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mitchb2 Elite user 455 Posts |
Do you guys get good reactions with Shadow Coins?
I mean this is the trick that "a Saudi prince offered Michael Ammar a blank check" to teach him, right? I feel like I'm doing everything right. It looks great from my perspective. I do it smoothly, I use the patter of casting shadows. I gesture with the empty hand in between transpositions. The cleanup is relaxed. But I've done this 3 times now for different groups of friends, and I get nothing. There's no sense of awe or "How did you do that?" There's no gasping or ohh-ing on any of the transpositions. So I must be doing something wrong. I don't know when I'd be able to make a video to show, so I'm just wondering how people react when you do it. Oh, then I do Invisible Deck and people practically fall down. I don't get it. |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
Is there a routine you perform where you do get that sort of reaction?
If so, what is different about how you perform that routine?
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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mitchb2 Elite user 455 Posts |
I don't have any other coin routines ready yet.
But I do a variety of individual tricks that get great reactions. Even vanishing a silk with a TT. Shadow Coins and Chink-a-Chink always looked amazing to me before I knew how they were done, so I don't understand. And I'm not blowing through it fast, so it's not confusing. At least I don't think it is. |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
Okay, let's work with the one you do get that "great reaction" from the audience.
How do you present it?
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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Mobius303 Inner circle Lakewood, Ohio 1309 Posts |
I only had one person not understand the effect. Everyone else in the room understood ...so maybe it is the people your performing for and not you.
How many different people have you performed it for?? I always have a great reaction to it except that one person at that one show years ago. Mobius |
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doug brewer V.I.P. 1142 Posts |
My recommendations: (1) Keep performing it; (2) keep performing it; and (3) keep . . . okay, you get it. I suspect the "kinks" just aren't worked out yet, but sometimes an effect just won't click with an audience either. No worries. Here's what I would also do - don't just do this trick then stop. Make it part of a set. Then afterwards, ask people what they're favorite was - or ask them directly what they thought of that particular effect. I will even say, to particularly nice people, "here's a new one - tell me what you think". I wouldn't do this at a banquet reception, but at the bar or places I work regularly. People will usually give very honest answers if you tell them "don't be nice - tell me what you think". Nothing wrong with this - and I'd rather know now than 6 months later after a hundred performances.
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Simon Bakker Special user the Netherlands 587 Posts |
I have very fond memories of shadow coins. The conditions have to be perfect, but if they are this is truly a magical experience in the eyes of the laymen I've performed it for.
I don't do it as a seperate piece, first I do the first two fases of translocation, which I do very slowly intentionelly. After that I move the coins in a square and start shadow coins. It is the perfect build up, and really gets gasps. On the other hand, you have to be very careful, one wrong timed motion can spoil the whole impact of the effect. |
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SWNerndase Regular user 168 Posts |
I don't perform the Shadow Coins, but I've seen many magicians do it for laymen. Sometimes it is a showstopper and the most magical thing they've ever seen. Other times it is as Mitchb2 suggests--kind of a "ho hum" effect.
The difference, as always, is in the presentation. But I won't stop there, because that isn't really helpful. Since it isn't an effect I do, I don't know from experience, but from observation I think this effect requires a substantial build up to create expectation. The problem is that by itself this effect isn't about anything. It's just eye candy. So the performers who get the great reaction from it spend time creating a context and a heightened sense that we are about to see something REALLY special. Chris Korn gets the best reaction I've seen from laymen with this, but his presentation has not been published and is therefore not open to discussion here. We can talk about Ammar's presentation though and it is a pretty good example of what I'm talking about. He gets down on the floor. He talks about when magicians get together to do magic for each other and how that situation requires something extra, something special. He then deconstructs the methods that a layman might think of when watching it--and all of this builds a feeling that we're about to see something extraordinary. It gives the effect a context and a reason for the audience to care. It's a cliché all right, but the fact is that learning the mechanics and the technique are just the beginning. The hard work comes after the mirror practice when you have to find something original to say that infuses your performance with purpose and resonance, and provides your audience with a meaningful context for the effect that makes them care and delivers the effect of magic. In this case, when the effect is pretty and impossible, but not really meaningful, you have your work cut out for you. SWN |
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Fingers Inner circle Pennsylvania, USA 1330 Posts |
A while back I had someone, I forget who, but someone told me to watch the spectators eyes when you perform. Definately don't watch your hands! Well, ever since I started performing I started doing just that, watching the spectators eyes. They tell you everything. I do mean everything! You will know when your routining is effective or when it is not simply by looking at the expressions on your spectators faces. Try it and you will see what I mean, I am totally convinced it really works and it will tell you where you are lacking immediately.....
Where I go, so do my coins.....
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joseph Eternal Order Please ignore my 17407 Posts |
I watched Ammar do this one at a lecture in Detroit, and found it fascinating..
Did you perform this on the floor, as Ammar does?..
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." (Einstein)...
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harris Inner circle Harris Deutsch 8812 Posts |
Connecting with your spectators and not your hands...excellent suggestion..."Mr. Fingers"...
Harris "All thumbs" deutsch (when it comes to mechanical tools that is)
Harris Deutsch aka dr laugh
drlaugh4u@gmail.com music, magic and marvelous toys http://magician.org/member/drlaugh4u |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
If one is performing FOR an audience, it seems appropriate to keep one's attention on the audience at all times except when an extraordinary moment directs the performer's attention (and that of the audience) elsewhere.
Ramsay put it nicely and his advice is passed on through his student Andy Galloway, though both presume that the reader already knows that the performer is expected to be constantly aware of feedback from his audience. Most people don't need to hear about what is plainly evident and will wonder if you take your attention away from them and focus on such things. Though if you are doing a "rainman" or similar character in your performance such might be appropriate.
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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mitchb2 Elite user 455 Posts |
Joseph: Yes, I do it on the floor.
SWN: Great points. I didn't realy give it much build-up, other than to talk a little about the magical power of shadows. Jonathan: You asked how a present something that does get a good reaction. I'm not theatrical or extroverted, so if I have a "style," somebody commented that they like the nonchalant way I do things. I'm not half asleep like Blaine, I just use my own natural personality, which is laid back. I'm still new enough that patter feels corny to me, but I'm not one of those "Watch this trick" types. I try to put something behind it. So, for example, the particular friends that were over the other night are huge into recycling. I had a prepped can, and I waited until the conversation turned to one of her "green" topics. Then I said "Here, let me show you a new way I have to recycle." I did the effect slowly (no shaking), and I watched my friends' faces. The woman was literally waiting to breathe. She was just completely still with a half smile on her face. Her husband was watching the can and just laughing hysterically the way some people do when they're seriously being fooled. When I finally popped the top and actually poured a glass of beer, they just yelled out "No way!" "How'd you do that?" etc. So I'd say that's a good reaction to what I feel is a solid effect without a lot of talk. Same thing for Scotch-and-Soda. A simple trick without a big story, and the finish had them looking around, looking at my hands, trying to figure out what just happened to them. |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
All this discussion of the basics just got me thinking of something fun for the chink-a-chink.
Since most wear jackets when performing... how about using the COOLER thing to make the coins very cold at the end of the trick, ie when all are under your right hand, blast them good. Then... if you can arrange to have a plastic glass almost full of a super saturated solution of...(yeah you guessed it) ... after they touch the coins and deal with the first surprise, you gingerly drop them in the glass and it freezes solid. It gets cold in the shadows. You read it here first. Okay back to enrolling the audience in the magic...
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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Rob Mencarini New user 56 Posts |
Has anyone seen this performed using some sort of gaff? I saw a performer doing this where his hands never actually touch the floor. I couldn't see anything, but I assume he had some sort of extension that couldn't be seen when looking down on the effect.
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harris Inner circle Harris Deutsch 8812 Posts |
Funniest version this nearly normal guy saw was at an early Dessert Seminar...Phillippe(sic) did one where the objects visibly went across...
He also did "rocks over the head"...Sleight of hand then sleight of laughter.... great combintation.... Harris
Harris Deutsch aka dr laugh
drlaugh4u@gmail.com music, magic and marvelous toys http://magician.org/member/drlaugh4u |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
There's something in 5x5 Scotland like that.
And one guy who's been doing the trick like that for at least twenty years now named Chris Kenner (who has not published his handling).
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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Jacob Smith Inner circle Columbus, OH 1871 Posts |
I'm finding that shadow coins getting a bad reaction is hard to beleave, did you do it smoothly and let it flow like "real" magic? I did joe rindfleisch's version with only four coins and the audience gasped on the first, whent nuts on the second, and the third one they were stamping their feet and cussing out my coin comrads and i!!
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Rich B. Special user Philadelphia 632 Posts |
Here is a little tip from Shoot Ogawa. I learned this at his lecture. He did a bare handed matrix routine which used the same type of moves from shadow coins. It looked very magical during the performance. The audience went nuts. He then explained it while performing it again...this time no reaction.
Shoot did this intentionally. He then asked the question "I know what your thinking, where's the magic". He said watch...and performs the routine like the first time...the audience go nuts...very magical...even though we knew the moves. He then let us in on the real secret. Your hands (fingertips)must be floating above the table top about the height of a deck of cards (except for the part of the hand that does the move)...he used the deck as a guide. When he explained the trick he kept his hands much closer to the table...and he got the "oh...thats how its done" reaction. It takes the trick from secretly moving coins around to "Magically" having them appear by waving your hands (casting a shadow). Rich B. |
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Jonathan Townsend Eternal Order Ossining, NY 27297 Posts |
Mitch, tell us some more about how you perfrom the trick.
...to all the coins I've dropped here
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