Soirs de Fêtes is one of the largest pyrotechnics companies in France, producing around 700 shows per year across half the country. We spoke with Bruno and Guillaume about their creative process, what changed when they adopted FWsim, and why imagination should always come before the screen.
Soirs de Fêtes was founded in 2003 by a team that had previously been part of Ruggieri, one of France’s best-known pyrotechnics companies. Starting in the Paris area, they have since expanded to cover roughly half of France, from Brittany in the west to Bordeaux and Toulouse in the south. Today they are the third-largest pyrotechnics company in France, producing around 700 shows per year.
Bruno came to show design through an unusual route. By trade a mechanic, he spent 15 years working at a polar station in Antarctica repairing machines. During the summers back in France, he helped out at fireworks shows—first just setting up and firing, then gradually moving into design.
“At the beginning I’m just working to participate in the show, you know, to go in the town and to realize the show. And after, one people of the company asked me: if you are available during the summer, you can help us to design the show. So I say yes, I’m happy to learn, and I start like that.”
Bruno
Eventually he left his Antarctic work behind to focus fully on show design for Soirs de Fêtes.
While still stationed in Antarctica, Bruno started using FWsim in his free time—purely for fun. With almost no internet connection at the polar station, he needed software that could work fully offline.
“I used FWsim only for fun at the beginning. We tried to find software with no needed internet connection, because in Antarctica we do not have an internet connection. And the only choice was FWsim. So I was able to do some simulations offshore in Antarctica with no internet connection.”
Bruno
For Soirs de Fêtes, show design begins not at a computer, but around a table. The designers listen to music together and describe what they see in their heads—colors, effects, feelings—before anyone opens any software.
“When we talk in the meeting of designers, we talk with no visualization. We just listen the music and we say: ah, I think it’s yellow with cracking. Just impressions of feeling of the music. And it’s very important to keep that.”
Guillaume
Guillaume feels strongly that this order matters—that starting with visualization risks weakening the creative instinct.
“If you go at the beginning with visualization, you lose imagination. I think the next generation will risk to have less imagination because it’s imagination on the screen, not imagination in the head. It’s a question of creativity.”
Bruno agrees. Both he and Guillaume have years of field experience, and the creative vision starts from that lived experience rather than from a screen.
When designing a pyromusical, the team starts by cutting the music into segments of roughly one to one-and-a-half minutes each—short enough to hold the audience’s attention.
“If you’ve got a long title with another long title, you’re sure that your public will lose attention. So we cut, and we build the music with little cuts. And then we associate color and effect with each kind of music. It’s the most interesting part of design.”
Guillaume
These associations between music, color, and effects are decided in team workshops, bringing together all the designers at Soirs de Fêtes.
One thing that might surprise outsiders: the style of show varies significantly depending on where in France it takes place.
“In the southwest of France, the people like the show very bam bam bam bam bam, and in the north the show is more delicate. It depends on the clients, depends on the area of France.”
Bruno
When asked what the hardest part of designing a show is, both Bruno and Guillaume pointed to budget—and to making the show practical to set up on the field.
“The most difficult for me is the budget. We need to respect the safety for the people, be careful if we have a church in the area of the show or something like that. But the budget—if I don’t respect that, it’s not possible, and Soirs de Fêtes doesn’t exist tomorrow.”
Bruno
“We try to think of the people who set up the show on the field. Sometimes it’s difficult to design a show that is easy to set up for the team. Guillaume and me, we are on the field ourselves, so we try to be really sensitive about that.”
Bruno
Before adopting FWsim, Soirs de Fêtes used software with no visualization at all. Designers had to keep the entire show in their heads, and when they needed to check what a particular product looked like, they searched YouTube for videos.
“Before, we had no visualization. We put only some products on the timeline and that’s it. If I don’t remember the effect of a product, I go to YouTube, put the reference, and look: ah, the product is that. It was fastidious sometimes to choose some special product. Now with FWsim it’s really easy and fast.”
Bruno
The visualization also helped them calibrate the quantity of products in a show:
“We can adjust the quantity of products we put in the show, because before we maybe put too much production because we didn’t have the visualization. Now we can adjust. It’s a really good thing.”
Bruno
When it came time to choose a professional visualization tool, the team evaluated their options carefully.
“FWsim is really better in visualization of the show. Quality of the visualization of one product, like a shell or something like that—the quality is very, very high.”
Guillaume
FWsim Pro is used by professional pyrotechnics companies in 40 countries — including the team behind 700 shows a year in France.