Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
BLINK — the four-day light, art and projection mapping show — is back in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky this Oct. 13-16. Here's everything you need to know, from getting around to details on our silent disco Oct. 15.

BLINK director reports a few bumps, no major bruises, for festival's first night

Illuminated drones form a blue spiral above the Ohio River, with Covington in the background.
Bill Rinehart
/
WVXU
Three hundred drones from Sky Elements perform synchronized "dances" over the Ohio River two times a night during BLINK.

The light and art festival BLINK started Thursday night, and Executive Director Justin Brookhart says he's heard good things from people.

“The streets of Cincinnati were full, they were vibrant. People hadn’t felt the city that vibrant since pre-pandemic levels.”

Brookhart says there were a few problems with some of the projectors, and with the second drone show of the night.

“After they fly the first show, they have to change out the batteries for those, resync everything and reset them," he explains. "We’re working through how to have a quicker turnaround between the two of those. Admittedly last night’s window was a little tight and aggressive anyway. We were probably being a little overzealous doing them at 9 and at 10:30.”

Brookhart says there's a longer interval between drone shows the rest of the nights. The drone shows will be at 8 p.m. and 10 p.m.

There were some technical issues at a couple of projections, but Brookhart isn't worried. “We really think of Thursday night as little bit of a dress rehearsal for some of the projection stuff because we don’t know how it’s going to perform totally at scale.”

Brookhart says technicians worked through the night recalibrating equipment.

BLINK starts again at sunset, Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings.

Brookhart says there were no big safety problems reported.

Bill Rinehart started his radio career as a disc jockey in 1990. In 1994, he made the jump into journalism and has been reporting and delivering news on the radio ever since.