The 2006 Queen's Baton is chock-full of high tech features. Designer Paul Charlwood speaks about his creation.

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-All the technology aspects that they wanted and we wanted to incorporate in it, and the way it's turned out is just beyond my expectations.

-The challenge was to keep the form really simple as well as having all this technology actually within the baton and being used by the baton.

-On the front of the baton there's about 72 LEDs that indicate each nation. And as you move through the nation, it lights up. The lighting technology does-- and I guess the way to put a camera and make it discreet is an issue. We initially designed the shape and then fitted the technology around it.

JONATHAN LAWSON: The main thing I wanted to do was try and keep the design as clean as possible, because all of a sudden, we've got cameras, and lights, and all those different things on the actual baton.

-We really didn't want to make it look busy at the end of the day. And the Queen's message now will be stored digitally rather than the piece of paper, which originally was the idea. The Queen's message is actually inserted at the stage, per the queen, as a small medallion. And that brings the whole baton to life. The interaction with the baton is such that people can interact through a website. This is the first web-enabled baton relay really.

-It passes my wow factor, the cameras and the LED lights and being able to track the baton worldwide from a community perspective, but I suppose more importantly, from the children's perspective. Being able to log on to an internet site and find out where it is at any one time is quite unbelievable.