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Creating a False Finale

This idea I got while watching a professional fireworks display from around my area. The show was Lockheed Martin's, 2004 display, and was advertised as a million dollar show. The show was impressive from the start. They were shooting larger than normal mortar shells, when compared to what most local town shows shoot in my area. The thing that caught my interest the most from this show was that towards the end of the show they had finale chains and titanium salutes pounding away. It seemed that this was there finale, this went on for about a minute. Afterward there was a slight measurable pause as the crowd was cheering and clapping cause it seemed like that was the end of the show. With that they lit off 4 large Willow shells, that filled the whole sky and another round of a few titanium salutes. I have also seen this technique done towards the middle of the show also, this being a real surprise when the show continues after it.

Planning your False finale.
When planning your False finale I use the "Rule of 2" The rule of two states that for every individual piece you have in your false finale you will double that number for those types of items. For example our finale for the 2005 year for our Consumer firework display consists of 3 small Crazy Exciting, and 3 or the larger 500gram version, Crazy Exciting on Steroids, plus mines and more shells. All of these items will be electrically fired using Phantom's F-5 Remote Firing system.  Now if I were to build a false finale in my show this is what I would use:

False Finale
1 Crazy Exciting on Steroids
2 Crazy Exciting
10 Mortar Shells
5 Mines
 		 Finale
3 Crazy Exciting on Steroids
3 Crazy Exciting
20 Mortar Shells
10 Mines
 

Besides the "Rule of 2" there are other ways to create your False finale. There are a lot of cakes that shoot groups of shells into the air at one, and or are very intense and quick that you could shoot by itself that would work very well.

Remember after your False finale you want to pause for a few seconds before you continue with the rest of your show. This will give your audience the sense that the show is over.

Just be careful your False finale doesn't out shine your real one. 

 Planning your real finale.
The one main factor that you must remember when doing this is that your real finale needs to be bigger and more items than your false finale. Information  about how to design a great finale can be found under Designing your finale.

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