Okay, here's my minor frustration. I just bought some thimbles and am trying to work on the basic thimble palm. I have a set of the Berland's Thimble Routine, and I also have some hard plastic thimbles with concentric rings on them. The wood ones stay nicely on the fingers but are so slick in the palm position that they pop right out. The plastics palm well enough, but don't stay put on the fingers.

I tried roughing up the inside of the plastic thimbles with some coarse sandpaper, and that helps a tiny bit, but I'll extend my finger as I retrieve a thimble and it still goes flying. That gets old. And the truth is, I don't find them all that secure in the palm, even if I can hold onto them better than the wooden jobs.

So, any thoughts? I could put surgical tape in the plastic thimbles to make them easy to grip, but how about on the outside? A little beeswax maybe? Or, is there some lotion that thimble flickers use to keep those little things on?

For what it is worth, I only have minimal resources on how to use these props. I have Patrick Page's Big Book of Magic with a very simple thimble routine, and I have the Berland set. That's it. I can't afford Tarbell yet (just had to take the cat to the vet, and that was $400 for a rather unexpected problem) and I am also not ready to shell out for the few DVDs that touch on them.

So, what do I do?

-Patrick

Pat Page's book is a great resource.

You might want to also check out the book "Digital Effects, the Magic of Joe Mogar," by Steve Beam. The book includes lots of tips and effects with a good dose of humor along the way. Mogar recommends the use of plastic thimbles.

Be forewarned that while some of the tricks are fairly easy, others are heartbreakingly tough.

You can purchase spray rosin at music shops. This should make the thimbles easier to grip. You can also crush some rosin and apply it to the surfaces of the thimbles.

Check bowling supply houses to see what kind of non-slip things they have.

Rosin bag if you want to throw strikes!!

I'd love to get Mogar's book, but at the price, I just can't swing it. After some recent expenses being a whole lot higher than I had expected, I am not going to be spending any money on magic for a while. I have this whole list of books and recordings that I would just love to own but can't, for a while at least.

I like the idea of using rosin. I can powder up a little fiddle rosin and apply it. I'll see what I can do with rosin on the outside, too. That's a great idea. Thank you.

Is it cheating to make the thimbles more grippable?

If it is cheating, is that a bad thing?

-Patrick

I don't know or do thimble tricks, but I think I can answer your last two questions.

This is just my opinion: Almost everything in magic is cheating. If your goal is to pull off a good routine using the thimbles and you need a little help to make it work better for you, do it. No one's getting cheated by doing or watching an excellent routine that required a little 'help' that only you know about. If your goal is to be able to manipulate the thimbles on your own, based on your own manual dexterity, then you might be cheating yourself.

Also, I sometimes find that one of the steps in practicing something is using a device that helps me get the feel of how things should work, when I am unable to get them to work of my own skill. Rosin or powder may be the very thing you need to break through that wall to get the feel of how things 'should' work, so that you can eventually get to that without using them. This is what training wheels do.

Lick your fingers, it will help for the present.

I found, however, that it simply takes time to build up a layer of sweat inside the thimble to help traction.

Even so, I stopped using my nesting thimbles because they would still fly off, and now use ribbed thimbles as they tend to stick better. They don't nest, but the fact that they stick means I can do more furious colour changes and get better visuals.
So I've sacrificed an 8 thimble explosion for presentation, cleanliness and better colour changes. It's a tough call, but whatever keeps the thimbles on your hands and not on the floor is the best solution.

Steve

Applying rosin directly to your thimbles could make them stick together, which would be a problem if you do anything that requires nesting them.

You might benefit from applying the rosin to your fingers.

Try it out.

I think this is one of the most entertaining posts I've read in awhile.

Not sure I can be of much help to you, but you've helped me see I'm not alone with thimble difficulties. Thank you for that. I've got some inexpensive metal (aluminum, I think) thimbles that I've found slippery.

I'm using them with a larger cow thimble and have painted them green (grass) with acrylic paint. This has provided a rather dull finish for the moment, and they're less slippery. Inside I've affixed fabric band-aids, which have sized them and aided greatly in preventing fly-aways.

Don't think you'll be wanting to paint your wooden thimbles, though. I do plan on shining mine up with a more glossy top coat before performing with them- not sure how that will affect grip, but I'll certainly find out. Good luck.

There are a number of manipulation thimbles that are designed with layered rings, so that they are easier to manipulate. Unfortunately, they don't nest well. Wooden thimbles were, at one time, painted with shellac, which gives them a slight tackiness. Billiard balls (for manipulation) were also shellacked.

The wooden thimbles from the Berland set are already painted red. I'm thinking of painting them bright green. In one of my searches here, I found a person mentioning a thimble routine with green thimbles, that he tells children they are hats from leprechauns. I was tickled with that idea, though I will probably use a different patter. Thing is, I like the green better than red, which will make it more fun for me to do, even if I just stick to the Berland routine.

Bill, next time I am able to buy discretionary bits and bobs, I'm going to look at getting some shellac. That slight tackiness is exactly what I am wanting. Or perhaps, I will find some unpainted wooden thimbles at a craft store and stain them green and add the shellac over. I do want tackier thimbles (in the retention sense, but I suppose it works for the sorts of humor I inject with kids if you use the other sense of the word) and that sounds like how to get it.

-Patrick

Shellac is a very interesting finish. It usually comes in either white or clear. If you can find some clear shellac in a spray can, it may be the answer. You might find it at Home Depot or Lowe's.

As soon as I have the discretionary money for additional fun purchases, I'll be looking for it!

Got loads of work to do on the new house, and thimbles are just going to be something I do with my hands at night until the floors and doors are in. But I'll be in Lowe's and Home Depot several times over the next couple of weeks, no doubt about it. I'll at least price the shellac. If they don't have it, I can probably get something that will work from another source.

What a fun little thing this is. More like juggling somehow than like what I normally think of as magic.

-Patrick

Use adhesive tape inside the thimbles.

Pete- I have more trouble with the outsides. The silly things keep popping out of the grip.

-Patrick

Never heard of that. Do you have any meat on your hand bones?

Perhaps rosin in your thumb grip area will take care of it. I just wet a plastic thimble and can't get it to squirt out. Maybe you are trying to grip 'em too tightly?

This afternoon I called Joe Mogar, who is a thimble expert, and during the discussion I asked him about your problem. He says he has never had trouble holding onto the thimbles. The ones he uses are some that he had made in plastic for him. They are basically like regular sewing thimbles used to be, only made of heavier plastic.

He thought rosin might help.

I strongly suspect that if I could spend five minutes with someone who knows how to use these little wonders, I would be able to clear up my problems.

The next time I think I have money for magic, I am going to get Mogar's DVD (or book, if it is still available at that time) and a few of his thimbles.

Thanks to all for your advice!

-Patrick

You may be trying to grip them too hard.

Perhaps I am. They don't feel any too secure, though. I'm not putting any serious pressure on them, but I am beginning to think that I must be doing something wrong. All I have to go on at the moment are the line drawings from Patrick Page's book, and I'm trying to get better at cleanly transitioning from the grip to a finger tip and back again. Takes time.

Seems to me that I'm hanging onto them a little better than I was when I first posted. But if I move too fast with the plastic ones, they still pop off and go flying. And the wooden jobs from the Berland set stay on the fingers very well, but are really insecure in the thumb crotch.

Well, if magic were easy, everyone would do it. For now, I am just going to keep a pair of thimbles in my pocket so I can mess with them anytime I have a moment.

-Patrick