RE: Kettlecorn

This in ingenious. I tried it tonight and it killed. It’s so much more than the sum of its parts.—PH

***

That’s a great combination of two ideas that cancel each other perfectly.

The best thing about this routine is that it justifies you essentially imposing your performance on the spectator. “Hey, sorry to bother you, but can I show you this trick? I’ve been preparing for it for three days and I’m starting to get a headache. Okay? Thanks.” —PM

I like PM’s point. There are very few presentations in magic that justify why you have to do this particular effect right now.

And I also agree with PH that this is much stronger than you would imagine based on just the strength of the individual effects.

We think of Vanish 5000 as being an alternative for the thumbtip version. But seeing how well they work together has me wondering if there are other combinations of effects where we see one as a replacement for the other, when in fact they may be stronger when performed in concert.

RE: Lady in the Water

You could remove the photo paper completely, and have the image appear right on the bowl itself by using a photo emulsion like "liquid light". Make the bottom of the bowl photo sensitive itself: https://alternativephoto2015.wordpress.com/2015/01/07/liquid-light/ —DL

That looks amazing. I don’t know how feasible it would be to pull off in the course of a trick, but if you could, that would be dope.

RE: Precocious Precogs

A significant reason I pushed pause on pursuing social magic for a while was having kids. Soon, we were surrounded by small catastrophe-generators, since you tend to hang out with other parents in the same boat. I quickly learned that all the adults' brains are about 40% occupied by their little kids at all times; any attempt at a magic trick runs a significant risk of a serious (and probably more important) distraction. I think the answer here is unfortunately to not try a trick at all unless you're confident some little simpleton won't try to eat a woodchip or something. Your post today seems to have a great approach, but I wonder if you have any more advice about trick management around teeny boppers. —CC

I’ve always had a pretty good natural radar for when it’s a good time to show people a trick and when they’re just not in the state of mind to really engage with it. But since I can sort of feel it out naturally, I’ve never really given it much thought to formulate it into “advice.”

I have definitely run into the situation where a parent is only half-there and can barely hold up their end of a conversation, much less be present for a magic trick. But that being said, I’ve also been in situations where parents crave nothing more than a distraction and are completely down to see a magic trick. So I think it cuts both ways.

If there’s any question, then I would lean towards a trick that incorporates the kid directly, so the parent doesn’t have to turn their attention away from the kid completely. See “Kids and Animals” from The JAMM #7 for more on this subject.

RE: Under-Developed

I liked that idea about using the Photographic paper and developing it to show the match for the mustache. I thought of using the dry sharpie, as you had mentioned, and instantly nixed it for the exact reason you described. Upon reading the next thought, about predicting a location, I thought of an idea combining the two thoughts mentioned. What if you had a photographic paper that has many (even 50-100) location written on it, while on the other side is the location you will develop in your presentation. You can then go and place a mark (circle or X) on the written location in the list you are forcing. Then use the dry sharpie method to make it appear that they marked that location and then demonstrate that their intuition or whatever is spot on as you flip over the paper and develop it to show a picture of that exact location. Would love to hear your thoughts! —MD

I think it's okay, but I don't generally like using the dry marker ploy to choose something from a list.

What I particularly like—as in the mustache trick—is the idea that they draw a mark on the page somewhere and when the photo develops, that mark makes sense as a part of the image.

A mustache might be too ambitious. But certainly we can use the dry marker principle to get them to think they drew a line or something else simple.

So, let’s say they blindly “draw” a line on the photo. Then when you develop the image we see it’s a photo of a bridge that is out and the line they “randomly” “drew” is a line that connects the two sides of the bridge. “Oh, thank god. The people in that car can now cross safely.”

Or maybe they “draw” an X randomly on the page, then when the photo is developed they’ve put the X right in the winning spot in a photograph of kids playing tic-tac-toe on the street with chalk.

Something like that is good because their mark would add to the image, rather than just marking something on top of an image.

RE: Starcle Curve

I received a lot of positive feedback on this one. People were very happy with it. And I’ve become even more happy with it after performing it again this past weekend. For some reason, over the years, Starcle has come up a bunch of times in emails to me from people wondering if I had a presentation for the effect. I think everyone admires the method, but it didn’t necessarily lend itself to the type of magic they wanted to do. Hopefully this presentation will work for those of you who weren’t into the traditional presentation people use with this trick.

Of course, if you don’t do the standard patter, you won’t be able to do the ever-hilarious joke where you hold it up to your face and say, “Do you see the man in the moon?” So that’s a trade-off you’re going to have to be willing to accept.