MagicShow.Tips – Page 123 – A daily blog about magic by Louie Foxx

Using Time Wisely

When I’m on the road, I try to find projects to work on. Things that free up my time when I’m back home. A couple of weeks ago while I was on the road I was working on making my Evaporation Trick.

I found 60 of the the bottles at a store:

In my hotel room I did all of the bottle prep:

When I’m home I’ll put the gimmicks into the bottles and they’ll be ready to ship out to Murphy’s Magic Supply, then to magic dealers around the world!

Doing the bottle prep saves me a lot of time when I’m home, time I could be spending with my family. Look for ways you can use your time on the road wisely, like working on promo or whatever to free up your time when you’re home.

-Louie

Silver Rocket Box by Richard Himber

I’m a huge fan of Richard Himber’s magic. He’s put out some really interesting stuff and generally did a really good job of branding it. That’s why we have the Himber Ring the Himber Wallet and my personal favorite the Himber Pail.

At a recent auction a Himber Silver Rocket box was for sale and I managed to get it at a reasonable price. This is a box that’s about 6 x 4 x 4 inches that is show empty by opening all of the sides. The sides are then closed and you produce a lot of silks from it.

I really like the way the load chamber moves around for the production. It’s a great example of economy of motion in apparatus.

It’s a cool piece to add to my collection!

-Louie

Magic Inspiration!

Many years ago on a John Cornelius VHS tape he did a quick bit that wasn’t explained that I always thought was cool. He took a flower off his lapel and it turned into a silk. The silk then turned back into a flower. The flower disappeared and was back on his lapel. The whole thing took about 15 seconds, but was visually really cool and went full circle.

Here’s a trick that was inspired by John Cornelius’s trick:

@louiefoxx Alexander Hamilton Does a Magic Trick! #alexanderhamilton #magictrick #magician #moneymagic #surprise #cuptrick #cupsandballs #louiefoxx #hamilton ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

There’s not much to the trick, it was fun to figure out all of the small things that made it work and translate it to a bill and not a silk/flower.

This is a good example of why watching magic is important, it can inspire you!

-Louie

Take Out Boxes!

I’m getting ready to offer my Take Out Box to magicians. This is a Chinese style take out box that you can use to produce, vanish or change items. There’s a lot that goes into making thing for sale, and one of them is shipping. I made a batch in a slightly larger size but decided to go with the smaller size for the main marketed version. This was mostly due to packing/shipping concerns.

Here’s the Take Out Box in action:

I had 3d printed about a dozen gimmicks in the slightly larger size and instead of throwing them away, I’m offering them at a discount.

With the Take Out Box you’ll get a fully assembled box with 3d printed gimmick installed, a template to use when moving the gimmick to a new box, video instructions and two ungimmicked take out boxes.

These will be available through Hocus-Pocus.com and and here on my daily magic blog at www.magicshow.tips in a few weeks and will be $40.

Save $10 and get FREE USA SHIPPING!

I was playing around with making them in a slightly larger size, but decided to keep the size that I use. This choice was based on packaging them for retail sale. I made about a dozen of the larger size and if you want one of the larger ones you can get them for $30 with free shipping in the USA!

International shipping is a flat rate of just $10!

Click Here to Order the Take Out Box!

These are ready to ship out and there are a very limited quantity of the larger Take Out Box available and once they’re gone there won’t be anymore at this size available, so order now and save!

The Moisture Festival Podcast – Peter Irish

On this episode we interview 6 time world hackysack champion Peter Irish. He tells us about how he came to be considered the one of the best hackysack players of all time and how that led to him combining that skill with juggling.

We learn about his practice regime, his visual art and how he appeared in one of Adam Sandler’s worst movies. A great conversation a few weeks before his first appearance at the festival.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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Magic in Focus!

As I get older, my up close vision has started to go. Reading had gotten difficult and when I realized that during my morning writing, I couldn’t read what I had just written I knew it was time to go to the eye doctor. He prescribed me glasses for reading and what a difference it makes!

Having a new view on the world…as long as it’s about 12 inches from my face got me thinking about a trick that has to do with vision. My first idea was to have blurry writing on a notecard that then changed to in focus writing that was readable. The problem with that idea is that it’s small, it wouldn’t really play for many people, unless it was a social media video.

The next idea is better, it’d be a picture of the Mona Lisa, or whatever, but blurry. Then it changes to in focus.

This could easily be accomplished by making it like a flap card.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever do this, but I think it is a good idea!

-Louie

Production Box

One of my favorite tricks that I did last month in my school assembly show is my Take Out Box. This is a utility box that I created that can make items appear, disappear or change. In the show I used it to make a Tennis Ball Appear.

Here’s it in action:

What I like about this is that it’s a magic box that’s a normal box…well by normal I mean something that people have seen before. It’s also handheld, so you don’t need a table. Personally I’m anti-tricks that happen on a table in stage/parlor shows as the table puts a barrier between you and the audience. The table also limits the sight lines of what can be seen. The exception would be if you’re using projection.

The extra bonus is that the box is versatile. It has more than one use, unlike many other stage magic props.

-Louie

Learning About Thurston

Last weekend I picked up the Thurston Scrapbook that was put out by Phil Temple. This book is Grace Thurston’s autobiography of life with Howard Thurston. I started reading it and there’s a lot going on that doesn’t hold up to modern standards. I’m only about 30 pages into it and it’s really changed my view of Howard Thurston.

It begins when a 29 year old Howard meets a 15 year old Grace at a train station and convinces her to go on the road with him. He then takes her shopping for clothes and says that they can deduct the cost from her wages. In modern times this is human trafficing behavior. He took her from her family to a different state and now she owes him money, so she’s stuck with him. Then he gets her to lie about her age so that they can get married.

On the first few pages she casually mentions he beat her, so there’s that. I think that men hitting women was more common an accepted by society in 1898 than it is now almost 125 years later.

At the time that they met Thurston was working as a sideshow barker and much of his troupe performed in brownface. Once again, this was more acceptable in late 1800’s than it is now. These are things that aren’t really brought up in the stories that old magicians would recite about him.

A common story about Howard Thurston that older magician would tell me when I was a kid was about his preshow ritual. Howard would stand in the wings and say, “I love my audience” to himself before he stepped onstage. In the book Grace mentions several times that he refers to his audience as “suckers”. I figure I should mention this is early in his career while he’s still working in carnivals, so that may change later.

I’m curious if more of what I was told or assumed about Howard Thurston will change as I continue reading this book.

-Louie

Sanada Gimmicks!

Over the last few years I’ve started to really prefer the Sanada Gimmick over a thumb tip for stage use. I primarily use it for a bill switch and it allows me to not fold up the bill as small as with the a thumb tip. This makes it play a little bit bigger, but also I think looks more fair.

When I use something like a thumb tip or Sanada Gimmick, I try to stock up on them so that I always have them. I just had 10 arrive in the mail.

These are just for general use whenever I need them. Having access to a lot of them allows me to make some custom gimmicks with them like my tennis ball to confetti gimmick.

If there’s something you use, stock up on it, you never know when they’ll be temporarily or permanently unavailable.

-Louie