Well - You can get the instruction with 1 coin of half and dollar or a bunch. $39.95 is right in line with a good DVD that comes with no coins. https://www.copelandcoins.com/products/r......79578379

Well, it still seems that you're partly paying for the coins, but OK, fair enough.



Correction: This is true as well for foreign currency. If you explain that this is a Mexican centavo or an English penny, they know if you are performing in the U.S. that it is currency used in a foreign country.

I too am guilty sometimes of being like many Americans in blindly and ignorantly thinking that America is the only important country in the world. My apologies.

Hey Ray and others,

I really appreciate your thoughts and adding to the conversation. The best response I can offer to all of them is: read the reviews. The people that have the products are overwhelmingly satisfied offering high praise. As you can see by the responses from people in this thread. If they have the product, they are happy to let you know of the quality.

The people that have not yet experienced it may offer critiques from the outside. But it is really hard to review a product without trying it.

I receive these critiques as the custom deck guys did 10 or 15 years ago. They say, “Look at now!”

The coins are based on real history from real locations. I would choose the word “exotic” to describe them. The coins draw the authentic history and languages from far away places to make a compelling arguement as real coins. But the reality, this proof of real comes up no more than proving any coin is real... Really do you waste valuable performance time, boring your audience on proving everything in magic is real? This is a message board conversation only. These “What if’s” waste our time, cause headache, and we could be spending this time practicing or performing.

There are 100,000s of government coins out there and I think we did an amazing job of making these coins interesting and life like. The colors are bright, but not as in your face as a new US penny... they are designed to be seen in the real world. I honestly believe these coins get better reactions by design. Because they feel right and are very visible. (A real and unrecognized problem with historic bronze and copper coins is visibility.) If the trick is not seen, you don’t get reactions. No reactions = no magic. This has been sadly overlooked for too long.

...

I hope you will give something a try. I’m sure people have taken a bigger risk than $40 on a lower rated magic purchase before. For forty you get a fully edited Video and the lecture notes that work together. In most people’s purchase history, that’s a $50 or $55 value, then you get the coins ($30) for free in the free custom album ($5) to add to your collection. Instead of giving you a useless, outdated tech “plastic disc,” I choose to invest in coins that would last you for years to come. Continued value in each purchase...

But that brings me back to “why not offer the content separately,” and I’ve gotten enough requests now, so Yes! I’ve decided to offer a streaming download only Verison because the shipping cost overseas is simply too high for some people and if you don’t want the coins, there is someone else who will. So it won’t have the coins and it will have no shipping costs and at a more traditional price point... the right option for some people. Either way, I hope you check it out!

https://www.copelandcoins.com/products/tresor

https://www.copelandcoins.com/collection....../reialme

The larger retail market has offered J.K.Rowling style Gringotts Galleons.
https://www.google.com/search?q=gringott......&bih=893

So we could mint our own clinkers and call them Downs, (and others who consent) ... encoding our history into our notes, tokens and markers.

Great to offer the training solo Jeff! As an owner of both I say -- get the coins too! You'll love it all.

BrotherJeffrey,

I think it was mostly the hype that ruffled my (and no doubt others') feathers, that it was "A MUST!" [capitalization and exclamation point in the original] We are told, "Buy out of self interest for the future of coin magic!!!!" [exclamation points in the original] If it had been announced as a new, interesting and wonderful product, I probably would not have said anything at all. But the original post came on too strong in my opinion.

And I don't like the coins. If you've had success with them, all the more power to you. I just don't see the need for something weird like that, no matter what storyline you've concocted to go along with them. We have a difference of opinion as to how much emphasis to put on the props as opposed to the magic.

I still maintain that people relate to real coins on an unconscious, visceral level more than they do to fake coins that are like nothing they've ever seen, no matter how "authentic" and well-researched the designs may be. That's just my opinion, but I have to ask, then, why on the trailer, when you are performing for laymen, do you use a normal silver dollar and not one of your fancy Copeland coins?

I'm happy you've decided to de-couple the coins from the video instructions. I like the complete vanish you performed on the trailer. I have a number of DVDs on my list, and I'll be adding yours for the future.

Ray
Very well said.

The hype in this thread is not mine. I didn't start the the post, but I will defend someone's enthusiasm for almost any product IF they have tried it.

You're picking apart years of my work without a test drive. Not a one. You could go also to Genii magazine, Linking Ring or Magic Seen and read stellar product reviews from magazine reviewers who know "product" and have tried to mine with good things to say.

I'm dragged into this conversation defending my babies, when what you really want to do, based on confession, is defeat is someone's joy.

Again, 100% satisfaction from those who have tried it. Is it perfect? No, nothing I do will ever be perfect, but the value, the thought, the ideas come across pretty strong. People that try it are happy. StarManager gambled on a new product with my name on it because he purchased my first release (Traveler) which also made him happy. He made an unpaid, unsolicited endorsement of a product. So I would say congratulations to him, or ask him a question for clarification, or anything other than try to be the color of this message board.

The thought processes getting to such questioning makes me wonder if you've considered the change of thinking for lay people since the advent of the Internet, the decline of coin and stamp collecting, and the response of clicking like and responses of "that just looked cool!" ...because you concerns aren't real world for 2018. Magic, art, performance has moved on... I may have been where you are a decade ago... but I believe your concerns are message board, think tank concerns that don't slow me down anymore. They won't slow you down either...People are too busy having fun with the magic. We just show cased copper and silver moves through out, it was editing choices why coins are where they are, less than ten percent of the material taught is color changes. We tried to show off copper coins with close up shots and not be redundant. director's choice. The moves work with anything flat and round.

On the coin design:
The Tiger coins are based around historical coins from Southeast Asia from the last century and the Kingdom coins has a resurgent medieval theme true to the geography and time. Name call if you like. I feel like this opinion is welcome to a message board. It deals with the product! The ideas are from history. They have been scrutinized and gleamed from dozens of coins from the areas. My graphic designer literally used ideas from the coins in his pocket. He lives in Indonesia!!! So call the coins names, it's just not what YOU are used to seeing. The Morgan dollar is probably one of the most criticized yet highly collected US coins, I'm in good company.

Rick asked a few posts back how the coins were received at conventions. Well, let's just say I'm going to 7 conventions this year as a part-time company. I could have stopped after the second... We are filming and producing more. People are happy with the products!

Right on Mr. Copeland. Can't believe you need to go on DEFENSE here after what you're providing the community.

Ray - You said you don't like the coins. Did you HOLD ONE or are you ignorant of the materials, workmanship and non-tarnish value these coins bring which are not available any other way?

[quote]On Aug 14, 2018, Ray Haining wrote:
I think it was mostly the hype that ruffled my (and no doubt others') feathers, that it was "A MUST!" [capitalization and exclamation point in the original] We are told, "Buy out of self interest for the future of coin magic!!!!" [exclamation points in the original] If it had been announced as a new, interesting and wonderful product, I probably would not have said anything at all. But the original post came on too strong in my opinion.
==============
Re Hype: I stated the above (A MUST - Etc . . ) in my initial post opening this thread. If I was the manufacturer, then I think you have a valid point. I am, not. I paid full price for what I received. I was thrilled. I wanted to share. I stand by my statement (my personal opinion as a consumer) that this is revolutionary training - the system itself is better than anything available for coin training before AND that the content includes new and very valuable thinking for beginners to very expert coin guys.

I managed Hollywood's Magic corner for years, toured the world as cruise ship and convention magician. I've hung out with the greats in coin magic. I am a current Murphy's dealer. I'm buying Copeland at RETAIL not wholesale and loving every dime spent! I know my stuff. I'm sharing with the community. To call that HYPE is BS.
============

[quote]On Aug 14, 2018, Ray Haining wrote:
And I don't like the coins.

Did you touch one? Hold one? Work with one? Best not to opine here if you have not. These are superior in low light to any copper coion I've wever seen. They are tarnish and hence POLISH FREE. They grip. Fantastic choice.

Money makes the world go around ... fictional worlds too

Sorry if I missed this detail if mentioned earlier - how do the coins sound when counted onto your hand or dropped into a glass?

Well, I seem to have hit a nerve here. A few more remarks and I am done.

BrotherJeffrey, nobody is dragging you into anything.

You engage in a couple of ad hominem arguments. You state: "...what you really want to do, based on confession [?], is defeat is [sic] someone's joy." You say I should "[do] anything other than try to be the color of this message board." (You mean green with envy?)

You state: "You're picking apart years of my work without a test drive." Since we are using a car analogy, I can look at a car and without giving it a test drive decide it is not for me, just based on what I see with my own two eyes. This is what I have done with your coins. I don't need to give them a test drive. They are not for me.

You make assumptions about my thinking. You state: "... I believe your concerns are message board, think tank concerns ... ." This statement is completely divorced from reality. Quite frankly, I don't know what message boards or think tanks you are talking about.

You talk about how people have changed since the advent of the Internet, how people think differently today. You state: "... you [sic] concerns aren't real world for 2018. Magic, art, performance has moved on... ." To that I will reply, "The more things change, the more they stay the same." A vanish using a retention pass and ditch may be "oh so yesterday," but it is just as effective today as it was 50 years ago--and will be 50 years from now.

If you want to know where art--all art--is and is going, I suggest you read From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, by Jacques Barzun. (Barzun wrote it when he was in his 90s. He only recently died at age 104. It is a work of incredible learning.) It's not an easy read, but it drives home the point that there is not much left that is new under the Sun.

There's a marketing aspect to what you are doing here. I would wager that you've studied marketing, formally, perhaps taken a course or two. I could be wrong. But everything about this project smacks of marketing: the packaging, the "cool" names of the products (such as "Reialme" and "Tresor"). You have a graphic designer, for God's sake.

So let's not pretend this is all about the magic. You're into selling products, which is OK, but I believe you are P.O.'ed that I might have put a damper on your sales, which, I suppose, is understandable, although you may see a spike in overseas and domestic sales of just the "training" since you have decided to de-couple it from the coins, depending on the price, though.

From the trailer, I can see that you are a good-looking guy who seems genuinely to enjoy performing magic. You appear likable. These are qualities that will serve you well in your performances. You're also a competent technician.

You still haven't answered my question as to why on the trailer when you perform for the camera (i.e. for magicians) you use one of your Copeland coins, but when you are performing vanishes for laymen you use an ordinary silver dollar. Maybe you get better reactions when using a silver dollar? Maybe when you use the Copeland coins the interest becomes too much about the coins and not enough about the magic?

StarManager, I would say that calling hype as hype is not BS. It is the hype itself that is BS. And OK, you like the product. I get it. I still feel your praise was over the top: hyperbolic statements, statements in all caps, statements ending in multiple exclamation points. This was my favorite: "Buy out of self interest for the future of coin magic!!!!" ????

And what your credentials have to do with anything, I'm not sure. I wasn't questioning your integrity.

================
Hello Jonathan,

Both coins sound like clad Half Dollars to me in all respects. They look and feel and are solid. The one with the ape from TRESOR is actually copper and the one with the hole from REIALME is steel. I love the REIALME one because of the mag holdout possibilities and the flashy yet dark nature of the scallops in one side. If a real government made them they would be real.

Let me splain something to you.

I created Matrix in 1970. In 1972 while at a convention in Milwaukee, Larry Jennings dragged me up to Bill Larson's room at the hotel where the convention was being hosted. Mr. Larson took pics with a Poloride camera, gave them to me, asked me to write instructions, and send it all to him so he could put it into his magazine called Genii. That happened. The trick went around the world like wildfire. Shortly after that, when I went to a convention, every table in the close-up show was doing Matrix. When I walked into the room I could hear whispers from all around the room saying, "That's the guy that invented Matrix." Bill put an ad in his magazine selling the issue with Matrix as a book teaching the trick. Do a search on Youtube and see how many people do Matrix and/or teach it. The number is vast. Look how many people invent their own version and use the name Matrix. Why don't they call it Sympathetic Coins from the trick I derived the routine from? And look at the original version. The moves match how a real magician would manipulate the cards if he were duplicating the effect. And guys like you use old technology to improve it and claim it is better. I have performed Matrix for audiences up to seven times in a row and they shake their heads saying, "You could do that a hundred times and I would never see how that happens." Look at the history of coin magic and count the number of books devoted to coins before Matrix appeared. The number is not very large. How many books are published today on coin magic. Matrix was the turning point in all of this. There are many other points of the effect of the original Matrix effect.

I can't help but share another one. Paul Harris came up to me one day and apologized for telling a layman how Matrix worked. He said he was working in some nightclub and a customer asked how the trick worked. Paul told the customer that he could not reveal the method. The guy pulled a 45 out, laid it on the table, and said, "How ya do dat?" Paul said he explained it.

Some punk invented a card trick called Matrix. I contacted him inquiring the use of the name I invented. He said, "Who the **** are you?"

Now, I am humbled by this. People ask me what I feel about the number of times the name and effect has been stolen from me. I say I cannot express how I feel. It doesn't matter anymore.

Brother, I chose to disassociate you from Starchild in the stupidity of an over the top marketing push of very mediocre stuff. But you have the gall to claim this is the best thing since sliced bread that will revolutionize the industry. To me you have very high skill. However, to me your understanding of magic theory is weak. Your hand waving is not magic to the audience but a message that says, "I can hide a coin and you can't see it.

I guess your coins are cute. I'll bet you spent a bundle getting them made and wondering if you will ever get your money back. Been there, done that.

As far as your special teaching tech. Been done long ago. Some company I think called RealVideo had a pretty fancy system linking text, pics, and video. Though that was never applied to magic. I came up with one myself using HTML. Hey man, nobody cares.

Now, I suspect you and Starchild will blast me like a number of people have many times on this forum. Have at it. Get in line.

StarManager (not Starchild) here Al. That's my "handle" because I manage some of the biggest named stars on the planet and it is a respected name in some rarefied circles of show business.

I have enough respect for your contribution to the art and science of our craft not to resort to calling you names. But I sure think about it and need to contain myself, Sir.

I don't know why every conversation you have is about how important YOU are. Glad you created Matrix. Really. But you're just WRONG about Copeland. He's very talented technically. His effects are solid and have lessons learned from the likes of you, Jennings, Roth and Slydini. He's doing the community a service. And you do not have his work - either the training or the coins - and yet proceed to blast him. Inappropriate and downright dishonest Al. Never thought of you that way. Always associated you with integrity before now. How about you recuse yourself from these discussions with your opinions that are baseless UNTIL you have purchased the product and can give it a fair review? How can you opine on any of this having not EXPERIENCED it? And you carry legendary weight and should be extra cautious in dissing things you do not even own.

Magic folk who like coin work: Copeland has a new system for learning and some coins that are cool and show up in the dark to contrast with your silver. Try it if you like what you see in the trailers. I did and love it all! That's reality talking -- not theory. And that is what the POINT of this board is! Sharing our experiences in the topic, not dissing an innovator when you don't even have his work to evaluate.

You're tarnishing your own legend. (BTW - Have I mentioned Copeland copper coins do not tarnish as they are coated? - I LOVE that!)

Shame on you, Al!

Let me put this a different way.
You are running a ME TO marketing plan and it is boring.

Hey Johnathan.

I think Starmanager is correct, compare the sound more to clad than silver just to be safe, that's a fair description. The Tiger coins are pure copper and heavier than clad coins I believe, so it's a little purer ring. The Kingdom coin has that cross cut out, so it sounds a little different, but still surprisingly solid. I don't know the physics of the densities of metals, but gold and silver obviously some of the more dense, produce that pure ring... Copper not too far behind. Steel in the Kingdom coin is closer to the nickel alloy in clad, maybe? They will not sound like some festival token or the imitation Chinese coins on the market, much better than those! I hope that helps. Good question.

Ray,

Thank you for the complements and assumptions. They are not entirely accurate, but fairly stated, and if I'm coming across as a polished marketing guy that's fine by me because I do care about my work. I'm just a thinker and ask, "how do I want people to treat me?" and "What should it look like?" Then I answer, "Let's do it!" I tried to answer your questions best I could. The Editor's choice in the video to use tricks highlighting the copper coins in close up since they are part of the project, balanced with the silver. We literally performed for three groups of people a overcast day in a tourist town. As you can see by the shots, the people were friendly, but we didn't have much to choose from. I still think there is a misunderstanding, the coins are the prize in the cereal box and not the focus of the 20 something sleights taught. That being said, I know from experience and so do hundred's of satisfied people, a few in this thread, the reactions are there and the coins don't disappoint.

Thank you for the book suggestion.

Thank you for picking up on the marketing aspect. That is one of the highest praises you can give me and it's some of the greatest 5 star feedback we have received. People are happy with their purchase. It brings joy. It's marketed well and doesn't disappoint, delivering above expectations. I believe that there is a certain confidence given to a performer when they feel the tricks and props matter. I feel that confidence is one of the main things that holds performers back. I try to instill strength and pride in performers with ever aspect of my work and even the packaging. I believe that is part of the teaching process. Everything I do has a purpose. From creating a new teaching method, DAVE, which makes learning easier and somewhat interactive, to encouraging live performance. Again, from the users who have made purchases, the results are in. Its a good thing.

How many other projects through out the years have been presented amazing in an ad, only to show in the mail as up a rubber band, a paper clip and xeroxed instructions thrown into a plastic bag?

You will not receive that from me. If my name is on it, it stands for something.

Does this thread help or hurt sales? I don't know ultimately. It does create awareness. But most of my traffic doesn't come from here, it comes from reputation and word of mouth, other social media.

SO, if I've done my job and StarManager is pleased and elated! So be it! Let him shout! Anyone else here reading this, give it a try! It's new. It's different. It's got ridiculously high ratings from around the globe and the major magazines. I don't think you'll be disappointed in value for a small $40 risk. Plus I think there is something to learn. Check out the July review in Genii. It's straight up if you don't care for StarManger's take, but it says the same things in different words.

I've got work to do. I'll make that my closing thoughts and bow out for now. StarManger. Thank you for starting the thread, thank you for your enthusiasm! Thank you for other purchasers who have chimed in and offered feedback!

I just noticed this thread has 52 "likes" to date. To me that means I was able to share something new that I like with a bunch of pretty serious coin magicians. I'm thrilled to have been able to make that impact. I hope it has been helpful to the fraternity. Copeland is good for us.

Starchild
I would like to point something out. When I dropped into this forum and tripped into this thread there was only one post, the original one you entered. There were 60 views which is probably the number of people that view this thread over and over. There were no other posts. I thought that odd, so I helped you out.

The size of this thread is due to me. You guys can brag about your power but I made it happen.