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rasp Inner circle 1124 Posts |
The material within 'Orion' is definately not fanciful or impractical.
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ed wood Special user 742 Posts |
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On Nov 22, 2020, Martin Pulman wrote: I'll add to that list: MMM - TA Waters - £50 Prism - Max Maven - £45 13 steps - Corinda - £25 Practical mental magic - Annemann - £15 Artful mentalism of Bob Cassidy - £50 The classic books containing material people actually perform are reasonably priced. There's a lifetime of study right there. Why pay more? The idea that anyone paid $1000 for The Taboo Treatise is disturbing/hilarious. p.s I enjoyed Phasma very much. The first and only "propless" material I've liked and actually use. |
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Martin Pulman Inner circle London 3399 Posts |
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On Nov 22, 2020, ed wood wrote: Couldn't agree more. It would be hilarious if it wasn't so disturbing that he got away with it for so long. Thankfully the days of people who don't know any better being ripped off for thousands of dollars by snake-oil salesmen on the Café seem to be long gone. I'm sure 'Orion' will be offered at a sensible, rational price. Even with the demands of "capitalism" hanging over us all. |
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Mark_Chandaue Inner circle Essex UK 4187 Posts |
I think when you look at a lot of those book prices from yesterday year you have to factor in the year they were printed and in some cases the fact that they were compilations of previously published material. Thirteen steps was originally published as 13 separate documents and then was compiled into a stand alone book in 1961. Practical Mental Effects was a compilation of items originally published in the Jinx and was published in 1944. Prism is a compilation of the previously released colour series. My copy of Prism is dated 2005. Barrie’s book was 1999. Artful Mentalism is also a compilation of previously released work. MMM is hard to find for less than £150 these days although I saw one recently for £100.
These days a premium hard back book averages about £100, this includes APOMM, AOTM, Bairn, Harpacrown, Mythology Codex, Minimalistic, Metaphysical, Mentalism, Olivia this is just off the top of my head and I would say that all of those contain practical workable material rather than fanciful and impractical material. I posted elsewhere on the effort involved in writing a book vs the size of the market but here is a summary. HC Too for example has been 4 years in the works before you count the time spent coming up with the material, performing it and refining it. Sure all 4 years weren’t spent sitting at a keyboard. HC Too is around 125,000 words and is just over half the size of Orion. To put that in context a Phd Thesis is around 80,000 words, Hmm in the time it took to write HC2 I could have got a doctorate. To write 125,000 words you have to write around 175000 words unless you are a very efficient writer. That then gets edited down and often restructured into the final copy. A good editor needs paying. If you have illustrations you may need a photographer to take good quality photos, for example there are around 130 illustrations in HC Too and that required over 200 photos. A good photographer may need paying. These then need to be turned into illustrations and a good illustrator definitely will need paying and I can tell you that you have to sell a bunch of books just to cover illustrators fees. The whole thing then needs to be laid out into a print ready file and again if that is professionally done it isn’t going to be free. It then needs to go through multiple rounds of proof reading. People do not realise how hard it is to catch every errant or missing apostrophe or typo in 125000 words, particularly when sometimes you are talking about the participants and sometimes it’s the participant’s. Good proof readers may want paying. Then of course if you are providing a premium quality book rather than using a print on demand service you have to pay out for the entire print run. Most of your sales won’t be direct sales so you can expect about a 35% return, maybe 40-45% if you get a reasonable amount of direct sales. However this return can take several years to materialise unless it is a small print run. I am just about to sell out of Harpacrown 4 years after it was released. There is always the chance that people won’t like your work and you won’t even break even although you don’t release a premium book in this format if you don’t believe in the material. So yes there are some great books available from yesteryear that are at bargain prices if you can still get your hands on a copy but in many cases the price reflects the time of printing and in many cases that these were compilations of previously released material rather than reflecting their true value today. Mark |
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 22, 2020, rasp wrote: Thank you Ian... And thanks to you, it will be more of a pleasure to read. Quote:
On Nov 23, 2020, Mark_Chandaue wrote: Mark, these are great points you’re making. And I can relate, as I spared no expense for making Orion beautiful and worth owning. I have taken great point to give retribution to everyone involved. I didn’t hesitate to pay even friends who proposed to help for free. The covers, the paper, the layout, everything is being done by the best in the industry, that is to say Phill Smith, Steve Haresign. I had it proofed by Ian, who does a terrific job at spotting every single typo and pays great attention to preserve the spirit of the text. Mark Chandaue did a superb job with the credits, because his knowledge in the field is beyond what I could ever achieve. All these come at a price, as Mark beautifully pointed out above. PLUS, the material itself. I am not going to ask a crazy price, never. Money was never my motivation in magic. But, it won’t be cheap either. This is hard work, over a very long period of time, and the price I’ll ask will be reflecting all these parameters. Phedon
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 22, 2020, watkins13 wrote: Thank you Robert. Phedon
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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Fenomeno New user 47 Posts |
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On Nov 23, 2020, Mark_Chandaue wrote: Mark, I couldn't have said it better myself! |
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ed wood Special user 742 Posts |
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On Nov 23, 2020, Mark_Chandaue wrote: You make some good points but do any of the modern books you mention pass what I like to call the David Hoy test. What is the David Hoy test I hear no one ask? Well I’ll tell you. In 1963 David Hoy published his one and only book “The Bold and Subtle Miracles of Dr Faust”. This book was sold for $3 at the time. With inflation this equates to $25.53 in 2020. I think we can all agree this is very reasonably priced. It’s not the price though that is important but the material it contains. David Hoy introduced a number of original effects including the tossed out deck, his fantastic book test and a magazine test and another 8 original effects. Here’s the point, 60 years later these effects are still being performed and known and loved by mentalists and magicians everywhere. In Luke Jermays most recent show he performed 2 effects directly from this book. In a book priced at $3 he introduced tricks and plots that are still being performed today! The David Hoy test is simple. In all the modern books you mention how many contain an effect that is as good as the Hoy book test or the myriad of other classics to be found in the book? How many contain an effect that will be performed in 60 years time? How many of these effects will you just have to say the name like “Tossed out deck” and every magician will know what you’re talking about? In these books which effect would you say is the creators tossed out deck? From what I’ve seen many of these books contain reworking’s of other people’s tricks. Seriously, how many versions of 4dt do we need? (the correct answer is none, it’s a fantastic trick and people are generally capable of reading the original and coming up with their own tweaks if they think it necessary). The occasional new plot using classic methods and essays. Soooo many essays on how an individual thinks magic should be performed. Sure if you’ve been performing for 40 years I’ll pay to read your opinions. If on the other hand you’ve only been performing for a few years or just a hobbyist, the magic café is the best place for your opinions. In the old days a magician or mentalist would perform for their entire lives keeping their secrets to themselves. At the end of their career they may publish a book containing their ideas. Many of these are classics. The Berglas book is a perfect example of this. Even selling at $150 I doubt Berglas made any money out of it, the author had to be paid, the publisher etc. David published this book to pass his ideas onto the next generation not to make money. These days many people are publishing book after book. Being so prolific they must have so much more quality material than, say David Hoy and David Berglas. If that was the case it’s strange I never see anyone performing tricks from their books. What are the modern classics in these books? Ultimately none of this matters, I’ve bought a number of the books you’ve mentioned, ranging from poor to very good. I bought them all generally a year or two after release, heavily discounted up to half price. So if people can avoid the need to buy everything on pre-order, ignore the hype, everything can be bought at quite reasonable prices. |
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MadisonH Inner circle 1752 Posts |
The Hoy book you mention has 46 pages... this has 700.
Ultimately, this is a strange argument to have since the price hasn’t even been released yet. Maybe we can put a pause on knocking the price until we find out what the price is Madison |
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Mark_Chandaue Inner circle Essex UK 4187 Posts |
I’m not sure the Hoy test is really valid. It was a 46 page pamphlet rather than a book and a little over 10,000 words compared to around 448 pages and 125000 words for Harpacrown Too and almost double that for Orion. So if we value Hoy at $25 now that puts Harpacrown Too in the $250 bracket, 10x the words and pages. That should put Orion in the $400 bracket before you factor in the additional production quality of the product.
As to content, that is always a tough one, one mans trassh is another man’s treasure. Very little is truly new today and even back then very little was new, Pegasus Page for example was an update of someone else’s effect. The Koran deck was’nt new to Koran and so on. If you will not use anything from a book and learn nothing and gain no inspiration then it has no value. If, however, there is something you will actually use, or something that inspires you, or you learn something then it has value. I will certainly use items from Orion and it certainly inspired me. If we look at a few other books Michael Murray’s is full of amazing ideas. Sure some may exist in some form elsewhere but Michael has completely unlocked them. In other cases they are completely new. Look at some of Pete Turner’s work, mostly uses classic methods in a completely unexpected way. His almost legendary name guess that looks about as close to the real deal uses a much maligned classic method in a beautiful way. Similar with Orion, technically it isn’t new techniques, what is new is some of the ways that Phedon weaves them together. The stand outs in Hoy are the bold book test and the tossed out deck. Some of the directions modern works have taken both of those have really added value. Another factor is that back in those days the author rarely had much financial layout in writing material nor did they see much return beyond exposure and reputation. In today’s world there are easier and cheaper ways to get exposure and reputation such as 20 minutes in front of an iPhone and your latest untested idea is on penguin. If you write a good quality book the reviews are usually out long before you break even and if you are selling unworkable tatt sales are going to dry up as soon as those reviews are posted. So, as I said, you don’t produce a premium book unless you believe that there is real value within the pages. It is still a risk though because you never know how that material will be received by others. My material works for me, and Phedon’s most definitely works for him. When we release material we hope that others will find value in it. Mark |
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ed wood Special user 742 Posts |
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On Nov 27, 2020, MadisonH wrote: Oh dear, sounds like someone has been telling you that size matters. Before you waste money on unnecessary surgery let me assure you it doesn’t. Quality not quantity is the key. Just to clarify, I'm not referring to the Orion book, I know nothing about it but modern mentalism books in general. |
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Mark_Chandaue Inner circle Essex UK 4187 Posts |
I don’t agree about modern books. The only version of tossed out deck I have used is from a modern book. However let’s revisit that Hoy test, and his original masterpiece the Tossed Out Deck which was far from original. Whilst Hoy’s book popularised the tossed out deck it dates back to Henry Hardin in1909. Likewise in the form that Hoy used it can be traced back to U.F. Grant in 1949. Prior to Hoy the effect had also been published using a three bank telematic deck by Orville Meyer in 1956 who introduced the idea of having the three people raise their hand to verify their cards had been named.
The only change that Hoy made to UF Grants method was to have the person verbally confirm that the card was named rather than raise their hand and he provided no crediting whatsoever. You could argue that Hoy’s contribution was on a par with “I use a red deck”. You could certainly argue that Hoy’s version was a step backwards from Orville Meyers, which forms the basis of Luke Jermay’s modern day version. Due to his lack of crediting it is hard to say whether the other stand out, the bold book test had its inspirations elsewhere. Alas the David Hoy test doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny. Many modern books by comparison have extensive crediting and generally do add something to the works they are based around. Michael Murray’s book for example I revisit regularly. Drew Backenstoss book has some great effects and some wonderful advice. Mark |
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 27, 2020, ed wood wrote: I partially agree with you Ed, but I do humbly and personally believe that you're failing to take many parameters into account. And Mark Chandaue's arguments above are hard to dismiss. I don't think that simply adjusting the values in current dollars does the trick. Moreover, as Mark suggests about the price, I don't think that it would be possible to sell, say, Harpacrown for... $25. Would you? As for Quantity vs Quality, put like that it's hard to disagree, but why do you think they're mutually dismissive? You can have both. Many books I own have both quality and quantity. And their stiff price was, to me, fully justified. Finally, I see that you seem to discard some 'modern' methods because they're variations of 'older' ones. I, personally, am happy to pay for those, as usually these updates are more 'workable' for me. I think you mentioned 4DT above; despite the indisputable beauty and potency of the original, and despite the fact that I personally came up with slight variations that suit my own style, if you come up with one that I didn't think about, one that suits me, one that I'll use for the rest of my performing life and that will make me earn my living, then yes, I'll be very happy to buy it at a fair price. I think that the point is: if you buy something that you will use or that deeply inspires you, should it be dirt cheap because it is based on something older? Moreover, if it inspires you, it means that despite you knowing of the 'old' version, you simply didn't think of this very one. Otherwise, it wouldn't inspire you. Shouldn't the creator be rewarded? The good thing is that nobody forces anyone to buy anything. I, sometimes, see a product that I feel to be too expensive for what it is. I read, as Mark says, some reviews -that never fail to pop here and there- and then I re-consider. Do I buy, or not? Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. And sometimes I'm happy I did, despite the stiff price, because I learned something I'll use for life, or that inspired me. And sometimes I regret my purchase, and the result is: I'll probably never buy again from this creator. That simple. And I think that this works for everyone. At the end, a creator who charges top dollar for crap is setting himself up for destruction. It's not me saying that, it's the law of the market. I hope I make sense. Just my opinion though. And I think that Mark said it all above in a way better way. Love to all, Phedon
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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RedDevil Inner circle Deep South 1315 Posts |
Happy Holidays, everyone. I see the points on all sides of the pricing debate. But truth be told, and I invite correction if I am incorrect, but Phedon Bilek has never been guilty of charging exhorbitant prices on any of his work. He has never published trash (In my humble, but convicted opinion). And he is one of the most generous characters in the mentalism story these past 3-4 years. Just my two cents.
Anyways, I haven't been around lately, but I wish you all a safe and blessed holiday season!
www.reddevilmentalism.com
F-F-U-L-Ri-F-F-Li-R-U-F-F |
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Fenomeno New user 47 Posts |
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On Nov 28, 2020, RedDevil wrote: My comment seems to have been the butterfly that initiated the above chaos!😅 |
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 29, 2020, Fenomeno wrote: Exactly. So please, from now on, refrain from posting. 😛
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 28, 2020, RedDevil wrote: I have no words... Thank you RedDevil. Coming from you, it means a lot. Phedon
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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The Unmasked Magician Inner circle If only I didn't have a wife and a kid I would have MUCH more than 2644 Posts |
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On Nov 29, 2020, phedonbilek wrote: That must be hard. Being a propless magician without words.
Please check regularly if you are becoming the type of magician Jerry Seinfeld jokes about. (This applies to mentalists as well.)
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252life Inner circle Ninth Circle, Hades 3243 Posts |
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On Nov 30, 2020, The Unmasked Magician wrote:
Look for all the world like you're counting the brain cells in his cranium.
-Theodore Annemann |
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phedonbilek Special user Greece, Cameroon, France 883 Posts |
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On Nov 30, 2020, The Unmasked Magician wrote: Not that much. 75% of communication is non-verbal. That's actually going to be my next project: "Prop-less, Silent Miracles Made Easy". Phedon
...The only easy day is yesterday...
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