky in beautiful shape-shifting clouds.
The show has previously been performed at NASA and a few other places. However, the New York spectacle was much larger in scale than past presentations. They typically involved around 300 drones.
"Franchise Freedom" was Central Park's largest public artwork project since "The Gates" in 2005. This temporary installation featured 7,503 "gates" holding saffron-colored fabric. They lined 23 miles (37 km) of the iconic park's pathways.
Resources: CNN.com, NYPost.com, NPR.com
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39 Comments
- avocadon12 monthsOmg like the lights are just so beautiful i just can't believe how pretty they are
- pefurijybano12 monthsThat’s so cool
- supershy12 monthsThat's so prettyyyyy!
- laniii12 monthsWoah I wish I was there
- crystalf12 monthsI wish I was there to see that thats so cool
- willy_wow12 monthsthat looks cool
- potterhead2244312 monthsThat is so cool My cousins live there and we got to see pics they were so beautiful
- mattyb944112 monthsLucky!!
- deafgirlhistory12 monthsWHAT?!?! Lucky!
- oreocookie6412 monthslucky!
- waltermatteo12 monthsCool and Awesome.
- jylalisevely12 monthsWOW
- orcarainbow12 monthsAmazing!!! especially the first video