HOW TO BUILD A FIREWORKS DISPLAY

The end of the year is hard for me. Everyone’s celebrating the New Year by watching fireworks pop in the sky, and where am I? Cowering under a table. I just can’t deal with the noises: first a SIZZLE as the firework launches into the sky, and then… eventually… not yet… nearly... BANG! Doesn’t that remind you of a certain green mob?

Enough misery. I’m told I must face my fears if I’m to ever overcome them. So for this New Year, I’m not only going to try to watch a fireworks display in full view, I’m going to host my own!

I’m not doing it alone, though - I’m obviously not that brave. I’ve gathered some Minecraft players who are experts at putting together grand fireworks displays. They’re going to show us how it’s done. We’ll go through everything from crafting fireworks to configuring redstone clocks to perfectly timing each BOOM.

Crafting Fireworks

You’ll need fireworks in order to put on a fireworks display. Heard they’re quite important. So what you’ll need to do first is craft some. It’s fairly easy, but you can create all sorts of shapes and colours. Where to even start?

Oh yeah, the basics: firework stars and rockets. You’ll need to know how to make both of these to create a basic firework in Minecraft. Here’s how you do it.

Simple enough. Note that you can add more gunpowder - up to three - to make the rocket fly higher before it explodes. You can also add more dyes when creating a firework star to have it burst with more than one colour. In fact, you can have up to eight colours in a single firework star. You can make your own rainbows!

RAINBOWS!?!?

Yes, rainbows.

But that’s not all. To take it further, you can add extra items to the firework recipe. Do this when crafting a firework star and your rockets will have a spectacular variety of different effects when popping in the sky. 

Redstone Devices

Right, you’ve got your fireworks. Now it’s time for a display! Oh, hold on, apparently just putting fireworks on the ground and watching them instantly take off isn’t a display. That’s according to the experts who say that’s just dangerous. Well I was having fun, at least.

Like there’s a safe way to handle a device that’s literally designed to explode anyway! Wait, there is? According to YouTuber stormfrenzy, we can build “sequentially connected redstone circuits” that will send the fireworks into the air for us while we stand back. That sounds... very complicated.

So let’s start with the basics again. The images below demonstrate how to form simple redstone devices that let you launch fireworks from a distance (the boring way, if you ask me).

If you can get the hang of those basics then you can start playing around with different formations to see how it affects the show in the sky. Especially important is to vary up the timing of fireworks to create contrasting moments of quiet and busyness. Also consider how long you want the display to go on for, as well as the type, colour, and height of each firework you send into the air.

Minecraft tutorial website and YouTube channel Digminecraft has a good demonstration of how you can make a large redstone circuit to create a fireworks display that can last several minutes with a variety of patterns.

Advanced Displays

If you have an advanced understanding of how to use redstone devices then you can take your circuit much further. Stormfrenzy informs me that he connects a redstone comparator to a dispenser within a circuit to detect when the dispenser is empty of fireworks.  

He then uses “the inverse of the redstone signal from this comparator to start powering the next redstone circuit and so on,” he tells me. “If you join a number of these redstone circuits together you can come up with some interesting fireworks displays.”

Need some more inspiration for your fireworks display? Take a look at maps that showcase how other players have put together their complex shows. This one titled The Most Amazing Firework Show EVER!! by Minecraft Forum user ninjanoah5 lives up to its title.

We can thank YouTuber ForgeLogical for downloading it and uploading a video of it in action. Check it out below! Yes, that is a horse flying across the sky.

Get crafting and have a great new year!