Hey Café!

Been reading up on magic for the past month and trying to make up for never having the patience for learning proper magic when I was a kid.

I wanted to get a small sponge-ball routine down, since I like the effects and it seems like a good way to learn basic (mis)direction and sleights. I got Jay Noblezada's "Sponge" which I think is a great DVD for teaching sponge-ball. It even has a full routine, which is great.

I just have a question. The effect he does where he shows three balls, picks two up and puts the last one in his pocket. Then showing he still has three balls in his hand. (The effect goes on from here with doing it again and finally vanishing all three balls).

I like the effect, but I really dislike the "You're dumb and I'm a clever magician" angle. Could you guys help me out by suggesting some other people's versions of this effect or maybe another spin I could put on it, to not seem better than my audience?

Thanks in advance!
BB

Be creative. I also have had this same problem when I first got involved in magic. I did not know how to routine. Still, to this day, sometimes I think that I stiall do not know how.

I also wanted a great sponge-ball routine because I was also sick of the "one in my pocket" routine. So, what do I do when I want to routine? I sit down in my room, turn on some heavy metal, and mess around with the sponge balls, coins, cards, whatever I want to routine with. Then, when I have to come back out, I spend every waking moment with the sponge balls in my hand. Just trying to master a new sleight, create a new illusion, or get a different angle on a certain trick.

Eventually, with a lot of practice, you find something that you really like. For instance, in my sponge ball routine, I start off by producing the sponge ball, then multiplying it into two, then doing a variation of the "one in my pocket", then multiply them into 4 for the finale. All the while, I am giving the impression that I have no clue what I'm doing. I present myself as a clumsy illusionist who is always messing up....or so it seems. You know, I like to see myself as an ordinary guy who can do extraordinary things under any given circumstance.

That is the key to routining. Find out how you want to present yourself. You are already getting that down. Then, you will be able to vary the tricks so that they suit your style.

Oh yes. Look up sponge ball magic on YouTube. Not necessarily tutorials, just other magician's presentations. You'll get a feel for other's styles and what tricks get good reactions. You'll also see a lot of new variuations of old tricks that you might like.

I'm going to get one thing out of the way really quickly and that's this -- if you're doing the spongeballs, most of the time it's a good idea to get them to travel into the spectator's hands and then finish, moving on to some other trick. That moment is so much more profound an experience for an audience than the usual 2ITH/1ITP sequence.

That said...

2ITH/1ITP is a great trick on its own. You can use all sorts of items (not just spongeballs). Think of it as a blank canvas on which to paint any number of ideas. You could be telling a story about several different characters who keep magically jumping around. You could be telling a story about yourself, when you were a beginning magician, and your teacher gave you this test, and you kept failing. You could do it as a forgetful person... you keep forgetting what you're supposed to do next, so you keep starting over with all three in the hand. You could do it as a demonstration of quick hands. You could do Vernon's Climax To A Dice Routine with a tongue-in-cheek tone. You could use it as the finishing bit for Vernon's Balls and the Net.

And it's also perfectly ok to do it as something that just straight fools them. The only thing you have to try to figure out is how to soften the blow so that it doesn't come across as a challenge to their intellect, or suggests that you're smarter than they are. It just requires the ability to joke around with people in the right way.

Andrew is right on!
I once performed 2ITH / 1ITP with broken pieces of French fries at McDonald's, instead of "1ITP", I ate the piece ...... worked great until I ran out of fries.
BWind

For the phase of spongeballs that a lot of routines use, where two become three and so on, try giving them personalities.

I also dislike the challenge aspect of it, which kind of dares them to figure out where the third one comes from. My favorite sponge routine is with a set of sponge teddy bears. As far as I know, these are no longer on the market. However, you can name your spongeballs and still give them personalities.

Say you have Rufus, Charlie, and Bob. Bob is naughty. He likes to play tricks on people. That's why he goes in the pocket. He's having a time-out. You get frustrated at naughty Bob because he comes back into the hand when you were not looking. Talk to the ball. Tell him his time-out isn't over. Put him back in the pocket, the other balls are going to do the trick. Augh! That rotten Bob! He's back again!

My own presentation with the bears depends on this personality and mischief aspect. I think it motivates the trick pretty well.

Develop your own patter, of course.

-Patrick

Welcome to the Café, BB, and to a reawakening to sponge magic. (Mark Wilson calls it 'sponge sorcery'). So many possibilities. L&L has a worlds greaatest magic DVD devoted to sponge routines. I don't care so much for the 2 in hand, 1 in pocket routine because of what you mentioned ... the confused or conned spectator. Daryl does a 2 sponge routine in which the spectator steals the 2nd ball out of the magicians hand (thus putting one over on the magician while creating a startling effect). I don't know about sponge teddy bears; but sponge rabbit routines are widely available, and you can imagine the patter one could add with this. Anyway, great fun. Lynn

It's funny, because a couple of weeks ago I was stressing out about presentational approaches the to 2ITH/1ITP plot, and ended up writing this big old blog post about it.

http://sleightly.com/blog/2011/10/13/286......reatment

Warning: clicking that link will bring you about 2000 words on pontificating, verbal diarrhea and the general pulling of stuff from ye olde tuckus. Plus, I think I listed most of the best ideas earlier in this thread. That said, it's there if you want to read it.

I rather like Tommy Wonder's approach. "I became a magician to learn how I do this stuff".

My word!

You guys are really the greatest! I didn't dare to hope for so much great feedback! I see what you guys are saying and I'm going to try and come up with some variation of the presentation that I like. I might take a spin on the "confused magician". I'm not sure I can pull that one off in it's "pure form" (since it doesn't fit my personality that well), but I like the general idea of something being beyond the control of the magician. Kind of like the gist of some Ambitious Card routines.

Andrew > I was fortunate enough to find your blog early on and I've been reading every word since. Having your Annotated Royal Road on my Kindle next to the actual book is fantastic. Thanks for all the hard work you put into the blog. It's a pleasure to read and as a new magician, it has really helped me see beyond methods and get a taste of what magic is really about.
And I'll be re-reading the post in question. Even though I've only been at this for a month, I still feel a lot smarter now than I did a month ago. So when I originally read that post, I don't think I got it completely..
I was actually going to write you an email to express my gratitude, but this seems like just as good a place. So thanks!

and thanks for commenting on my humble newbie question to all of you!

The Patrick Page sponge ball DVD is an excellent source of ideas, and it's pretty cheap - say, $12 or so in most places. This is great not so much for the presentation, but for the routines and mechanics - and the excellent teaching. By the point he recorded the tapes, he'd been performing and teaching this material for a very, very long time professionally and it shows.
I'd recommend everyone get all 6 "Secret Seminars Of Magic" DVDs, but the sponge ball one (vol. 5) is especially good.

I also like patrick pages teaching
on sponge ball magic .he has some great routeins.
including the bension bowl routein.i also love his
dvd on silk magic.he will be greatly missed.
todd

I was always under the impression that this effect could only be performed with three sponge balls, dice, candies etc., all looking exactly alike in size, shape and color. Wiz Kid Qua-Fiki showed me how wrong I was in my thinking when he came up with his "One Fish, Two Fish" routine for three differently colored sponge fish (that he shows how to make from sponge balls) in The Wizards' Journal #20 on my site. Not only can it be done with three objects of different colors, but of different shapes, such as a version he does using three Christmas candies - a red and white peppermint ball, a white Snowman "Peep", and a green Christmas Tree candy.

Wiz Kid Wilhelmina puts a new spin on the whole spongeball routine with her "Magic Jacks" from her book "Magic For Girls", which, trust me, is NOT limited just to girl magicians, but for anyone who appreciates her creative approach to magic. The jacks, because of their shape, allow her to use new sleight of hand moves that are simply not possible with any other objects. http://www.magicnook.com/Wilhelmina-M4G/......acks.htm