On Friday evening, Edgbaston Stadium roared with the hubbub of hundreds of families and children, laughing and talking, glow sticks in hand, anticipation in the air. But not for cricket, as one might expect; the crowds were there for a show other than the performance of the T20 team, the Birmingham Bears. Instead, Birmingham was raring for a WILD night at the Drone Light Show.

From the moment I arrived at the stadium, the range of entertainment I found was pleasantly surprising. Food stalls, glow stick headband sales, and an entryway transformed into face-paint central: the pre-show fun was certainly in full swing. I saw kids proudly waving their multi-coloured glow sticks, so I decided to buy one as well. Equipped with my own glow stick, I headed into the stadium and found my seat among the crowd.

The clock struck seven, and as the show began, I was instantly blown away. Edgbaston Stadium was a brilliant venue for the drone light show, with the bowl-like arena adding a whole new immersive dimension to the prowling animals that soon filled the night sky. Allow me to set the scene: the air was warm and still, with rain gently pattering, almost like a staged performance, while lively music reverberated through the air. As if by magic, hundreds of drones rose into the night air, and then the show began.

I was promised ‘a world where darkness bursts into life’, and they certainly delivered. As a giant 300-foot bear sniffed proudly, icy blues and pulsating silver sparked the sky to life, melted seamlessly into another, transitions indicated by a Mexican wave of golden and white drone lights cascading across the creature before it dissolved into the next. Roaring lions became striding giraffes, their long limbs so uncannily realistic as they strode across the stadium, only for gold to shimmer and an elephant to fill our worldview. Its trunk, made of light and smoothly shifting aerial vehicles, swung in an arc to face us, before exploding into a firework of light. I had expected to see animal shapes like those in a colouring book, pretty but still. The synchronised transition of the drones from one moving life-like form to another built beyond my expectations.

Then came a couple of minutes of calm before we were thrown straight into the universe of smaller- sized wildlife. Sloths swung one-armed from heavy branches, snakes struck, tongues darting out to devour balls of light, peacocks flared arrogantly, and frogs slurped at the stars for sustenance. The undergrowth came to life, with mammoth crickets springing towards the stadium ground and flowers blooming to life as if Mother Gothel herself was there to steal Rapunzel.

Such sensational displays bloomed to the beat of a cinematic soundtrack underscored by the murmurs of nature. The light trill of the hummingbird’s wings infused the night through speakers, even as its wings flapped synchronously, lit up in the colours of a glorious rainbow. A frog’s ribbeting call gave it away as it successfully hunted a drone, and the lion’s roar certainly got the children in the audience yelling excitedly.

It wasn’t just a series of images for forty minutes, but more like an observation of nature at a 3D cinema. The WILD Drone Light Show was undoubtedly a brilliant demonstration of how far technology has come, but more impressively to me, it showcased the skill of the handlers behind the hundreds of drones and the beauty we see at the hands of human creation.

You can buy tickets to see WILD’s Drone Light Show in Nottingham, Brighton or Bristol here!

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