Quack Attack was a playful fountain featured at the PEX Summer Festival in Darlington, MD. Imagine walking down a path and discovering a hidden glen. Branches reach their fingers out across the path, hiding your view of what comes next. Curious, you press on into the unknown. As you continue down the path, the sound of rushing water reaches your ears accompanied by… quacking. Illuminated duckies dangle from the trees, urging you closer to the source of the commotion.
Then the water hits you – and you’re on their secret turf.
Enter Quack Attack, a playful corner of the lake inhabited by friendly but territorial rubber duckies. They love making new friends, but if you come too close, they’ll squirt water at you. They play fair, though – their watery abode has several user controlled water elements so that you can squirt the duckies – or your friends – back. There are also umbrellas under the main spray, offering some protection – but mostly, deflection of the water.
The duckies also love to play with Pexies at night, too, and light up to show their affection for the evening. A few of them even like to hang out in the trees, where it’s a bit drier. When they hear people coming, they make a bit of a quacking commotion that is soft enough to only be heard when one is nearby.
The project consists of a large, L shaped basin that houses a fountain with interactive water elements, LED lit rubber duckies and interactive quacking sounds. The fountain basin is approximately 8’ long on a side, 3” tall and and 8’ tall. The fountain will have two levels, creating a cascade of water. Two pumps will power the fountain’s interactive water elements. The L shaped basin will be situated on top of a square platform on the ground, filled with gravel in the remaining square section. This will serve to catch any excess water.
There will be several interactive, user controlled water elements, controlled by varying the amount of water sprayed out. One type will be through 8 vertical PVC pipes topped with rubber duckies squirting. Participants will be able to control the flow of water coming from these ducks (and even direct it at their fellow Pexies). The powerful center water element, also user controlled, will shoot up and over a tier of umbrellas, which fans the water out. Two separate pumps will control each water element. There will be illuminated LED duckies, many of them with color change LEDs, floating in the fountain. They will be secured with fishing line so that they don’t wander off with any of their new friends. There will also be rubber duckies illuminated with LEDs hanging from nearby trees, near the fountain and along the path.
The sound element of the project will consist of battery powered mp3 players and speakers. The sounds will be soft quacking and won’t be loud enough to be heard far from the ducks. The sounds will be triggered by the presence of people. There may be a few surprise sounds, too.
Ideally the project would be placed in the clearing at the end of the path next to the near side of the lake, down from the pavilion.