Hello guys. I'm doing a manipulation act and I would like to get some comments from you, professionals, people who have been doing this for years. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZvj-AQNmbQ
This is not yet the full act.

RJH

1. The fabric of you jacket seems to be flimsy, which is not suitable for performance.

2. You need to refine the steals. Try to give a motivation or reason to justify: why your hand is there?

3. More eye contacts are preferred at certain points.

4. Do you have any background music for this act? Normally silent acts have that accompanied.

5. I assume you have a more visual ending for your complete act.

Keep the good work up, you have put quite a lot of time into practicing

1. I will be using a suit in the show, now I just practised the moves and steals.
2. Yes, my steals are kind of bad, could you give me any more tips on that?
3. I agree.
4. My backround music is Piano guys cover of Adele's Rolling in the deep.
5. My ending is Modern times, it is a very visual card color change.

After the end of the video will be a sequence of fan productions, and after that, the Modern times.
Thanks.

RJH

You have obviously been practicing your moves! great job.

advice I can give

1. wear your suit when practicing. wearing your sweatshirt for practice and then the suit for the show will lead to mishaps! its ok to practice the moves in general but when performing your whole routine in practice wear the actual suit.
you will find that the suit functions different then the sweatshirt therefore you may find a move does not work right or you built up a habit with the sweatshirt that wont work with the suit

2. slow some of the moves or the productions a bit. let the audience enjoy the magic. (i am not saying slow the "secret" I am saying with some of the productions take a moment to acknowledge the audience verses just bam bam bam non stop productions.

3.this is a personal thing but I really hate the cards being dropped all over the floor. I know it seems to be the "cool" things these days but it to me seems sloppy and un cool.
I would rather see the cards being dropped into some sort of container or other type of Receptacle. I don't mind a few cards for dramatic effect being thrown about but to drop all of them on the floor is just...well lazy in my mind.
again this is just my opinion.

great job keep up the great work.

sam

I agree with Sam. Practise your full act in your performing costume. Levent pointed out a few stealing tips in his ball DVDs.

Personally, I feel the colour change might be a bit weak as a finale. As Sam mentioned, you might want to use a top hat as receptacle, or install a card fountain inside the hat.
A common alternative is card fan to jumbo card fan. Or you might consider something entirely different, for example: under the cover of the card fan, produce an appearing cane as a surprise to end.

Sam, thanks for the tips. I agree with the slowing down, but what parts do you mean? I will have a top hat, might drop couple of cards there.

Absolute, I will be doing the color change, and then the card will turn into confetti, my mentor has 2 card fans to jumbo fans so I might consider that. I don't have a card fountain (I would love to have that).

RJH

RJH,

Levent¡¦s Fundamental Rules of Stage Magic:

1. When making a steal, the visible movement should have a natural motivation.

2. The big movement masks the smaller, secret movement.

3. When palming an object onstage, you have only a few seconds before you must either produce the object or add a visible object into the fingers of that hand.

4. The easiest way to secretly dispose of a palmed object is to discard it under the guise of picking up a visible object at the fingertips.

5. The simplest way to steal and palm an object is under the guise of picking up a visible object at the fingertips.

6. Secretly maneuvering a palmed object from one hand to another is better if the procedure employs a visible object.

7. Deception can be enhanced by lengthening the time between the secret move and the magical effect.

8. When stealing an object from inside a coat under cover of misdirection, it is more deceptive to have the object travel to the palming hand than the other way around.

9. When performing a routine with a repetitious effect, it is more deceptive if you vary your methods.

10.You should only break these rules, if you fully understand the rules and can offer an intelligent reason for breaking them.

c 2012 Levent Cimkentli

Thanks AbsoluteZero
RJH

Anymore tips/ideas for me?

RJH

Okay kid, are you ready?

1. Stand up straight, shoulders back and stomach in.
2. Smile and look at or into the camera, they are your audience.
3. you are waving your arms around with no certainty or purpose.
4. Arm spreads are from the fingertips to the elbow. Not from the wrist to almost to the elbow. Make it look hard, like you might fail. Put your whole body into it. Bend your knees and your whole body leaps, propelling the card into the air, where you catch them.
5. Steals are made quickly, so when your left hand goes for the steal, your body turns to your hand bend at the elbow. The arm does not move, your body twists to the left, then returns. This is what Absolute Zero was saying.
6. Get a container knee high to drop the card into.
7. Think exciting thoughts, you want them to like you, and your magic.
8. The kick from the floor is very lazy looking. It should be a "KICK" of the cards to the hand. A snap action.
9. When you swing your arms out, make it quick and firm, then stop, produce the cards, and stop. Maybe tighten your hands to emphasize your what you are holding.
10. All you are doing now is a collection of moves, you need to perform and show some personality.
11. All the cards are to be produced and held face flat toward audience.
12. It is time to stop doing moves and start rehearsing!! Put your suit on, and perform.

There is 2 kinds of manipulation, skill (look at what I can do), and magic (causing things to appear by magic). You have mixed them which is okay, but your hand washing and pop up cards are skill. Pulling cards from the air is magic. You have to think this in your head when you are doing the complete moves.

Think, what do I want the audience to see what I am doing. Then show them.

I suggest you get this Utility Drop Box to drop your cards into. It fold flat for packing. Put it on a short table that comes up to your knees.

http://www.laflinmagicstore.com/ProductD......e=MPDUDB

Good start, now get rehearsing!

RJH,
At your age and skill level, I recommend less body steals and steal from a table. This is some of the best advice given to me from Jeff McBride. My routine uses one deck of cards with no body steals. DO NOT disregard this due to its simplicity, it is a lot better to do open steals from a table or hidden table steals than flashing all of your body loads.
Also, and I'm not saying this to be a jerk, but your spit fans are terrible. This will come with more practice, you need to re fan the discard cards after the split in order for it to be convincing. Again, I'm sorry if I sound like a jerk.
Also, your hand relaxed and gave us a BIG flash of your stack.
You need to give the audience cues to applaud, you are just in your own world performing for youself. You need to practice standing still for at least 4-5 seconds in a pose to get applause. You will also get applause if you SMILE. You were dead pan the WHOLE time. In order to look and be a professional, you need to move, smile and act like one.
If you practice in those clothes, then when you perform you will be wearing different clothes and you will make mistakes.
ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWYAS, practice in the costumes you will perform in.
I am 14 years old by the way, if you have any more questions, PM me.

How about NO steals at all? Why complicate?

It seems to me you're overly excited - that's comprehensible. Now try and get minimal. Relax. Do some jogging, go crazy on Karate and spend your extra energy.

Now think of ways on how can you "dry out" your routine from EVERY SINGLE ACTION, be it a move, a steal or a production (and especially that dreadful shoulder '"whatever" expression' whose name for I completely forgot) that can / must get ridden of. Try and identify the core essentials of your routine and how can you improve them instead of splattering different sleights and lnger series of single prodctions. The Double Perfect Production is ultimately needless at this point, both technically and routine-wise for you, IMO. You haven't even perfected your Cardini's yet, so why bother with advanced stuff?

My card manipulation routine uses only one body load, but that is for the sole purpose of the finale - even then, I could resort to a no-load finale if I wanted (e.g. Cards from mouth, or just a fancy pose - whatever would possibly float my boat).

Bill, thank you for your advices, they really help.

Elliot, the final routine uses 1 and half deck. Yes, my split fans suck, I might change that sequence.

Fabio, no steals are not my style...

Thanks for you advices. They really help. I will now change my routine and see if I like it or not. THANK YOU!

RJH

Alright, but keep in mind you can easily keep a single deck of cards throughout your whole routine if you use them wisely.

Okay, thanks.

RJH

Actually, I like the shoulder shrug, it shows some humor and that says, "Oh, Well!" What this needs a more acting, emphasis on why you are shrugging your shoulders. Look, hold for a beat, then shrug. A smile will help at this point. Then look at the audience. Then continue.

The Shrug shows and indicates indifference or lack of knowledge (from the dictionary), so through acting this should be conveyed to the audience.

Hehe, that's right.

RJH

Body loads complicate things, if you really want to, you can keep some in. But I recall seeing you drop a WHOLE stack of cards, then reaching with that same hand for a load. You can easily split off some of the cards you drop and completely eliminate that steal! With the loads, you are working very hard for little pay off. Like what Fabio said, you can use just 1 deck if you use them wisely. My routine is about 4 minutes. With one deck, no loads, and a finale. Keep this in mind. It is not too late to change your routine.

I pretty much concur with everything that's been said. However, I will say that on the matter of steals, there is no RIGHT/BETTER way. All these methods have been used by various people with great success. Cardini did his card manipulation with body loads, Jeff McBride/Charlie Frye do card routines with no loads at all, actually I've seen relatively few magicians using table loads. My advice would be if your card routine is going to go in a show, then avoid body loads. Either do table loads, or avoid loads altogether. If it's a stand alone act, body loads are a possibility. Also don't be afraid to mix methods. It's actually more deceptive to vary your methods because even if they suspect one method, it still doesn't explain the whole act. I personally have used all three methods at one time or another, and don't really have a preference. Again context is king.

Lastly, about your spit fans. Again in MY OPINION there isn't a "right" way. Some people prefer to split the fan and spread the remain cards before the toss, others prefer to split in the action of tossing away. Again both methods have been used by different people. Jeff McBride uses the first method, Cardin used the second method. I prefer the second method, Elliot obviously prefers the first method. Whatever you want. Just practice, practice, practice.

Good Luck.

-Leo

I'm sorry, I am obviously mentored by Jeff McBride, but my personal feelings are that split fans are less convincing if you don't re fan the stack. If you just toss them away immediately after like cardini, then it works, but if you don't throw them away immediately and let them see that you are closing the fan, it gets secpicious.
On the other hand, I do agree that there is no correct way to do manipulation, everyone is different, so it's what ever works for you and looks good. But if steals arent convincing, then you should practice more, or change it.
When working with McBride, he taught me that it is better to do table steals than flash body steals. But if you look at Ahn Ha Lim, he has obviously practices his butt off, and thus his steals are practically invisible. If you don't use a mirror and a video camera during rehearsal, then you will not got good steals in the end. I recommend that right now in your career, that you minimize the amount of body loads you use and work out of a table. It is much more practical. Because the truth of the matter is, there are few magicians today that perfom in theatre situations, today there are a lot of commando situations that body steals wouldn't work in. So prepair an act that people will be able to see at the events that you perform at instead of flashing steals to people at bad angles. Be prepared I'd all I'm saying.
If less professionals use table steals, then I would recommend it to give you some variety. But make sure to practice in a camera and mirror to perfect them