Salvage Yard: Slide Project

I picked up Slide Project by Sebastien Calbry a few weeks ago. In my mind it looked as good or better than most anything I do close up at least in a visual sense, but the reactions have been only so-so. Any thoughts on why or ideas for a presentation that might take this up a notch? —CM

I don’t really have an answer for this, but I can point you in a direction you might want to consider as far a potential weakness to address. And I’ll give you the beginnings of an idea of how I might address it.

You see, while this looks nice enough in the gif above, it falls into the category of the type of effect that doesn’t seem to get the strongest reactions in my experience. It would be the type of effect that is described thusly:

“This thing happened! And also this thing!”

So, for example,

“The card moved through the dollar bill without him touching it. And the card changed to a different card.”

Two beats is not great when it comes to describing a trick. I want the tricks I perform to be described in one simple sentence or in a full paragraph detailing the twists and turns of the effect. Two beats usually implies that two unrelated things happened, and that doesn’t usually get the best reaction from an audience because their focus is being split between the impossibilities.

Remember the Jerx Calamity Sentence: The experience of MAGIC is created by the gap between what the spectator knows to be true and what feels real to them in the moment.

Spectators know that objects can’t move without being touched.

They also know that one object can’t change into another.

So when either of these things happen individually you are really emphasizing that gap between what the know and what they seem to be experiencing. But when they happen simultaneously, I don’t think you get twice as much magic. I think it just confuses things. Not that this trick wouldn’t fool people, I just think it’s weaker than doing similar effects separately.

What you could do, if you particularly like this gimmick, is to try and combine those moments into something that is a singular effect. And I don’t think “correcting my prediction” is a singular effect. That accounts for why the card changes, but not for why it moves by itself.

Here’s an example. This isn’t fully formed but it’s halfway there.

You have someone select a card and you place it into a folded bill. You hold up the card by the bill and freeze like that. You ask your spectator to open up a picture you texted or emailed them a few minutes ago. It’s a picture of you in a similar position, holding up a card in a folded bill. You ask your spectator to spot the differences between you in this moment and the photograph. Eventually the spectator spots three differences: it’s a different card, it’s coming out the other side of the bill, and in the photo you’re smiling, but in this moment your face is expressionless.

Then you demonstrate your ability to synchronize reality with a photo (okay, it needs some work as a premise) and after a brief moment of concentration, the card moves from one side to the other, changes to a different card, and a big smile comes across your face.

Now the movement and the color-change are part of the same thing. They’re part of the “absorption” of the photograph’s imagery into the current reality. So while a spectator may recognize these as distinct things, they are presentationally part of the same action.

Now, it’s not really my style to come out and say, “I can change reality to mimic a photograph.” So I’d probably come up with some backstory for it. Although I’m not quite sure what that would be just yet. Maybe something like, “So here’s something strange… I’ve been stressed out a bit recently because of some work projects. And I was having a hard time getting myself in a better headspace. So I was talking to a friend of mine who’s a psychologist and asking if she had any little hacks or anything to boost my mood. She told me about this thing called, ‘Photographic Assimilation.’ And it’s like this quick breathing/visualization technique where you concentrate on a photo of yourself in a happy time, and you’re able to take on some of the emotional elements that were occurring at that time.”

And then I’d go on to describe practicing this technique and noticing other changes happening as well when there was an overlap of physical objects between the photo and reality. Then I’d go on to demonstrate this weird phenomena. Or… something like that. As I said, it’s only halfway there

If you’re performing for a single spectator and willing to lose the visual element you could have them hold the phone at arms length and then block their vision of you with the phone for a moment and then, in an instant, you will have changed to match the photo when they move the phone away. Although losing that visual might be too much of a sacrifice.

So to answer the original question, no, I don’t have a particularly great idea in regards to how to perform this. But I do think if you can find some way presentationally to make the movement and the change a result of the same impetus, then you’ll likely get a better response, because it won’t just be two somewhat disconnected magical moments jammed together.

Monday Mailbag #55

I feel like one of the longest, weirdest debates in magic is dumb but fair: what's better, invisible deck or brainwave? It's hilariously polarizing.

So I was just thinking, maybe this could be a fun/funny thing to do your laymen research against to definitively know, once and for all, what's stronger. —MJ

I’ve added it to the list. I’ll happily test it out if/when the world ever gets to a point where gathering strangers together for something as inconsequential as testing out magic tricks seems like a good idea.

I miss the testing sessions we used to do. People who have just come to this site in the past couple of years might not know the extent to which we delved into this testing. When I talk about the “focus group testing” we did, they may think I showed a trick to eight friends or something like that. But that’s not how it worked. We were trying stuff out, and getting feedback with anywhere from 40-100 participants (not at one time) per test. In 2019 alone we spent over $14,000 to pay focus group participants. (That doesn’t include any of the other costs associated with the testing.) That might not be much for a big company, but for a small dumb blog it’s a pretty significant investment. And I say “we spent,” because a chunk of the supporter’s payments each year are allocated for testing. So it wouldn’t exist without the supporters, (and that’s why most of the testing results going forward will appear in the book the supporters receive annually as opposed to here on the site).

So sure, I’ll test Brainwave v. Invisible Deck. Once we get back into testing I’ll test all the long-standing magic feuds. Hell, I’ll even test red vs blue-backed deck. This was an argument that used to happen frequently on the Magic Cafe in the early days, and it became sort of the defacto criticism for all the worthless talk that happened there. But what if we test it out and the results are like, “Magic tricks are 12 to 20 times stronger when performed with a blue deck as opposed to a red deck”? Well, then we’re all going to feel pretty fucking stupid, aren’t we. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to figure it out in the near future.

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FWIW, one could write entire essays based on some of the prompts that the AI generated [in last Wednesday’s post]. "Forget about doing the Houdini escape, and practice doing the Hippocratic trap, instead" could confound people for months, if attributed to a "thinker" like Larry Hass.

And I gotta say, there's something in this one that explains why there are so many unfunny comedy magicians: "Most people do not perform for fun; they perform to make money, because they don’t know what fun is."

Of course, this last bit is just a paraphrase of Vernon's advice to Ricky Jay: "You will want to perform this illusion often in private to your significant other, and gradually this will lead to an intimate feeling for each other." —CK

Oh, absolutely. While the AI produced a bunch of nonsense, the sad truth is that it didn’t provide significantly less food for thought than most magic writing done by sentient beings.

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Quick anecdote related to today's post. [Dear Jerxy: More is Less]

About 6 months ago, one of my magician friends visited when my 3-year old niece was around. He literally showed her like two tiny things (a gag with his watch and a quick Flip-stick vanish with a pencil) and she remembered and talked about them clearly for the next 6 months.

Just last week my friend was going to visit again when my niece was around. I got her all pumped up for it and she was so excited for him to do tricks for her. He brought tons of tricks and showed her one after another for more than a half hour. After my friend left, I had this suspicion that in a couple weeks if I asked my niece what tricks he did, she would only remember the two things he showed her 6 months ago, because they were special isolated moments. Sure enough, later THAT SAME DAY, I asked her what her favorite thing was that he did. She could barely even name one thing! I spoke to my friend and told him this and how it's exactly what Andy always writes about.

So,anyway, just a quick anecdote and it's cool that you just referred to this idea once again. I'm not convinced that the psychology of a little kid's experience of magic is precisely in line with everything you say on this subject, but it's definitely in the same circle of theory. —YR

The psychology might be slightly different, but honestly, probably not that much.

The pacing of how frequently you show people tricks is probably one of the least understood factors when it comes to how to enhance—or at least maintain—the impact of your performance. As far as I know, nobody has written too much about this. There is a lot written about the pacing of a show, but I don’t know that I’ve ever seen anything written about how frequently you should dole out magic to people from an amateur’s perspective. If I’m wrong, please direct me to where I can read more about it because I too am stumbling my way towards the best form of pacing. I certainly don’t claim to have the answer on this.

I said in a recent post that I try to average about a trick a month for a given individual, but even that is the most general sort of recommendation. It really depends on the type of trick. I wouldn’t follow one immersive reality-melting trick with another one any time soon after. But I might show a couple minor effects to someone over the same evening.

I’m still trying to codify my feelings on the pacing issue. What makes it slightly more difficult is that I’m of the belief now (I haven’t been all my life) that you should mix up the types of tricks you show people. Not everything should be a 10/10 mind-blower. There was a time I believed that. I figured, why bother showing someone a trick unless it was a true mind-fuck? But now my belief is that while I want to show people consistently strong tricks, I only want to really ratchet up the intensity, and show them something truly devastating a few times a year. This, I believe, makes the mind-blowers feel even more special.

So, yeah…. pacing. What makes it difficult is the fact that the audience can still be enjoying it, even if you’re not doing it most effectively. What I mean is, the audience might enjoy seeing five card tricks, so that feels good for you and them. But they might have really cherished just seeing one of those tricks and being fully drawn into that one memorable experience rather than a jumbled mass of effects in their head where nothing much sticks out (even if they enjoyed the jumbled mass).

Think of it like a massage. If someone gave you an hour long massage every day, you would probably look forward to that hour of relaxation and enjoy it every time it happened. BUT it would soon turn into a pleasurable non-event. Whereas, if you got that massage just once a month, it would be something that you’d be looking forward to all week and would be a real highlight when it came around. Then, maybe throughout the rest of the month you get a foot rub, a scalp massage, a shoulder rub—these smaller indulgences that don’t quite take away from the significance of that monthly full-body massage.

This is kind of what I’m going for with my pacing. I don’t want to do something incredibly significant too often that it ceases to become an event. So I tone down the frequency of the “big” tricks, and mix in some strong, but not as intense effects to try and keep it lively and fun while keeping the special moments feeling special.

There probably isn’t a formula for all of this, but I’ll let you all know if I stumble into any good heuristics as I experiment with it.

Dustings #51

One more week remains to get your entries in for The Jerx AI Contest. Normally I get 100s of entrants in a contest, but that’s because the entry requirements are usually, “Send me an email.” With this contest, where the requirement is: “Get off your ass and do some work and entertain me,” I’m expecting maybe two entrants. If that. We’ll see. You have until next Friday to submit.

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Ellusionist sent out an email recently that stated:

We often get accused of over-hyping things - and we're definitely listening to feedback. Expect a slower, more open approach from now on.

I hope that’s not true. I enjoy the stupidity of their ad copy.

But I’ll give credit where it’s due. Their recent email told the story of them being contacted by the Zippo company regarding the Nicholas Lawrence effect Plasma, because Zippo has the patent on that lighter shape. Ellusionist caved to the pressure and let go of their remaining stock at half off. (It’s now sold out completely, I believe.) It was a much more interesting email than we usually get from Ellusionist.

I was a little disappointed they caved so easily though. I expected them to put up more of a fight against Zippo. Here’s what they should have responded:

Dear Zippo,

Lick our balls. You own a patent on a lighter. This is not a lighter, it’s a magic trick, you fucking dunces.

By the way, do you know who runs this company? It's Brad Fucking Christian, that's who. Do you want to start shit with Brad Christian? Do you want to have him do ninja on you? Because that's how you get him to do ninja on you.

I'm not even 100% sure the story Ellusionist told in that email was true. Maybe it was just a way to dump some stock of a trick that wasn't selling as well as they hoped. Who knows. I guess we'll find out if they try it again. "Oh no! The Acme Dildo Company says our Fiddle Sticks are infringing on their patent. We need to let our stock go for half off or they're going to take us to court!" Sure. Nice try, Ellusionist.

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Joshua Jay’s new book came out.

He seems to be taking a lot of credit for it, which is odd considering he gave me $200 to write it for him. I barely put any thought into it and shit it out over a long weekend (as you’ll be able to tell when you read it). He's going to deny it, but I have the receipts.

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Over on my non-magic sister-site, I recently posted about some favorite live music performances, for those who are interested.

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In response to last week’s series on AI and, specifically, in regards to the this outline the AI created…

Pete M. sent along the following email:

I am just dying to know what the Makeup Drop is. I think it would be awesome to give an AI the challenge of inventing a new move, just based on the name.

BTW if you are interested in more specific details about why Writesonic sucks so utterly, I recommend “You Look Like a Thing and I love You” by Janelle Shane. A good overview of AI and Neural Network learning written for non AI experts.

Pete got me intrigued as well. What is, “The Makeup Drop?” Let’s find out! I had Writesonic write the article using that outline. How do you think it turned out? Do you think it produced a great article that explained a really interesting move called “The Makeup Drop”? Or do you think it’s actually the dumbest article yet? Place your bets!

Holy Moly… this shit is bonkers. Check it out…

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Confessions of an Amateur Magician: How to Perform Magic Tricks at Home

I'm an amateur magician, and I'm going to share with you my dirty little confession about how I perform magic tricks at home. The professional magician has a stage to perform from. That gives him instant credibility. As an amateur, I don't have a stage. I've got the part of my room the futon is in, and the part of the room the tv is in. And then I have the kitchen that I share with Trent. But he doesn't like me performing magic in there. So really I just have the futon and TV area. And I CERTAINLY don't have Trent's room. That's off limits. So here's how I perform magic tricks at home.

How to Perform Magic Tricks at Home

And I'm going to share this step by step. Because this is how I learned to perform magic tricks. When I was a kid. I was a horrible child. I was a bratty kid. I was a teenage bratty kid. And when I was a teenager, I had this on-again off-again friend named Pascale. She liked to write horror and Gothic fiction stories and plays and stuff. And I liked to perform magic tricks. I spent a lot of time at her house. I even had the bed next to hers. I spent a lot of time hanging out with her. Because we didn't go to the same school, we didn't have the same friends, and it was a weird "we have the same sense of humor" thing, and also we both had small kids at the same time. So we'd do crafts and go to the park. Or I'd just hang out and we'd hang out. Pascale and I had a ritual.

What You'll Need

How I Perform Magic Tricks at Home (In order of how much this costs me) Thermometer - I bought a cheapo digital thermometer to give a reading for Trent's body temp. I bought it at the dollar store, but the brand is Magician Thermometer . They're small, and cheap. I know Trent is probably a man, but even if he's a woman I'm sure that he is warmer than 99% of the human population. My husband, who makes fireballs in his mouth, is always warm to the touch. This was $4. - I bought a cheapo digital thermometer to give a reading for Trent's body temp. I bought it at the dollar store, but the brand is . They're small, and cheap. I know Trent is probably a man, but even if he's a woman I'm sure that he is warmer than 99% of the human population.

The Basic Moves

First thing is first, you're going to want to build a secret area that no one else will know about. That way you don't have to do magic tricks around anyone else who might see you and be like, "Hey! Is this the secret passageway Trent used for the bathroom?" Instead you're just doing your magic tricks in a room of your own. You need some room to hide all the magic tricks you'll have to do at home. I use a room I never go into, the same room that has the futon couch in it. That way if I ever want to watch TV or play video games I can use the futon. Which, now that I think about it is where my magic is done. I do most of my magic there, and it doesn't matter if I never go into Trent's room. I'm going to ask Trent to do something, and he'll probably watch me do it.

Sleight of Hand

So as I've mentioned, I'm an amateur magician. This means I don't have to be a master of manipulation like a professional magician does. I can make some pretty simple tricks. I have used my sleight of hand to get myself beers, and coffee, and candy bars. I've also taught myself how to pull off card tricks with coins and paperclips. You should check out Magic for Dummies, by Roger Kadushin. He's a master of sleight of hand, and he's written a book all about it. The Pitfall Let's say you have a magic trick and you want to perform it for Trent. You have a few different options here: Ask Trent for permission to perform the trick. Don't ask. Just do it. Don't ask. Trust that he will not say yes. Let's say you have a magic trick and you want to perform it for Trent.

The Cut

You'll need a pen, glue, and a newspaper. First off, you need to draw a circle on the newspaper that fits the contours of the palm of your hand. The Glasses In my first two tricks, I use glass. To make sure that the magic trick is fully feasible, I will only make the glasses appear once in the magic trick. The Softball I only use a softball in this magic trick. I know, I know. You may have heard that you shouldn't use a ball in magic. I have two reasons for using a softball instead of a ball. First of all, I am an amateur magician. And I'm very clumsy. I wouldn't want to risk hurting my magic wand. Second, softballs don't take up much room. My magic wand is a real bastard to carry around. And I hate carrying anything when I go out.

The Makeup Drop

So here's my technique for pulling off the makeup drop. I look in the mirror to decide how much makeup I'm going to put on my eye lids. If I've got a really long eyelash, I'm going to put my makeup on one of my eyes. If I don't have a long eyelash, I'm going to put my makeup on the other eye. It's almost always the left eye. Next, I'll grab a wad of toilet paper and put it up under my eye lids. And I put the wad of toilet paper up above my eye. Now I'll lower the toilet paper to the bottom of my eye, kind of the pointy end, and then go over it, like a stamp on an envelope. Just kinda lift it off and down and down and down. And I'm going to take my upper eyelid off and lower it down so that my lower eyelid is the one that's lower than the toilet paper.

Conclusion

I'm no professional magician. At least not yet.

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Well… there you go, Pete. I hope that was worth everyone’s time and effort.

Artificial Intelligence Redemption?

[The AI Contest, as described in last Friday's post, is active until next Friday, the 8th. Essentially the idea is to create a video featuring a trick inspired by the AI posts from last week. See the details in that post. First (and only) prize is valued at $460.]

You know, I think maybe I was unfair to the AI process last week. I used a fairly nonsensical opening paragraph and maybe that’s why the articles turned out so poorly. Garbage in, garbage out, right? I've decided to give it at least one more shot. But this time I will write an opening paragraph that sets the AI up for success! If the AI blows it this time, then we'll know it's truly useless.

Here is the information I'm going to feed the AI for the article:

Title: Performing Magic for Fun, Profit, Love and Life Fulfillment

Opening Paragraph: Magic is the most powerful form of art to have ever existed. There are so many ways to have fun, make money, and garner the love of others with incredible magic tricks. In this article I will be explaining those ways in a succinct, coherent, step-by-step manner. What follows are some very amazing tricks, and some performance philosophy that will allow you to entertain anyone anywhere. To be clear, what you are about to read are really good magic tricks and the way you can use those tricks to entertain others to the highest degree while improving every aspect of your life.

Okay, there we go. Let's be honest... I've laid the groundwork for the greatest magic article of all time. C'mon, computers... don't let me down!

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Performing Magic for Fun, Profit, Love and Life Fulfillment

Magic is the most powerful form of art to have ever existed. There are so many ways to have fun, make money, and garner the love of others with incredible magic tricks. In this article I will be explaining those ways in a succinct, coherent, step-by-step manner. What follows are some very amazing tricks, and some performance philosophy that will allow you to entertain anyone anywhere. To be clear, what you are about to read are really good magic tricks and the way you can use those tricks to entertain others to the highest degree while improving every aspect of your life.

The Basics

(Magician) Steve Bailey gives a magic demonstration. Steve’s brother, Sid, gives a demonstration as well. There are three “points” or “things” to remember when performing any magic trick: 1. Everything you say will be recorded 2. Everything you do and say will be recorded 3. All you can do is prepare what you say or do (the trick), and execute it. What is your intention for performing the trick? What is your “magic number”? How do you aim to present yourself to the audience? Everything in the illusion is only a tool or a tool in the effect. In other words, it is all stagecraft. An illusion should not look like a trick. It should not look like a trick or be a trick. Illusion has no boundaries. Essentially, an illusion is an extension of ourselves; it is an extension of our minds.

Tips for Performance

Feel confident about performing the tricks that you learn. Take into consideration the psychological, physical, and cognitive elements of magic, and utilize those elements while performing magic. Being the best magician is about knowing what you are going to do and doing it very well. Presenting is a necessary skill, but you need to understand why you are presenting in the first place. When performing magic you are the brains and the voice of the operation, but sometimes you need to use your hands and physical actions in order to drive the point home. A great trick for businesspeople is demonstrated by Dean Reece. In the magic trick you are not buying a purse, but you are using a mental model to form an attachment to the way you see the world.

How to Perform Magic for Fun

All the performers in the history of the world who perform magic for fun are super successful at it. It’s much easier to perform magic for fun than for profit or love, and it is the most rewarding form of magic. The best thing about performing magic for fun is you’re forced to do your best, because you’re not making any money. Most people do not perform for fun; they perform to make money, because they don’t know what fun is. Here are some of the most rewarding things that can come from performing magic for fun: People get an immediate smile and laugh when they see you perform magic, which is much more frequent than seeing them getting the same laugh when they see you make money at it.

The Importance of Practice

As a performer of any art, practicing and perfecting your craft is essential. The best performers in the world go through years and years of painstaking practice, and they learn to really know their craft. It is an intangible thing, but if you spend the time and effort to perfect the art of magic, then magic is going to show up and show out. What do I mean by that? The best way to figure out what will work for you is to take the ideas of other masters and add your own twists. Be an original genius, not an imitator. As I have written before, imitating is not your friend, it is a form of laziness. Practice routines that you can learn in minutes and perform every day. Forget about doing the Houdini escape, and practice doing the Hippocratic trap, instead.

How to Perform Magic for Profit

By working magic in this manner you are working magic for a profit. Using tricks, and performing shows, you will amass a following which allows you to profit from your ability to inspire people. If you are good at this, it can increase your income tenfold. Of course, the money you make from shows will always be a secondary goal. With money you can accomplish things with no stress, or even in silence. Don't worry about having to get out and go to work and explain the reason for your presence to others, let your magic do that work. Yes, magic as a business is more than just spending money you earn to entertain people; it also requires hustle. Magic is a very competitive art, with plenty of competition from other magicians. What is your style? What do you think of your competition?

How to Perform Magic For Love

You are going to learn how to perform this extraordinary illusion and reveal the heart of a woman’s true self. There are three ways to find love: 1) Love someone enough to be good to them. 2) Buy yourself into someone’s life. 3) Unwittingly enchant a woman you will become husband and wife with. “You will be poor and have nothing, and you will be rich and have everything.” – Jewish Proverb You will want to perform this illusion often in private to your significant other, and gradually this will lead to an intimate feeling for each other. The Magic Will Make You Smarter You will learn a magic trick which will make you smarter. You will learn a magic trick which will allow you to become a more gifted leader. You will learn a magic trick which will make you the center of attention.

How to Perform Magic To Fulfill Your Life's Purpose

One of the problems with most magicians today is that they are primarily performing for others, instead of performing for themselves. This means they are only thinking about themselves and their desires. When this happens, they are not performing magic for themselves, but instead, they are performing for others and for their wants, needs, and fantasies. How can you perform magic that will result in satisfying your own life's purpose and ambitions? Well, you can perform magic by setting yourself free. What is freedom? It is when you are not constrained by the rules of society, the thoughts of other people, and the actions of the self. No one can decide the path that you are going to take in life. The moment you accept that you cannot control the outcome of your life, you become free.

Conclusion

Let's cut right to the chase, here's my favorite kind of magic trick that doesn't use any fire, smoke, mirrors, or illusions. It's a full on, no holds barred, balls to the wall, no gimmicks, no gimmicks, no gimmicks magic show. The first time I saw this, I knew I had to learn to do this for myself. I went out and bought myself a clean printer, so I could print all the cardstock I had purchased. Then I went out and bought the cheapest Casio keyboard I could find that I could still afford. Then I wrote out the entire instructions and put them in order on the cards and laid them on top of the keyboard. Then I proceeded to completely learn how to play this trick in a week and completely memorize all the notes. The trick is just incredibly well done and amazing.

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Okay, fuck me. This shit is garbage. But I have to admit I enjoy when things start going off the rails. It’s kind of fascinating. And the fact that it made up its own “jewish proverb” is kind of great.

I’ll admit, with the more “normal” opening paragraph we did actually get a couple sentences here and there that legitimately sound like some standard magic writing. If I told you this quote—“Essentially, an illusion is an extension of ourselves; it is an extension of our minds.”—came from Joshua Jay’s new book, you’d probably believe me. Shit. I guess now I have to buy that book so I can write a post where you have to guess if a statement comes from Josh’s book or the blathering AI program.

I don’t know shit about AI, but from playing around with this content creating tool over the past week or so, here’s my impression of it… When it comes to artificial intelligence created writing, you’re going to get something that’s boring and uninspiring enough to pass for normal boring and uninspiring human writing, or you’re going to get some bonkers bullshit. Occasionally the crazy shit will read like an inspired creative idea, but I doubt it really ever is. It’s more likely to be a matter of us using our human minds to make sense out of gibberish. The way we make pictures out of the random distribution of stars in the sky. So if you’re in the creative field I don’t think you have to worry about AI taking your job anytime soon. They haven’t quite cracked the code on that yet.

I think this will be the final post solely devoted to AI. I still have a bunch of credits at the Writesonic site to generate more content, and I will use them. But those will probably be included in the Friday "Dustings" posts in the coming weeks. Don't worry, the site will soon return from this general Artificial-Intelligence-generated nonsense to the very specific Human-Stupidity-generated nonsense I've been known for over these past years.

Dear Jerxy: More is Less

Dear Jerxy: I've found your posts about spectators googling tricks to be fascinating, and there have been a ton of stupid responses. While I agree that you can't charm someone into not googling a trick, I do think there is some nuance in the difference between amateur and professional performers.

I live in Chicago now, and a few months ago a neighbor was telling me about when he and his fiance went to the Chicago Magic Lounge and had a wonderful time. I asked if he remembered who he saw - he said no. I asked if he remembered any good tricks - he said he enjoyed the close-up tricks at his table, but he was unable to describe any effects that he saw. After a night of drinking and seeing a huge variety of magic, he wasn't able to pick out any details, and hence had nothing to google. He was just left remembering how he felt. I know that I want my magic to be more memorable than the venue, but his experience was still positive.

I think a lot of professional performers like Bill Malone or Chad Long have this effect on people, too. Even if you see them at a party and they're the only performer you see, there's so much strong magic coming at you that it's hard to remember what the effects were when you try to google it the next day. But at the same time, lay people who have seen them perform remember their shows and talk about them ecstatically. I think (or hope) that when people write to you to say that lay people won't google something if the performance was good, they mean that certain performance styles make it difficult for spectators to remember each distinct trick and therefore more difficult to google.

But in an amateur performance, you're unlikely to perform 10 minutes of card magic with jokes sprinkled in. In fact, if you do, it will probably feel awkward. But if you were to perform just Bill in Lemon, you'll have a strong reaction but the audience will easily remember it and google it.

Since you recently wrote about Anniversary Waltz, this is actually the trick that got me thinking about Google-abliity. A few years ago, I was doing a walk-around gig with four other magicians in New York. Early on in the night, I did Anniversary Waltz for a couple. Two hours later, they came up to me and said that they were impressed with the trick, and he had tried to google it and found nothing. He said he tried changing the phrasing 10 times and still wasn't able to find it. He tried things like "cards melting together magic trick" and "merging cards in hands magic trick". Maybe there are some laypeople who can keep at it until they find the trick on Google, but after someone told me they spent a considerable amount of time trying to find this trick and he was unsuccessful, I'm convinced that there's something about my scripting for that trick that makes people google the wrong things. But the other thing I learned is that if someone tries to google something and can't, it makes the trick even more memorable and special than if they had decided not to google it.

I'm mostly curious to hear your thoughts about the first point - that some magicians perform google-able tricks but the pace of their performance prevents people from remembering enough to google the tricks.

Signed,
Could Unfettered Magic Reduce Audience Googling?

Dear CUMRAG: Yes, absolutely. I’m going to get back around to your point, but here’s something that I think is very important for magicians to understand, regardless of how they feel about google-ability or anything like that: The experience of seeing one trick is wildly different than the experience of seeing three or five or ten tricks.

This is something I struggle with, even though I know for certain that it’s true:

The overall impact of the magic tricks you perform for an audience is not cumulative.

If you show someone a strong magic trick, and follow it up with another strong magic trick, I believe you have slightly weakened the overall experience.

Think of it like this (substitute in the sexes that are appropriate)… Hopefully you’ve had the experience of going out to a party or a bar or something and meeting an incredible woman there. Let’s say she’s gorgeous and you have an instant rapport with her. There is a ton of chemistry and a good amount of sexual tension, and in a blink, 90 minutes have passed. She gives you her number so you can meet up that weekend. When you leave the bar you’re smiling like a jackass, you tip your hat to strangers on the street, and practically dance your way home. When you get home you look her up on Instagram and maybe google her name to see what else you can find about her. You’re completely infatuated.

But now imagine you went to a party and met a group of four women who you had similar feelings for. They were all beautiful, and you felt great chemistry with all of them. Is that interaction four times as impactful? Is it even as exciting as feeling that connection with one person? I would say no. Sure, it’s exciting in the, “Dear Penthouse Forum, you’re not going to believe what happened to me” type of scenario. But I don’t think it gets your heart pumping like one person would. The fact that it happened with four people just makes it seem like it couldn’t be that special.

I think this is what happens when you string together multiple strong tricks as well. Your spectators’ focus gets fractured. The amazement doesn’t build, it gets split off in different directions.

Going back to CUMRAG’s point, does performing multiple tricks affect a spectator’s likelihood of seeking out more information about a trick? Yes, definitely. People don't google tricks just because they were fooled. They also have to be a little obsessed with what they saw. When a professional magician says, "Nobody googles my tricks!" I believe him. Doing three tricks over 5 minutes in a restaurant or 8 tricks in a 45 minute parlor show is less likely to create that obsession over one particular trick. The professional's goal is to entertain and also to build up his own brand. For those purposes, more magic tricks probably is better (to an extent). It's more entertainment, more climaxes, and more reasons to be impressed by the performer.

Ssome amateurs have similar goals: being seen as "entertaining" and a certain amount of self-aggrandizement is the goal.

But personally I want to use magic to craft seemingly unique and amazing experiences. I want to leave them with one particular story or memory that they can't stop thinking about. With that goal in mind, it doesn't make sense to do a bunch of amazing tricks at once. Will doing a number of tricks lessen their likelihood of searching out more information about any particular trick? Yes, it will. But at the cost of lessening the impact of the effects generally, so it's not a good trade-off. It's much better, in my opinion, to focus your efforts on presenting the effect in a way that makes it ungoogleable.

This doesn't mean I only ever perform one trick. I'm not always going for a home-run when I show someone magic. Sometimes the goal is simply to keep people entertained for a little while. In that instance I will show people a few different "good" tricks. And other times I'll show people a couple of good tricks followed by one amazing one. Usually I'll introduce it by saying something like, "Those tricks were just typical sleight-of-hand type stuff. I've had an interest in that since I was a kid. But do you want to see something really weird that I just learned? This is the sort of thing you won't find in any magic book" So in this case the "good" tricks are being used as some mild entertainment and to set them up for something much more powerful. The good tricks will likely be forgotten about, but they set a baseline for what to expect and make the amazing effect seem all that much more-so.

So I'm not saying you should always only perform just one trick. I'm just saying I wouldn't recommend stringing together a bunch of amazing tricks because ultimately it's going to lessen the impact they would have individually—when they are the focus of the interaction, rather than just a part of it.

Lemonade From Lemons Week: Day Five

I’ve been pretty depressed these past couple of days as Artificial Intelligence Week turned into a huge flop. My plan to take a permanent vacation while computers churned out content for this blog indefinitely has gone up in smoke.

To answer a question I’ve gotten a few times over email: Yes. Those are the ACTUAL posts that were written by the AI program at Writesonic. That wasn’t me trying to be funny and write nonsense. You can try it out at that site yourself. And no, that’s not like a joke site. Their actual claim is that they can write content for your site with AI.

I will cut them the smallest amount of slack because magic is a bit esoteric as a subject matter, and I didn’t really do them any favors with my stupid opening paragraph that they had to build off of, but still… I wasn’t quite expecting that level of grade-A gibberish. I kind of thought I’d get some regurgitated content that had been scraped off other sites on the web describing some simple magic tricks in a clunky, but at least somewhat understandable fashion. Nope.

But maybe I’m being too shortsighted? Maybe there’s actually a lot of good content in those posts that I just can’t see because I’m too stuck in the old world where tricks had to “make sense” and “have a point” and “be doable.”

Well, that's what we're going to find out. It's been a while since I've had a contest on the site, and it's time for that to change.

The Jerx Artificial Intelligence Contest

I'll tell you up front, this is not going to be a simple contest to enter.

But hopefully the prize will make up for it.

Prize for the Winner

- A 2021 Supporter Slot for the Jerx which includes a copy of the next book. (Value $260)

AND

- A $200 gift certificate for Penguin or Vanishing Inc. or wherever (Value... well, $200)

(If you're already a supporter, I'll simply refund your payment.)

How To Enter

Submit a video of yourself performing one of the tricks described by the AI in Wednesday or Thursday's post.

Those tricks can be:

• The one under the heading of Amateur Magician (Wednesday's post)

• The one under the heading of How to Perform Magic Tricks At Home (Wednesday's post)

  Or from Thursday's post:

• Card Trick

• Pocket Trick

• Coin Trick

• The Best Magic Trick for Beginners

• Disappearing Coin Trick

• Vanishing or Appearing Handkerchief Trick

You may choose to do a fairly faithful interpretation of the trick as described in the post. Or you may choose to somehow turn it into a real trick that actually has some kind of purpose. So you can choose to see this as an exercise in making a funny video, or you can choose to see it as a creative exercise. Or both.

Feel free to be inspired by other elements of the AI posts as well.

It can be a performance straight to camera, or for an audience, or couched in some other form. (For example, if I were submitting an entry, I'd do it like it was an ad for a 2010-era Ellusionist release. A bunch of meaningless "artsy" shots of me walking on a railway bridge, interspersed with some performance footage, and then me saying, "I'm Andy Jerxmann, and this... is Pocket Trick." And I'd put the palm of my hand over the lens, blacking it out.)

I will pick the winner based on which entry I enjoy the most. If I can't decide, I'll send out a poll to some of the original supporters of the site and have them vote on it.

There will only be one winner, but there may be some prizes for Honorable Mentions as well.

If you're just thinking of turning on your webcam and stumbling your way through one of the "tricks," you'll probably be wasting your time. Because someone is going to put some effort into this and easily outshine all the low-effort submissions. That being said, I wouldn't be surprised if there were only a couple of people who put some effort into it, so if you do have a good idea for a video and you execute it well, you could have a good chance of winning.

The videos may be posted here whether you win or not. You can choose if I use your full name or just a first name or pseudonym.

The best way to get your video to me would be to make it unlisted on Youtube and send me the link. Although we can figure something out if that's not an option.

Deadline: Videos should be submitted by October 8th. I will select a winner soon after.

I've Made A Horrible Mistake Week: Day Four

Okay! Now…NOW… I think we’re ready to go. If you’ve been following along, you know the drill. Blah, blah, blah… first magic blog content completely written by AI… blah, blah, blah… last post I’m going to personally write on this site. And so on. Again, other than the first paragraph of the following article, which was written by me, everything else in this post was written by the AI blog writing product Writesonic.

Here it is. I’m going to recommend you get out your notebooks because I’m guessing there’s going to be a ton of killer content you’re going to want to make note of.

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Confessions of an Amateur Magician: How to Perform Magic Tricks at Home

I'm an amateur magician, and I'm going to share with you my dirty little confession about how I perform magic tricks at home. The professional magician has a stage to perform from. That gives him instant credibility. As an amateur, I don't have a stage. I've got the part of my room the futon is in, and the part of the room the tv is in. And then I have the kitchen that I share with Trent. But he doesn't like me performing magic in there. So really I just have the futon and TV area. And I CERTAINLY don't have Trent's room. That's off limits. So here's how I perform magic tricks at home.

Introduction

"Okay, Kavan, let's do our routine. You're the magician." "Yep. That's what I am." I hold the card up and give it a quick close-up look-see for whatever flaw may have been revealed to me during the performance. "Perfect. I want you to show it to me again so that I can figure out how you did it. What do you have up your sleeve?" "I have a piece of paper in my hand. I put it on the table right there. And I hand the card to Trent. But he takes the paper and scrunches it up into a ball. He tosses it away and holds the card in his hand. Okay?" "Perfect. That's pretty impressive. And it's still probably too good for you to be able to do it with some regularity, but it looks like you may be able to do it on a different occasion. Why don't you try again?

Where to Perform Magic Tricks at Home

When I have a few friends over to practice, I always start in the kitchen. Or the futon. This is the stage. You see the magic trick there. You hear me flipping the table over, or the lightbulb turning on, or whatever. Everyone likes watching the magic trick. There's something about watching the magic trick that is hypnotic. Especially if they are really good friends. And I need these friends. Because it takes a lot of "I know, but" excuses to get Trent to practice magic with me. So I need more friends to help me practice magic. Now there is another part of the magic trick. And that is about the time we are done. I need to try to quickly do all the simple tricks in this part of the magic trick that aren't amazing. So my time is better spent trying to teach Trent other stuff I do.

How to Perform Basic Tricks

I started out with simple tricks. I know. If you are an amateur magician, you are probably thinking, "Oh for pity's sake. Don't use Magic Words!" And here's the secret: Magic Words are okay. In fact, you should use them if you are going to do magic tricks at home. They are not magic, but they can confuse people. And give you the opportunity to escape danger. Magic Words, when used correctly, can make your audience see things you do not want them to see. The audience may believe your magic is real. If you don't use magic words, and you use magic, it is real. Therefore you use magic. I started out with a couple basic tricks. They are simple, but they are also extremely difficult to do with my budget. The trick requires a pen and paper. I bought a pen from the dollar store.

Card Trick

I love to perform a card trick. I have a deck of cards and a deck of playing cards. I lay them out like this. Cards on the bottom, then ace up top. The trick is to have your audience guessing which card is the ace. So what I do is turn the playing cards so they don't face up. So the bottom card is the ace, and the top card is a nine. Okay, what I want you to do is count the cards. Here I'll do one on my right hand, but I want you to do it with your left. So all you have to do is count your right hand, then count your left. I'm going to flip them over, you're going to count, then I'll flip them over again. And all you need to do is to say “Oh look. I got another one.” Say that four times, and you'll know which one is the ace. I'll let you go ahead and do this on your own.

Pocket Trick

A classic trick that any magician should know how to perform. Without using a pocket. You could try to, but as my neighbor Trent (who is the only person who gets to use his side of the futon that I don't) will tell you, your not getting this magic trick to work. You can have a pocket, or you can buy a magic pocket. It's all the same. This trick isn't about having a pocket in front of you. This is about having that pocket behind you. You can have a pocket on top of you or in front of you, and if you aren't careful it will change the way your performing the trick. Okay, now watch this video, and we'll take a look at this trick. Trent and I try and teach you a magic trick. It's called a pocket trick. A magic trick where the trick is performed from behind.

Coin Trick

So the coins that I use for this trick are coin bank nickels. My family doesn't need coins for the washing machine and the dishwasher. This is a very, very popular trick. I really shouldn't use coins because a lot of folks find them too small to have the proper amount of weight to be in your hand, but I like them because you can only see their faces. So that's what I do. I pretend I'm not doing it because I know Trent would think that's cheating. But I put a dime and a dime in my left hand and 3 pennies in my right hand. I use my forefingers to grasp the dime and nickel. Then I rub them together and I hold them out in front of me. I tell Trent that I'm going to put them in my left hand, and then I'll change my hand to my right and rub them against my face'.

The Best Magic Tricks for Beginners

The stuff I do are the ones where you don't need to have a lot of experience. I can't teach you how to cast a spell, because I don't know, so I won't. But I will tell you how I perform magic tricks. You will learn a little bit about the science behind these magic tricks. That's how you'll be able to teach your friends and family. We'll start with the simplest of magic tricks. Simple Magic Tricks Many magic tricks use sleight of hand. To perform these tricks, you can use several props, if you have the space. You'll need to have a lot of props. A cigar box, a tube of duct tape, a jewelry box, a pen and notebook, and a deck of cards are all good things to have in your house. Take the jewelry box and use it as a playing card holder. You'll need a deck of cards, a pen, and a deck of cards.

Disappearing coin trick

You know those coins that change color? That's a simple trick, that I perform at home all the time. I bought a metal coin tray that looks like a basket. I insert the coin tray, flip the coin over to reveal the basket. It changes colors. Simple. More at the Princeton Packet. Too many therapists? We can help. I have been seeing a woman named Amanda for many years. My wife and I can't agree on therapy. One of us is satisfied with our therapist, while the other one is unsatisfied with the therapist that we're both seeing. It's a source of conflict. It's hard to be successful at marriage when you're fighting about who gets to see their therapist.

Vanishing or appearing handkerchief trick

I learned this one in my 25th birthday when I had a girlfriend for the first time, (I've got one every year) and we went to a magic show. The magician shows us this trick that would work for the dares. And I have a set up that I do when I'm at home. Step 1: Put a napkin or tissue in my mouth, hold it in there and cough. Step 2: Grab it and pull it out. Step 3: "DID YOU CHEW IT UP!" Step 4: Enjoy the shocked look of the crowd. It works every time. Rainbow effect I read an article about magnetic rainbow effect and I got all excited about it. So I tried it out and I could do it with magnetic bar. Which I was happy about because I already had one. It didn't work. But here's how I did it: Step 1: Take a bar magnet. Step 2: Put the bar magnet in a tin foil holder.

Conclusion

I should quit doing magic at home. But I can't. It's too fun. I've got seven more books to write. And a blog to write. And this site to keep up. And a friend to entertain and pester. I'm too busy. No, not busy. I'm the King of Content. I've got a lot of work to do. But the little tricks are fun, the satisfaction is fast. And nobody sees what I do. The cat seems to have trouble understanding this. She still tries to catch my hand every single time I do a trick at home. Why do cats get it so hard? The only down side of performing magic at home is getting one of Trent's bad habits to rub off on me. I keep forgetting to pick him up before I perform a trick.

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Uhm… okay. So…hmm.

So it looks like this technology might still need a few tweaks before it’s ready for prime time. Or daytime. Or any time, really. It seemed really intent on making Trent the break-out star of this post. It went so far as to suggest Trent and I are sharing a futon. (We’re not. I specifically mentioned in my opening paragraph that Trent had a room!)

I also found it odd there were numerous, obvious grammatical mistakes in the article. I don’t know what to expect from AI, but at the very least I thought it would have a better batting average than I do at using the correct your/you’re.

This wasn’t a total failure, right? I mean, there was that idea to use a jewelry box as a card holder. That’s not a terrible idea. At the very least it’s an idea, which is something that was missing from the rest of the article.

Aw fuck it. Let’s be honest. It looks like I’ll be back writing this site for the time being. See you back here tomorrow.

Out of curiosity, does anyone know if you invested a large sum of money—say half a million dollars—into a company that told you they have a product that’s going to make your job much easier, and it turned out their product didn’t even slightly work… is there any way you can get your money back? Just curious.