When I had six weeks of work cancel, I decided I was going to grow out my facial hair until my next paid show. Unfortunately that happened the other night, and I’ll never know what my full quarantine mustache could have been. The plus side is that I did a paid gig!
At the time the show was booked, it was a 10 min spot in a cabaret show with the audience’s chairs spaced out to meet “social distancing guidelines”. Then my county added restrictions on gatherings of more than 10 people and an audience wasn’t a viable option. The producer adapted and decided to do a streaming show, so we performed live at the venue for people who watched online. Then the state added more restrictions and the hosts of the show did their part live at the venue and all the performers did their acts from home, and they were prerecorded.
The nice thing about recording my set is that I could do it twice and take the better version. I cheated it a little bit and recorded each run through with two cameras, so that using camera changes I could mix the two recordings.
The downside of recording a set by yourself is there’s no audience feedback. It’s very strange, and I think I could get used to it, but it would be my last choice in ways to perform. You either end up plowing through material, or taking long pauses that are awkward.
If I had more time to plan, and not a day to shift from a venue to the corner of my office with a backdrop thrown up, I would have approached it a bit differently. I probably would have dusted off the cups and balls and done that in my set. That’s a 5 min set that doesn’t need audience interaction. I would also have planned some more visual quick things that aren’t as good in a live setting, but work on video.
Tag: cups and balls
Do It Right!
Over the weekend I got to watch many performers showcase their acts to a room full of people who book entertainment. I got to watch one magician, who I’ve known for years and he did everything right when doing the cups and balls on stage! Here’s the problem with the cups and balls, it’s not … Continue reading “Do It Right!”
Over the weekend I got to watch many performers showcase their acts to a room full of people who book entertainment. I got to watch one magician, who I’ve known for years and he did everything right when doing the cups and balls on stage!
Here’s the problem with the cups and balls, it’s not a stage trick. It’s a close up trick that takes up a lot of space. This makes a lot of performers think they can do it on a stage. Unfortunately, you cannot just put it on stage and have it work for 300 people without solving a couple of problems.
The first problem is the table top. If you are on a raised stage, the audience’s vision of the table top can be blocked because they have to look up at this. Years ago when I used to do the cups and balls in my show, I solved this by having my table sit at an angle, this is the same solution that I saw over the weekend. As a bonus it puts motion into the balls when you lift the cups and they roll, making the trick play a little bit larger.
The second problem with doing cups on stage is the balls most magicians use are very small, and usually a dull color. The ones with the crocheted covers don’t reflect light, this makes them appear smaller onstage. If they were glossy, they’d appear slightly larger as they reflect light. The magician I saw used glossy, bright red balls that were very big, at least an inch in diameter. You could see them from the back of the large banquet hall.
Take a look at your show, how can you make it play bigger, especially if you are moving from close up to stage.
Your Tricks Gotta Be Seen!
I’m frequently asked about why the Evaporation’s standard version is orange liquid. The reason for this is simple, it’s easy to be seen. Rarely will you have an orange background that you are performing in front of, so the color won’t disappear into whatever is behind you. Using things like cola, which is a … Continue reading “Your Tricks Gotta Be Seen!”
I’m frequently asked about why the Evaporation’s standard version is orange liquid. The reason for this is simple, it’s easy to be seen. Rarely will you have an orange background that you are performing in front of, so the color won’t disappear into whatever is behind you.
Using things like cola, which is a dark brown be hard to see with a dark background, or using milk in an elementary school gym against a white wall make seeing the trick difficult. That’s why I settled on Orange.
You need to think about this stuff with all of your magic. For example I love the idea of cups and balls, more specifically cup and ball(s). So a chop cup would fall in this category. My marketed trick Cee-Lo (Available from www.hocus-pocus.com) which uses 3 dice and a cup has some clever work on the final loads.
Here’s a video of Cee-Lo:
The problem is that the action happens on the table top, and if you are are a raised stage the audience is looking up at the bottom of the table and can’t see what’s happening.
There are a couple of solutions to this:
- Build your table at an angle, so the front edge is lower than the back.
- Use video projection onto a screen.
- Create a routine where none of the action happens on a table top.
The first two are pretty simple solutions, however how practical they are will depend on the venues you perform in. The third one is the one that interests me. You are now walking into fairly uncharted waters. Aside from Ball and Cone, the only other cup and ball type trick that happens in the hands is Axel Hecklau’s Just a Cup.
Axel’s routine is great, but I want to come up with my own take on an in the hands cup and ball routine. So my starting point was a baseball cap, which hand a brim that I can hold on to and a large ball, that’s an inch and a half in diameter. All of the action now happens at chest level and it plays much larger due to the bigger props.
This routine is still in its early phases, hopefully it’ll work out. Once it’s closer to being finished, I’ll start sharing some video of it.
The point of this post is simple: Look at the tricks you do and think you about what the audience can actually see!
Louie