close up magic – Page 10

Full Face Peel – Trials

The trick I’m currently working on is more of a gag. It’s for the end of my ambitious card routine. After the trick is done, I peel off the signed face of the card, leaving a blank card.

Here’s a video of one of the trials of it:

I quickly realized I need to do it backwards, giving them the sticker and leaving me with the blank card!

The full face sticker plays as fun, not strange. Almost like it’s something that you could do with any playing card, but never knew you could. The other version of the trick that I’m doing that leaves the pips behind plays more like a strange thing.

I think either version would be elevated from a bit or gag to an pretty good trick if you did it with a borrowed deck or a deck at the bar. If you added in the sticker card and stole out the duplicate, you’ve got a very memorable moment!

-Louie

Roving Magic at Fairs…

Last week I was doing roving magic at a fair. When I do this, I do either a street show, or close up magic, depending on which I think will get better results. The fair I was as had my times scheduled and my 1pm timeslot wasn’t the best for trying to do a street show as it was slower at the fair and there wasn’t really any shade. For those shows I did close up magic and went to the people who were in spaces more conducive to watching magic.

Here’s the props for my close up set:

And here’s what everything is:

real mans wallet, shell game and card tricks

The nut is actually over 2 inches across, hole is 1 1/2 inches. I bought the nut on a whim, and put it into my pocket and figured I’d think of something to do with it. I did come up with a way to produce it and use it!

-Louie

Magician’s Choice….

I think it’s time we need to accept the fact that most kids that know a card trick no longer do the 21 card trick. This is mostly due to YouTube tutorials, and that’s great, that’s one place where YouTube “exposure” has moved magic forward. There’s a lot more variety in what’s kids do now!

The trick above, wasn’t a really good trick. It was a very clunky verbal magician’s choice style force to make me think of a face card, then a very clunky physical magician’s choice force to make me select a card. For a kid that only does one trick, it’s a fine gateway trick to your second trick and they’re actively involved in making the trick work, not just doing math.

A few weeks ago someone had asked in a magician’s social media group about how to practice equivoque, and I used to do a card trick that was inspired by something I saw Bob Sheets do. Basically you are forcing a pile, it’s not too crazy. I haven’t done it in many, many years, but I made a quick video to help that person out.

It’s fun to do and a great way to practice making the decisions feel like actual decisions. Go out and give it a try!

-Louie

That Way More…

This summer I started playing with doing the Ambitious Card with the cards spread on the table, not with the effect happening in my hands. For context, here are my two previous posts about it:

http://www.magicshow.tips/magic-show-tips/horizontal-ambitious-card/

http://www.magicshow.tips/magic-show-tips/horizontal-ambitious-card-3rd-phase/

I now have the three phases worked out and cleaned up the handling a bit. It’s a much tighter routine than before. Here’s the version I’m currently doing:

One of the things I’ve recently added was anticipating that in the second phase that the spectator would almost immediately point to the top card. Being able to foresee that and being able to show that card as not being their card is a great moment.

I’m really enjoying performing this version of the Ambitious Card, and like it much more than doing it entirely in my hands.

-Louie

Fair Sizzle Reel

One of the things I’ve started doing to “add value” for the fairs that book me is to make little sizzle reels of me performing at the fair.

Here’s this weeks video:

You’ll see me do my version of Sticker Kicker in this video. I’m still working out the flow of the trick. I like it and it’s such a strange visual when you peel the back off of the card. I really like it!

-Louie

Another Shell Game Set!

I remember a long time ago chatting with Dr. Lloyd Cripe who was a brain doctor and now retired and he said, “everyone collects something” and at the time I didn’t realize it, but I was starting to collect Three Shell Game sets. Currently I have a giant collection of shells, and it getting harder to find shell sets that I don’t already have.

I found this lot at a magic auction site:

I don’t have the upper set of gold shells. I can’t tell what they are made from, it could be plastic or metal, I won’t know until they show up. It looks like I was the only bidder, so I got them for the opening bid price, which is nice!

I’ve had the Dr. Beaumont Shell Game book in the past, and it’s been a while since I’ve read it. I’ll give it a reread when it arrives with the shells and probably sell it with the Vernet Shells which come with this lot.

If you’ve got a unique or uncommon set of shells, send me a note, I’d love to see a pic of them!

-Louie

A Better 21 Card Trick!

I’m a huge fan of letting people show me tricks. I’ve written about it many times on this blog. Not only does it let the spectator shine, it encourages them to keep doing magic tricks!

Every now and then I get surprised and this kid showed me a great trick! It was like a way better version of the 21 card trick. It used three reverse faro shuffles and only 8 cards, so it was very fast when compared to the 21 card trick.

The ending was nice, as it wasn’t just a “Here’s your card”, it was a three phase reveal.

Full disclosure, I’m not the biggest fan of this type of reveal for what I do in my work, but the kid did it well and got a good reaction. I can’t argue with that!

-Louie

Some Close Up Magic…

The fair I’m performing at this week has me doing street shows. On the mornings of the slower days I’m doing some more close up style magic for people. Here’s a sample of what I’m doing:

You can see part of the Horizontal Ambitious Card that I recently started doing. It currently has three phases, ending with the card inside the card box. I’m really having a lot of fun with the routine, as it gives me a lot more room to play with the audience within the trick.

This is why it’s important to keep playing with a trick, even when you it’s a solid trick and your “A” material. If you keep playing you can find new bits or ways to do it. I’m of the mindset that a trick is never finished!

-Louie

Watching Audience Magic…

I don’t get it when magicians are annoyed when people in the audience want to show them a magic trick. If I was guessing it comes down to an ego thing. When I’m doing roving close up magic, I always let them show me their trick. Sometimes you’ll be surprised at what they show you…usually it’s just the 21 card trick.

Occasionally I get to see this two card change:

However sometimes you get to see an amazing trick, this is probably what I’d consider the greatest trick I’ve ever had someone in the audience show me!

Letting someone from the audience have their moment makes you a generous performer. Now there are times where it’s inappropriate to have them do a trick, but in 95% of times when they offer there’s really no reason for you not to let them show you the trick aside from you being worried that someone will steal your spotlight.

-Louie

Ending to a Card Set…

I’m trying to decide which is a better ending for a routine with a deck of cards:

1: Ending with the deck back in new deck order
2: Ending with all the backs in the deck of cards different (rainbow deck)

They are similar in effect in a very broad sense, visually all the cards are not how they should be. However the effects are different. When the backs are different it’s a transformation and the when they’re in order it’s a transposition.

The other question is whether to do both effects or just one? It’d be easy to get the second effect after the first one with a deck switch. That would make the color changing backs the kicker effect to the cards in order. I think I’ll just have to try it each way and figure out what I like…

-Louie