A burning man, a flock of starlings and a mirrored orb designed by architecture studio BIG were created in drone shows by Studio Drift at this year's unofficial Burning Man festival.
Amsterdam-based Studio Drift presented three drone shows at the Renegade Man festival in Nevada, which took place after the official Burning Man festival was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Studio Drift used hundreds of drones to create the playful light installations
Called Drone Stories, the studio hoped that the light installations would "create meaningful performances to connect people".
Each show saw hundreds of drones fly above thousands of spectators into formations known to be associated with past iterations of the official Burning Man festival. "We thought: 'if no one is allowed to bring art then why not use our drones to create a collection of memories"'" Ralph Nauta and Lucas van Oostrum, the founders of Studio Drift told Dezeen.
The drones formed shapes associated with the Burning Man festival
To create each installation, the team sketched out ideas on paper and then translated them into the custom software needed for the drones. During the process, the designers also manipulated flight time, speed and light power.
"It's not every day you get to play with hundreds of drones able to create what you think of," the pair said. "We are using this technology to create artistic expressions and we want to push the boundaries of what is...