This will just be a short post and is just me rambling. I recently watched Ben Earl's trick on Fool Us again, on youtube. And fuck me the comments pissed me off. Accusations of false shuffles. For a start there was an independent magician backstage who knew all the methods. Therefore if it was a false shuffle do you think he might not have fucking said something about it? Secondly, fucking watch it. It's not a false shuffle. The cards are mixed and he isn't retaining the order. And to say that he used a false shuffle to retain the deck is a bit vague and a shit way of trying to explain it.
Then there is this amazing comment "He never shuffles them when he's going one handed just splits the deck, puts one half on the other half and then back. That's a false shuffle."
That would be a cut not a shuffle for a start and they never accused him of using a false cut. Of course any magician with half a brain could see he used false cuts in the second half but the first part fooled the shit out of them.
Basically he won't have gotten through if he used a false shuffle, so youtube "magicians" please shut the fuck up because you don't know what you are talking about.
Monday, 7 November 2011
Tuesday, 1 November 2011
Naturalness
So here goes the first "proper" post on the blog.
Naturalness
Too often when watching magic, magicians give off tells, hinting at a sleight. For example watch magicians deal cards onto the table, and then ask them to second deal. The majority of magicians while change their deal. Whether they change grip, speed up the deals, etc. Eliminating this is simple. Watch yourself dealing normally then watch yourself second dealing, and spot the differences.
This is what you should strive to achieve with every move. Spectators aren't as stupid as magician's believe. A lot of lay people are just too polite to say anything and magicians are the same way. If I show a magician a move I want their honest opinion. If its shite tell me it is and tell me how to improve it. You aren't going to upset me, if I show you something I want honest feedback. I feel that this is something most magicians are guilty of. Being to polite to each other and not wanting to criticise. It shouldn't be taken as an offense, infact it should be welcomed as that's the kind of advice we need.
Anyway, getting back to naturalness, naturalness doesn't necessarily mean uniform. Go grab a deck of cards and start dealing as if you were dealing to a game of poker, or whatever. Each deal is different. Some may be faster, some slower. There may be sleight pauses inbetween the deals, maybe you place the cards down, maybe you throw them, maybe you drop them. There are many different variables that should also be applied to sleights. Don't act like a robot and make everything uniform. Speed up the deals and slow them down, have different gaps between deals. The main aim is to make second dealing look like a single deal.
This doesn't just apply to second dealing, it should apply to every move. Make every move look as natural as possible. Nobody wants to see your invisible pass if it looks like you are doing a move. If you shake the deck and it looks like you did nothing (i.e Clipshift, pass, etc) immediately lay people and magicians know that you did something. They maybe don't know what you did but they know that you did something and that is good enough for most lay people.
Naturalness
Too often when watching magic, magicians give off tells, hinting at a sleight. For example watch magicians deal cards onto the table, and then ask them to second deal. The majority of magicians while change their deal. Whether they change grip, speed up the deals, etc. Eliminating this is simple. Watch yourself dealing normally then watch yourself second dealing, and spot the differences.
This is what you should strive to achieve with every move. Spectators aren't as stupid as magician's believe. A lot of lay people are just too polite to say anything and magicians are the same way. If I show a magician a move I want their honest opinion. If its shite tell me it is and tell me how to improve it. You aren't going to upset me, if I show you something I want honest feedback. I feel that this is something most magicians are guilty of. Being to polite to each other and not wanting to criticise. It shouldn't be taken as an offense, infact it should be welcomed as that's the kind of advice we need.
Anyway, getting back to naturalness, naturalness doesn't necessarily mean uniform. Go grab a deck of cards and start dealing as if you were dealing to a game of poker, or whatever. Each deal is different. Some may be faster, some slower. There may be sleight pauses inbetween the deals, maybe you place the cards down, maybe you throw them, maybe you drop them. There are many different variables that should also be applied to sleights. Don't act like a robot and make everything uniform. Speed up the deals and slow them down, have different gaps between deals. The main aim is to make second dealing look like a single deal.
This doesn't just apply to second dealing, it should apply to every move. Make every move look as natural as possible. Nobody wants to see your invisible pass if it looks like you are doing a move. If you shake the deck and it looks like you did nothing (i.e Clipshift, pass, etc) immediately lay people and magicians know that you did something. They maybe don't know what you did but they know that you did something and that is good enough for most lay people.
Introduction
Basically this blog will be a place for me to talk about magic. It will mainly be my thoughts but their may be some tricks and shit occasionally as well. So instead of doing a horrific introduction I'm going to place some bullet points with some facts about me.
- I hate lazy magicians.
- I don't want to talk to the majority of magicians because they are dumb as fuck. I only listen to peoples opinions, that I respect. (And you should do the same)
- This blog is named after one of the best "moves" in magic and nobody does it.
- I've been doing magic for 4 years(ish) and I wasted the first 2 years by making mistakes, being lazy and taking shite advice.
- I like bacon cheese burgers.
- Most magic that gets published is utter, utter, utter shit.
Now I realize that that makes me sound like a depressing bastard but hopefully if you read this blog you'll find out that I'm not a cunt. Anyway I plan on writing my first actual post, either some time tonight or at least before the end of the week, so hopefully a few people will have read this by then.
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