This weekend, 10,000 smart wristbands are distributed to the Woodstower festival goers, inviting them to be part of the light shows during the evening concerts.

The Woodstower festival is a celebration of the last summer weekend with music, lake swimming and entertainment, and it is the first festival outside the project to try out MONICA solutions, which besides light shows also include crowd and sound level monitoring.

Light shows and crowd density

After two smaller demonstrations of the crowd wristbands at Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen and the IoT Week in Aarhus, MONICA is going large-scale at Woodstower.

Volunteers are distributing up to 10,000 MONICA smart wristbands with LED lights that will flash in synchronisation with the music played on each of the four stages.

Additionally, the crowd wristbands are tracked (anonymously) so that the organisers can get an overview of the crowd density by the display of a crowd heatmap.

Monitor sound level and level of annoyance

Besides boosting the crowd experience, the festival is also interested in monitoring the sound levels.

Inside the venue, four IoT-enabled sound level meters are automatically collecting and transmitting the acoustic measurements and displaying them in real time as a sound heat map on the COP.

Another four sound level meters are placed in the neighbouring communities to evaluate the level of noise annoyance. On the COP, the festival staff can see an index of ‘annoyance likelihood’ that takes into account the subjective perception of noise.

2019 marks the 21st edition of the Woodstower festival, which attracts more than 30,000 people. The music concerts which range from electro to rap take place on four stages with a mix of international and local artists performing. The festival takes place from 29 August to 1st September 2019.

The MONICA user interface displays information about the sound levels and crowd situation. At Woodstower, the COP shows a heatmap for estimation of crowd density as well as sound measurements and an ‘annoyance likelihood’ index.

Estimate the sound exposure in the audience

A final aim is to estimate the sound exposure in the audience by comparing the positioning data of the crowd wristbands with the sound level data from the sound heat map.

This approach is done in the light of a new French sound regulation, coming into force in October 2018, which sets limits on sound pressure levels in the audience.