Hello! New member here...newbie!

I've always noticed that some hand and finger moves made by magicians seem a bit unnatural, in other words - you wouldn't normally pick up a card that way, or hold a coin that way, but when watching, that thought vanishes quickly as I continue watching the routine, then I am fooled anyway.

So obviously, the goal is to make things look as natural as possible as much as possible, but are there times when a bit unnatural is ok as long as it's effective? Or is it not as good if it doesn't look as natural? not talking about any effect in particular, just the principle in general.

Well if you were talking to Dai Vernon, he would insist it must look both natural and you must have a reason for doing it. And to be honest, I'd have to agree. Yes, there are a lot of moves that don't look natural, and I suppose some flourishing type moves are common in most magic performances. The key is to make the move look as natural as possible, so if picking up a card a particular way is part of a "move" then perhaps you need to pick up the card that way when your not doing the move as well, at least then it looks consistent. Most moves can be made to look natural. There are certainly some flourish type moves for both vanishes and appearances that never look natural, I generally perfer to use a move that is more natural looking, but to each his own.

Read some great posts about being "natural" here:

http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewt......forum=27

Best to ya,

Yikes, I just posted on this very subject, but in another area. Here is what I said as concerns the Elmsley Count and whether the finger tip or in hands version is better, etc. ....

Use what works and seems most natural for YOU. Consider that NONE of the ways that magicians use to count cards are in any manner natural. Hand four cards to any non magician and ask them to count them. Know what most of them will do? Take a card from the four, verbally count one, and then place it on the table. Take the second, count two, etc. ONLY magicians count cards that way we do because we intend to manipulate them in some way. If you think about it 'naturalness' as applied to a lot of manipulations is really very funny. What we really mean is that we are attempting to be 'as natural' as we can be and that's as it should be. In some cases we can achieve a high degree of normalacy, but where we can't we go for the best we can. Consider the lowly French Drop. Probably no more odd looking action has ever been used to vanish a coin and yet done smoothly everyone here knows that it will FOOL folks and actually look quite magical. Best,

It depends upon how you define effective. If the move you are performing raises suspician in the audience, and that is not your designed intent, then I would say that the unnatural move is a problem even if the audience says "I don't know how he did it but something happend at X" the point where you performed your move. Some might say that it is effective as someone doesn't know how you did the effect, but they know you did something. This puts the effect into the category of a puzzle rather than the category of a miracle or magic. The answer to your question depends upon what your goal is. I can think of a few ways to deal with "an unnatural move"

1. If the audience doesn't see it then it doesn't matter. i.e. misdirection.

2. Create the situation so that what you are doing makes sense. i.e. there is a logical reason, from the perspective of the audience, for what you are doing, other than if I don't do this the trick won't work. I believe Michael Close addresses this on vol 4 of his video series "Very Very Close".

3. Make the move look natural.

Yeah yeah, natural, shmatzeral. I will usually ask my wife to do any movement that I'm trying to mimic about 3 or 4 times. "Take this coin in your left palm, then use your right hand to hand it to me."

I'll study hard and fast how she does it - because, on the fifth time she'll do it differently. I tried filming it on the first time, but she does it unaturaly the very first time when I do that. So I have my son do it, my daughter, my daughter-in-law and they'll ALL do it differently, subtle differences.

I finally decided that there just ain't no such thing as natural.

Still I strive for natural, or what I figger is natural.

But there are other times that I don't even try. There are times that I just am going to do something that is unnatural. Let me tell you a story.

Fred Donaldson told me that he performed with Blackstone Jr. once. It was a big room and they were doing dinner theatre. The performance area was smack in the center and raised a little. The master magicians were to perform surrounded. (sigh).

Fred watched as Mr. Blackstone came out in his evening clothes with a big cape. It was black on one side and lined in red silk that glimmered in the lights. He swung and spun that cape like a matador. All eyes were on him as he danced to the stage area. Then he tossed the cape into the air and when it came down there was a shape under it! He whipped off the cape and there was a live goat!

"Do you KNOW how he got that goat there? Do you? Huh?" Fred would sometimes get animated. "He CARRIED the da**ed thing in under his left arm. Everybody was so busy looking at that shiny cape spinning around that nobody noticed that under his left arm was a white goat butt!"

Ain't nothing natural about a goat butt under a magicians arm. You just need misdirection for that.

My favorite quote on being natural is by David Townsend:

"Not sure that there is a "natural". Perhaps congruent, efficient and consistent but no idea about natural. Each character has its own nature, priorities and those seem to give rise to mannerisms."

He uses some fancy words, but boy is he right on target. If your intent is to provide a visually stimulating display, do flourishes and flips, but not at the sacrifice of the effect. Otherwise, do the action without secret moves and try to match that as best you can.

If one does the most natural movement badly then you've accomplished nothing. Perhaps what we all really mean by natural is that the sleight or technique is done very, very well. That is, smoothly and without apparent effort and thus it becomes invisible to the viewer. Best,

I'm working on a routine which involves doing something sneaky while I turn over a deck of cards. I am proud of my "natural" handling of this sleight, and have used it many times to great success in another effect. But for this routine I wanted to turn the deck once with no move before doing the sleight. When I went to practice in the mirror I saw my handlings were completely different for both turns. A proven "natural" move had lost it's naturalness through lack of consistency.

If you do some odd movement that doesn't have a purpose, people will backtrack to that point. Thinking "he did something at that point" is just as good as figuring it out for some people.

To my understanding:

Natural means that whatever you do doesn't look odd from the spectators point of view. There are many subtleties that we do when performing, that if we stop and analyze them when we do them, they wouldn't make sense. However, the spectators are very unlikely to notice them.

eg. when doing a double lift(turonver): why turn the card on top of the deck before placing on a different place. We notice this, but real spectators never sees anything strange. (if done properly)

Dai Vernon, had great insight regarding being natural. Everything would make sense for him to do the move. eg. why he would transfer a coin to the other hand; hand positions where very important, etc.

I guess the important thing is that it makes sense to real spectators, so they would not suspect anything when the move is done, and they will only see the effect.

Wil

Here is my humble opinion, I would of course go with natural movements, but there are just some effective sleights that does the job. Unnatural yet effective sleights with effective and good motivation, should solve the problem. Let me try to explain. Take a look at the cups and balls move. The taking of the wand makes the transfer of the ball to the other hand, logical.When doing a one hand t#p p88m, the magician rolls up his right sleeves, then the "move" then transfers the deck to the other hand to roll the other sleeve. Slydini seem to have mastered both!

Rannie

I still say that making your moves look natural just means you should look like that is how you always do it. There isn't realy such a thing as a natural move of any kind. All people move and act differently. There may be some trends, but it'll be a scant %50, if that. Your moves don't need to look like everyone else would move if they did it. They need to look like a natural choice to achieve what you are attempting to achieve. In other words, they shouldn't look like an awkward action, and they shouldn't look like it's the first time youve moved in that manner. Your DL should look like that's just the way you flip a card on the top of the deck.

Natural = smooth and unhurried. Unnatural = awkward, hurried, clumsy.

Telegraphing - where the position of the body and eyes shows the audience where something is hidden, instead of where the magician wants them to think it is - incongruent body language.

Speed - tricky in the minds of the audience. Slow and eeliberate and also = tricky. A motion done in an offhand, unthinking manner, with no importance attacked to it is less likely to be thought of as "tricky."

Speed kills... moves. Usually. Flip Stick and the classic pass may be two exeptions that test the rule. But those exeptions are few and far-between.

Eye pointing also kills. If you put something in your right hand LOOK at that hand, NOT the other hand, unless it is going to pick up something else!

Hope that helps!

Lee Darrow, C.H.

I am totally with Drew on this. Virtually every move we do looked odd when we first started doing it. I had NEVER seen anyone Hindu Shuffle, but I learned it anyway and still use it. Then a friend from overseas told me that probably 3/4 of the world shuffle that way and not in the manner WE in the US are used to! Do any action until it is automatic, smooth and faultless and it will look totally natural to the observer. By the way I am taling about moves not static situations like palms. A bad palm is not a good thing. If you look like crab boy you may want to rethink the position of the coin in your hand. But, once the coin begins to move from the hand to someplace else, then the smoothness and effortlessness with which that movement is accomplished will make a big difference in the overall effectiveness of the sleight. Best,

Another thing to consider is that "normal" is a relative term. As a magician you do get a bit of leeway as to what is considered normal. People are going to accept that you handle objects in a slightly different manner than they normally would due to your great amount of study in magic. The Hot Shot Cut, for example, is in no way normal, but still quite magical (if done naturally, see the connection?). Now, I'm not suggesting that you have a carte blanche to manhandle your cards, coins, silks etc., but you get the idea. Just as a master painter would handle his brushes differently than someone who just wandered into an art studio for the first time, people expect that as a magician you might do things a bit differently than they would. As long as your moves look "natural" they're going to be magical.

I just thought of an old comedy western. Don't remember exactly what it was, but the hero was a dentist. He could shoot extremely acurately, but he had to do this odd little ritual and stand in a very awkward manner to shoot as well as he did. The point here is, if you are good with magic, people tend to accept that if you held/did things the way everyone else did, you would just be average. This theory applies particularly well to my first love, cards.

I'd agree with all above that you should do your moves as natural as possible, or has a reason of doing it. But, if it simply can be done very naturally, nor do you have a reason doing that move, one solution is verbal MISDIRECTION. Use your words to cover your move.

Say, if that move isn't important, then think about a joke or a question to speak at that particular point.

Just my 2 cents.