Comic Time #54

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Just A Sunday Post #59

What to do with cards that are left over:

addendum

Should magic be convincing, should Dan Sperry be a Magic failure? Yes...

Here is why: What drives a magician to be on TV? What drives a magician to be in a Talent Show that is on TV? Need for admiration? Maybe! The challenge? Possibly! Hope for more bookings! Yes! A sound argument to ask for a much higher fee? Hell yeah!

Are there other reasons? I cannot think of any. Please enlighten me! Why did Dan Sperry take part in "America's got Talent"?

To get famous of course... But why in the world is he going through such a system? TV is a bitch we all know it. We all know that the show is fake. That the possible winners are planned ahead, that the audience gives standing ovations if a big sign tells them to do it. It was planned that Sperry would fail. He had no chance. But he decided to go through the system anyway. And that is "fail"!

Hardly any magic withstands the scrutiny of a camera. Unless it is specifically designed to be performed on TV. That dental floss thing was good. Certainly no talent was involved in that routine, but it plays well and was a good choice. That arm cutter thing... well it was not a good choice.

Yes, the arm looked fake. There should have been a lot of blood to cover it. And yes, Justin from iTricks is right. I don't know what went on behind the curtains of the show. Maybe he was not allowed to use blood. Maybe technical difficulties made it impossible to do that. But whatever the reason was. The lack of blood, made the trick weak. Too weak to cause a reaction.

Piers Morgan correctly stated that magic should be convincing. If it would be about imagining and letting go it would be a play of Peter Pan. If you cut out part of an arm, it better looks like you cut out part of an arm. And not like a "fake rubber thingy."

About character: What the hell is Dan Sperry trying to be? An emo, A clown, a goth? Or maybe something unique? Whatever may be the truth, he failed to get the point across.

Granted, the time he has on TV is really, really little. But others manage to do it. Maybe because the characters they try to show are less complex and much easier to grasp.

And this is perhaps how Dan Sperry fails the most, the lack of a clear character, paired with his shallow personality, that doesn't go beyond "Hi, I'm Dan."

Am I unfair towards Dan Sperry... Well yeah... That's the point. That is my character. I am the asshole. Easy to grasp, isn't it? This is rushed, and I am drunk, maybe I should have waited with this until tomorrow.

WMF Dan Sperry

If you are not from the USA... which is most of you, you might have missed it. But Dan Sperry got kicked out of an American Talent show which was on TV. Well it was about to happen. Because Dan Sperry seriously has no personality. He might have a character that he performs as. But aside from that he is pretty shallow.



When being called out for that fake arm, Sperry said.

"Sometimes Magic isn't about being convincing it's about just imagining and letting go, that's what I do!"

What a pathetic excuse. He should have said. "Yeah I fucked up..."

I hate to say it, but Piers Morgan is right, magic is about being convincing. Nothing else... oh, and about being entertaining of course.

Dan Sperry failed this week...

Mentalist's Rant

I don't like mentalism... Wait, let me say it differently; I don't like mentalism if it's connected to magic. Both may use the same methods and principles, but are perceived as something entirely different. At least in most cases.

Magic doesn't exist. A freaking coin is not going to disappear. The magician is only able to make it look like that. But mentalism... that is a whole different matter. That could be true.

And therefore I see the appeal that mentalism has to fellow magicians. Also, being a mentalist, you need a lot less props, you can ask for much higher fees and you can wear a nice suit. Mentalism, if done correctly, plays stronger than magic and it can be just as entertaining as a good magic show.

The road to mentalism is a road that is easy to take and is much more rewarding than magic. So Bless all those Mentalists out there... as long as they don't dare to do any magic.

That is my turf. Magic and mentalism do mix... but they hardly mix well. If you are not a Joseph Dunninger, who actually did the linking rings to warm up his audiences for his mentalism show you are probably doing it wrong. Even Dunniger didn't really mix magic with mentalism. He did both but not within the same act. Or even the same routine...

Like this:


This is a god awful presentation of mentalism. It is a card transposition (clearly a magic effect) with ESP cards. It is so hard to watch that video. It was sent to me by a good friend and I have not managed to look at the entire thing for months. Now that I did, I want all of those 6 minutes back.

Now here is my question, maybe you can help. Who is this horrible performer? I'd like to give him a nice little digital trophy called "Weekly Magic Failure"

Comic Time #53

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Just A Sunday Post #58

Street Magic, he is finally revealing it. Yeah! His skillz are the shit, his patter is street wise....

He puts key cards on top... two of them... just to be different. And this ain't no card trick... it's Street Magic. Word!

Sad

What it should be...




What it is like...

Astral Projection

Click here, if you wanna have a laugh. Be sure to close the window which makes a script window pop up, after hitting "OK", you click "cancel" to get to the real page. (weird scripting here)

Take a look at the video. So you know what Astral projection is all about.


This has potential.. You might think of an awesome way of stalking people, but think further. You can actually go anywhere in time and get the lottery numbers for next week.

I'm amazed that the government has not categorized this as an terrorist's tool to spy on the security systems of government buildings.

All for just 37$, damn!

But I personally would stay away from it. The video proves it. You will always travel without your penis.

You Like Titles?

Is an Award worth anything? (scroll down and look at the pictures) Well only to those who believe it is worth something and that it stands for something. It could stand for effort, creativity, originality, skill or whatever you want, compared to the effort, creativity, originality, skill or whatever you want of the peer groups.

So if you do a card fan better than anyone else who does card fans you deserve a freaking "card fan award", right? Well if that is the case... Any award is crap. It only means something to the peer group. To the rest, who is simply unaware of the details of that award, it means nothing.

Unless you tell them. And they are easily impressed by any award... as usually it takes effort to get an award. But we, who are "in the know" know that it is really, really easy to get a magic related award. Merlin Awards are practically handed out to everyone. The title world champion is awarded to not so outstanding magicians. And magician of the year is shared by more than one per year.

So I propose the following idea. Let's make up an award. And give it out to some people. It will be important, if we tell people that it is important. We could even put a nice twist to it. What if the award is actually not a positive one, that shines on success, but rather an award that glorifies failure. We could hand out the award every single week. Naturally people do not want this award, therefore there is no need to actually make them. All we need to do is to declare it online. Maybe a blog.

Yeah, Weekly Magic Failure... has a nice ring to it.

WMF Andy Field

Better stop this now, before it get's out of hand. I present a failure in the making. His name: Andy Field. A decent magician I might add. He does magic that is not self working and his "skillz" are good. (About the same level as the current world champion of magic)

So what is it all about. Well his YouTube channel is filled with many, many magic videos and a few of them are tutorials.

Here is one of them:
Gone by clever editing, instead I bring you this:


You clearly see, that Andy Field is not one of those YouTube kids just out to expose magic. He does it fairly well and even calls himself a magic teacher. So far the amount of tutorials are little, but he obviously is on the right track to become a great exposer of magic.

Andy, please stop. You are welcome to spoil any magic you create, but doing the eidetic change with with a cover of a fan was even mentioned by Marlo himself.

If you wanna do online tutorials for selected friends... well, there is the option of setting the videos to private.

Andy Field, you are this weeks Magic Failure.

Edit: Andy Field is no longer Magic Failure. He actually changed the settings of his tutorials so they are unlisted. Only those who have the link can watch them... And I am totally OK with that. That means that Andy Field has his titel revoked and that he can no longer call himself a Weekly Magic Failure. Too bad, it's a really awesome title... Even the World Champion of Magic bears is.

Andy: Good luck with your magic. Don't join the dark side.

Comic Time #52

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Just A Sunday Post #57

WMF Mentalism Peyman

I am going to implement a new rule here. You can become WMF more than once. And Mentalism Peyman deserves it.

Same reason as before? You bet, but also because he is a really, really bad magician.

Take a look:


No charisma, no plot, no character, no effect and no magic... Poor performance...

Here is another one:


Also: I thank the internet for my spam filter. The flood of emails I got from that guy is worse than Brad Jackson

And again as last time... DO NOT SUPPORT THIS MAN BY BUYING STUFF FROM HIM. Let him starve.

Snap Illusions

Ever heard of Snap Illusions?

Share your story.... zaubererroland@googlemail.com

I'd like to hear it. Unlike the green monster.

"Do Something!"

Many, many times have I seen magicians who simply don't do magic. They talk, they do funny bits, they give too much damn exposition and do not do magic...

They do 10 minutes of stand up magic and within the 10 minutes there are 2 effects. I am not kidding. I have seen a spoon/fork transposition (two effects, although it is perceived as just one effect) that lasted 12 minutes. The story that went with it was supposed to be funny. But it was not.

Here is how I solved the problem for me to not step into the same trap. I got this theory, that within one minute, there should be 4 effects. That's seems right for me. Now that doesn't mean that there should be an effect every 15 seconds, but on average this should be the amount.

To keep up to that rule that set up for myself I need to do quickies. And trust me, sponge balls, rope, coins and cards are so great to hit the audience with effects every freaking 5 seconds. This is exhausting, but if I have done so, I "buy" myself more time, to do a much more relaxed effect a little later. That rule of 4 effects per minute (the epm index as I call it) serves me well with my pacing and my choice of effects.

4 epm might be a bit to much for the average magicians, but it should not be less than 1.

And one effect in ten minutes... Honestly, what can you do to make up for that?
If you are a magician, you are hired to entertain the guests with magic. Not with funny antics or boring stories.

If you call yourself a magician, you better live up to that. Otherwise you are just a comedian... And o boy, I hate those. The failure rate among comedians is bigger than among magicians. With an interesting shared middle. *cough* Jay Sankey *cough*

Comic Time #51

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Just A Sunday Post #56

Roy Zaltsman is a professional mentalist and the organizer of the annual Magic At the Red Sea convention. When he saw the LipDub concept he decided to come up with a special idea of his own... The participants in this LipDub clip are all professional and amateur magicians. This clip was created as a non-profitable art form for fun only.

That's Why

How come that there are people out there who don't like magic?

1. Don't act romantic, if your looks don't support that!


2. DO SOMETHING! First effect after two minutes. Badly done I might add.


3. Do not over sexualize your act!
4. Don't use music that everyone connects with that one pirate movie!
5. Stop the posing!
6. Don't ridicule your assistent from the audience just to make the rest laugh.


7. If you act like a clown, don't expect to be treated like anything else.


8. If you light candles during your act, don't drop the matches.
9. Make sure half of your act isn't "powered" by Fantasio
10. If you do manipulation, don't think that, candles, a blendo, some doves, snowstorm and the cage vanish is enough.


11. If you really have a good beginning, don't bore your audience with card tricks the rest of the time.


12. Don't upload videos of yourself that are a million years old and advertise with them.

Psypher Universal Impression 2.0 is Crap

Psypher Universal Impression 2.0 is Crap

Worth money? Absolutely not. Is the gimmick stronger? Yes the pen is stronger. But that's it. The rest of the gimmick is unchanged.

The suggested routines are crap. And don't need the universal impression.

Get the first version, it was decent. The routines in version 1.0 were much better and all that Paper Crane Magic should have done was to sell the better pen. And no extra video. Obviously just an attempt to make cheap, quick money.

More on that later.

WMF Parth Dalal

The Axis Change is one of those color changes that cannot be done in the real world. I would not call the technique angle sensitive... As there is only one angle to view this from. The change was purely created to be viewed from just that angle you see in the video below.



Fact: The move was designed for the YouTube magician not for a real magician. Of course Ellusionist knew that, yet sells the impractical, unusable effect for 12 dollars.

But shame also goes to the creator, the young Parth Dalal I guess... oh wait. Ellusionist bought the exclusive rights to sell the effect. So never mind...

I think it was a smart move of the young American to sell unusable magic to a company that will sell a few of them, and then gets known for selling crap.

In Parth's case I would have changed my name for that thing and would not use it in my Résumé, but he is young, he will distance himself from that project in a short while. At least that would be a wise move.

As for Parth himself. I hope he stays out of magic. And sticks to making music. He really has a knack for that thing.

Comic Time #50

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Just A Sunday Post #55