virtual magic show – Page 14

Still Working On It…

Months ago I started working on my version of Goshman’s Cards Thru Newspaper trick. My version ended up taking out everything I didn’t like about the trick, which are the cards and the newspaper. I ended up replacing them with Polaroid pictures and an envelope. It’s still a work in progress.

A couple weeks ago I was invited to be a guest at a magic club meeting that took place over zoom. One thing they did was allow people to perform and get critique from Patrick Martin, who also did a presentation during the meeting.

Only a handful of people took the club up. I volunteered to do something if they had space and wouldn’t get in the way of club member’s having the chance to be critiqued. They had plenty of space, so I did my trick with Polaroid pictures.

There was some great feedback, mostly with how bad my pictures were and how they showed up on the screen. They are 100% correct, here’s a screenshot:

The reflection from my ring light made the picture hard to see. There are a couple of solutions for this:

Spray them with matte spray to dull the gloss
Have the camera behind the ring light and bring the pics past the ring light
Have more contrast between the animal and background in the actual picture
Remake the picture so that it’s not glossy (i.e. fake Polaroid)

I think the final solution will be a combination of all of the above.

Being A Good Guest…

A while ago I was doing a video hangout with some friends and somehow the idea of having my daughter as a guest on one of their livestream shows. Well, we made it happen a bit ago and it was a lot of fun.

Here’s the thing, it wasn’t easy and that’s the problem, so many people think they are interesting and that’s enough. Here’s the truth, you aren’t interesting, you need to make yourself interesting.

How do you do that?

Simple, write out a few stories and have them ready to tell. Watch some of the previous shows and try to anticipate what the host will ask you and then write some jokes or stories as answers. You may never need them, but the act of preparing puts you a step ahead.

Then something unplanned happens, like on the show last week, there was no audio for the first 10 minutes. The first thing we did was look at what we had prepared that was visual that we could do. We had a few things, and we also played with it.

Having the mindset of having to work to be interesting and fun, instead of thinking we were interesting definitely gave us an advantage!

Here’s the whole interview (keep in mind there’s no audio for the first about 10 minutes): https://www.twitch.tv/videos/704662019

Magic Conventions…

One of the silver linings to the entertainment industry being closed due to COVID is that I can go to different magic conventions. I’ve always been curious about KIDabra, which is for family entertainers. This year they are having a virtual convention, and I’m lecturing at it!

I’ve got some fun stuff to share with the group, including the full version of my Spoon Stunt which has never been taught before!

Louie Foxx KIDabra 2020 from Mark Daniel on Vimeo.

The line up looks great, if you’re a family performer, you should check it out!

Three Card Monte Sequence

One thing that I like about the Three Card Monte is that it automatically engages the entire audience. It’s a game they all can play with being the person playing it. That’s why I think things like the 3 Card Monte or the Three Shell Game are perfect for virtual shows. The level of engagement is great!

Here’s a video from a practice session:

I’m working out the sequence, right now it’s:

Mix and the money card is in a different position
Set aside a non-money card, do the mix and the money card is now the one set aside
cards change so the two non-money cards are now the money card and the money card is now the non-money card
all cards change into jokers

There’s a lot of magic that happens in that sequence. It’s a pretty amazing sequence, and basically using the three card monte premise as a presentation hook for card color changes.

Triggers…

A couple of days ago I posted a video of a coin production and vanish I had played with a little while ago. Then a day later I posted a video of a short routine idea with that coin production. Those videos were works in progress, and it’s still a work in progress, however I’m working on solving one of the problems, which is probably one of the biggest problems. That is triggering the coin appearance or vanish.

Essentially I needed to design a triggering system for the coin. Here’s what I came up with:

I designed it and it’s 3d printing right now. I’ll assemble it later today and hopefully it will work without any major redesigns!

Copentro Like Routine?

After playing with the coin trick from yesterday’s blog post, it hit me that I could do something similar to Bob Kline’s Copentro trick. If you’re not familiar with the trick you can see it here:

Essentially the difference is that Copentro has a base for the cup and then typically a stand the holds the coins to allow them to vanish. Using the coin vanish / production from yesterday (plus something else), I can now do the Copentro trick eliminating the base and stand.

Here’s a proof of concept video (nowhere near a final version):

The routine and the moves still need some practice, but I think it has the potential to be a solid little routine.

An Old Idea…

A couple years ago I was playing with using black 2.0 paint to make a coin appear. The problem with it was that it really didn’t work in an in-person context for the show. Well, in the current world of virtual shows, I can control performing conditions in the room I’m in, so I’ve started playing with it before.

Here’s a test video:

Personally I like the production more than the vanish. I like how there’s a “pop” to the coin when it appears. Now I need to figure out what to do with it and how it will be used.

Vanishing Birdcage For Younger Kids…

Not too long ago I was doing a virtual show for a summer camp. They wanted me to do one live show and that show would then be shown to the other classes. That’s fine, however they gave me the youngest group first. Normally I’d recommend doing one of the older groups first, but given the current state of shows, I can’t be too picky.

Once I knew I was going to be performing for the youngest kids, I figured I’d play a bit more. I’ve been wanting to figure out how to present the Vanishing Birdcage for younger kids, and looked at this as a chance to work on that. I really didn’t have anything preplanned, aside from the vanish.

I put the whole thing together as I did it. The hand towel I normally use to wipe my sweat, and just grabbed it and produced the bird from it. Then playing with asking what it ate, and manipulating it a bit like a spring puppet. I’m glad I got just over 3 minutes out of it, without really planning anything.

Hopefully if I sit down and do some writing I’ll be able to get 4 mins out of it! It’s fun to be using my Take Up Reel in shows right now!

It’s Not Strange…

One of the most important things you can do right now is watch other performer’s virtual shows. You can learn a ton about doing these shows by watching them. You may see stuff you dislike and it’s a reminder for you not to do it and you may see things you like and you can try to recreate those elements.

The other day I watched a performer’s first public virtual show. One of the things he did was talk about how “weird” watching a show virtually is. From the performer’s view, it’s very strange and not like what we’re used to. From the audience point of view, it’s not that strange as they are used to consuming entertainment through their computers or TV.

Personally I firmly believe in addressing the elephant in the room, however at this point it’s only strange for the performer. Unless you have a joke, trick or point of view, in my opinion, it’s now best to skip it. In March and April I think mentioning it was appropriate, but now we’ve all had zoom meetings, zoom school, we’re all familiar with it.

Also going forward, if you’re a performer and you’re not an expert on using Zoom, you need to be. Kids have been using it for school for three months, PTA meetings have been happening over it for the same amount to time. You can’t be fumbling though it anymore.

Handling the Worst Case Scenario…

One of the things that I’m doing to stay creative is hosting a live, virtual variety show. I co-host it with a friend of mine and we have to write about 10 mins of new material each show. That’s helping keep me sharp, however the shows can be stressful, a lot can go wrong!

At our show last week, right after we introduced an act, our internet dropped. It completely cut off. That put us in a strange spot, as we do the show over zoom, so the act was still going. We ended up running the rest of the show using my cellphone as a hotspot. This was less than idea. However while we were getting that set up, we had to deal with what to do the the act that was performing.

Luckily the acts we book are all pros, and have dealt with having to fill time before. While one of us was setting up the phone as a hotspot, the other was calling the act that was performing live. We explained the situation, and he did more material while we moved internet connections.

We had the worst case scenario, losing internet happen. This wasn’t just a slow connection, the hard wired internet was gone! It was very stressful! Having acts that are pros, really helped it flow and not be a total train wreck.