magic show tip – MagicShow.Tips

Vanishing Bird Cage!

I love that there are people who know what I’m into and when they run into thing that they think I’d like, they text me! For example, I collect vanishing bird cages and last month at magic live my buddy Clive Hayward sent me some pictures of a vanishing bird cage that was for sale there.

This cage is unusual, you’ll notice the side bars are attached by string!

I have a vanishing bird cage in my collection that’s similar, however it has metal parts that connect the sidebars to the cage. I’m curious if maybe this vanishing birdcage was a “budget” model of one with metal connectors, or if this was a home repair.

I’m glad this one is in my collection!

-Louie

Hitting the Road…

I’m heading out for my first real road trip of the season, I’ll be out over two weeks performing magic shows up and down the west coast before I come home. One of the best things for me when I travel is a membership to a national chain gym. There’s no chain that will have a location in every city, so do a bit of research to see what has a presence in the territory you work.

For me the biggest advantage of them is having a place to shower. If you’re doing multiple shows a day at different locations, sometimes it’s nice to wash the sweat off between shows so you’re a bit fresher for the later shows.

Also working out for me is a great way to break up long drives, or to kill time during gaps in your schedule. Also gym has a consistent quality of bathroom, which is nice! A side bonus for me is that the gym chain that I use also has wifi and tables in the lobby, so I can pop in an use the wifi to send emails from my laptop.

For me the $20ish a month I pay for my membership is something that definitely pays off!

-Louie

A Step Backwards…

This week I’m performing on a stage inside a tent. It’s a nice tent and it solves a lot of outdoor performing problems, it gives the audience shade and cuts down on wind.

The first couple of days of the week I was performing at the front edge of the stage. The shows were doing alright, but I realized I was losing people on the side bleachers. It was a consistent loss of people from specific positions in the audience, so it was something that probably wasn’t my show. To try to fix this I watched another performer’s show from one of those positions and figured out why I was losing them.

You’ll notice there are two poles at the front of the stage and when I was playing too far forward, they people couldn’t see the show. Then there was a smaller problem that when playing too far forward it was hard for some people to see my face as they were almost behind me.

The solution was simple, I just moved my show two steps backwards. Once I did that the change in the show was dramatic! I kept the audience in the spots where I was losing them AND the side were more enthusiastic about the show!