chop cup – MagicShow.Tips

A Close Up Magic Routine

There’s a new sequence I’m playing with for my stage show. This is close up magic with projection. This whole sequence is done solo, with just me onstage. Here’s what’s going on:

1: Stand Up Chop Cup: This is the chop cup routine from my 2025 PCAM Lecture Notes. This routine doesn’t use a table and is done solo onstage with no projection. It ends with the production of a tennis ball.

2: Shuffle Routine: I move to the table, with the close up camera on it. A deck of cards is introduced and shown in new deck order. It’s shuffled a few times and is spread out to show it’s back in new deck order. This is repeated a second time.

3: That Way More: This is a modified version of my horizontal Ambitious Card routine. I’ve published parts of this routine in Vanish Magazine.

4: Card in Tennis Ball: The ending of the sequence is the selected and marked card comes out of the tennis ball that as produced at the beginning of the sequence!

What I like about the sequence is that it ends with a callback to the tennis ball that was produced at the beginning of the sequence.

-Louie

Roving Magic Show Set List

Here’s what my props for a roving magic set look like:

The bottom row is my card routine, which is modular and can run anywhere from about 90 seconds to 7+ minutes. The top row are the other props that I use. Everything goes into my pockets except for the empty chop cup.

The top row is the fortune teller (it’s in my PCAM lecture notes), then my Out for Beers trick, three shell game and a chop cup. The nice thing about these props is that there’s a lot of texture I can have with my roving magic set. The opening is always the card routine, then the next trick depends on the group.

-Louie

Dice Cup Chop Cups Available

two dice on a dice cup with an eight ball

In the past I’ve made Dice Cup Chop Cups available every now and then. They were never an item that I offered on my website. I would just post them to my social media or mention them in my email list. I’ve gotten a lot of people asking about when I’m making the next batch, so I’ve made added them to my shop.

You can get them at: https://www.magicshow.tips/product/dice-chop-cup-with-eight-ball/

-Louie

Chop Cup Thoughts

Yesterday I posted about my new sequence for the chop cup, go read that and watch the video before reading this post, as I’m going to write about a few things in that post.

Here’s what I like about that routine:

1: It doesn’t use the standard chop cup move of shaking the cup with the ball, or in this case a die

2: It’s not presented as a “where is the ball,” but as what will happen to it.

3: Once the routine starts, I never go to my pocket.

For me, the big thing is that I want to remove the going to the pocket element during the routine. If you keep going to the pocket, the audience knows that’s where the big ball or die comes from. Don’t fool yourself that repeatedly going to the pocket fools them, they may not have known when you snuck it in there, but they do know where it came from.

-Louie

A New Chop Cup Routine

Last week I started working on a new sequence with a chop chop. Here’s what it looks like:

The cool thing about performing at a fair is that I get a lot of opportunities to try out different sequences to find what I like. This is what the routine looked like at the end of last week, and then in a few days I’ll be starting at a new fair and really deciding if this is what I want the final (for now) routine to look like.

-Louie
PS: Click here if you want to learn more about how I work on trick in my show.

Learn a Chop Cup Routine

Here’s a simple chop cup routine that you can learn, and do with any standard chop cup.

What I like about this routine, over many chop cup routines, is that I only go to the pocket once, and it’s not immediately before the production of the eight ball.
-Louie

Simple Chop Cup Routine

an eight ball, dice and dice cup for the chop cup magic trick

When I made a small batch of dice chop cups last week, people asked me for a video. Honestly, I thought everyone knew what a chop cup does, but I was wrong. If you don’t know what a chop cup is, it’s a gimmicked cup that will hold out a ball, or in this case dice.

Typically, this is one with one visible ball; however, in routines like my CeeLo routine, it uses three visible dice. How the normal routine goes is that a ball keeps disappearing and reappearing under a cup, then at the end, there’s a giant ball or whatever under the cup.

Here’s a quick video of a chop cup routine that I made for the people who asked:

I was just improving and did this sequence. It’s actually a pretty good sequence; it has a lot of effects.
1: Teleportation: Die goes from pocket to under the cup
2: Penetration: Die goes through the top of the cup
3: Vanish: Die disappears from my hand
4: Production: Eight ball appears

That’s a lot of magic in less than 20 seconds!

-Louie

Dice Cup Chop Cup

Occasionally I’ll make a batch of dice cup chop cups. These are chop cups made from dice cups and use a die instead of a ball.

A dice cup, two dice and an eight ball for the chop cup magic trick

I prefer using a die over a ball for a couple of reasons. First, it makes sense when the cup is a dice cup; all of the props belong together. Next, dice are white, so they are easy to see. Finally, with dice being flat, they don’t roll as much, so you won’t have them roll off the table as easily.

When you use a prop, like a traditional magic chop chop that visually looks like nothing that exists in world, I try to find things that look real to build the trick into. It’s not always possible, but it’s something I try to do. I should mention that there is value in an unusual prop as a presentation hook. For example, my O-Korto Coin Box Routine uses small brass Okito Box style coin boxes. I introduce it as my “Grandma’s Coin Box”, then there are a few jokes that go along with it. There are ways and reasons to use unusual props.

-Louie

Weed Chop Cup

Since I released my Film Can Dice Force, I have a ton of film cans kicking around and have been playing on a chop cup with a film can and “weed nugs”.

I’m trying to work out the most efficient way to arrange everything for what I want to do:
1: The magnet is in the film can, and the weed nug has a shim
2: The film can has a shim, and a magnet is in the weed nug
3: The film can and nug both have a magnet

These props are kinda unique, as the fake weed nugs have really no weight to them. So it’s hard to build inertia to dislodge them. The little bit of weight that a traditional ball has really makes a huge difference in how hard you have to set down the film can.

These little challenges make prop building much harder than people think.

-Louie

Stage Show Props

These are the props that are in my hands or pockets when I walk onstage. This is for a 90 minute theater show.

The paper will have a person’s name under “congrats”, but that will be filled in right before showtime. The paper goes in the envelope, and that, along with the mic, goes in my hands. Everything else is in a pocket or under my coat.

I will say that switching from putting the ball in my back pocket to a ball dropper to steal the tennis ball is a game changer for me! I use it in my Stand Up Chop Cup routine (from my 2025 lecture notes). The steal is cleaner, with less motion and I don’t have a lumpy butt for half my show!

-Louie