Dusting #83

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Got a couple of credits to give in this post.

First, the trick I talked about in the March 21st post that summarized ideas from influence month likely comes from Clayton Rawson. He had a trick called, “The Time Forumla,” in Professional Magic Made Easy by Bruce Elliott. In that trick, a “formula” is written down, and then at the end, it’s shown that the reflection of the forumua says 8 of Spades.

His idea was to write “Jo 8” in script, over 23b692.

It’s probably easier to slip the version I suggested into something (that is, this string: 23b692708). Rather than try and include a division sign and the word “Jo” written in cursive. But it’s the same basic idea.

Thanks to Werner M. for the crediting note.

Just a quick note, if you ever do a trick like this (I’m thinking of Cryptext as an example of a similar trick) don’t write the letters/numbers so that things look perfect at the end. Write it so things look normal at the beginning. In other words, in the illustration above, the 3 is written like a backward E and the 6 has a little tail so it will look more like an “a” when it’s reversed. Writing it in some weird way takes away from the surprise at the end. Instead, write the letters and numbers so they look normal from the start, and then if you have to squint a little to “see” the reveal at the end, that’s fine.

You can see another example of the exact wrong way to do this type of reveal in this post.

In the last issue of the newsletter, I wrote about an idea that I attributed to Joshua Quinn (via a post he made on facebook, and then via a friend who told it to me).

It turns out this idea was published by Michael Weber in a Journal of Psience bonus publication in 2020, called Hold the Phone.

If you have that sitting somewhere in your digital library, you may want to check it out. It’s a very clean scripting (of Tequila Hustler) to prevent the spectator from screwing up the effect and it also includes a nice Paul Vigil idea to frame the questions that lead into the effect.

Great Moments In Magic Copywriting

From the trick Equalizer by Joao Miranda:

“Hearing is one of our most important senses.”

Indeed. Top 5 at the very least.

RIP to Harry Lorayne

Harry was one-of-a-kind. And by that I mean he was a grade-A lunatic (which I mean as only a compliment). In his 90s and trolling the Magic Cafe for mentions of his name and chewing out any idiot who had the audacity to suggest a book or trick that wasn’t his. I loved him. I hope I’m as passionate about myself and my work at that age as he was.

Taxonomy

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Kevin Parry’s video on the 10 types of magic tricks is really great.

As a piece of art, I really enjoy that video. But is it useful in any way for us?

Magicians have been categorizing the different types of effects for at least a couple of centuries.

Here is Dariel Fitzkee’s list from The Trick Brain published in 1944

1. Production (Appearance, creation, multiplication)
2. Vanish (Disappearance, obliteration)
3. Transposition (Change in location)
4. Transformation (Change in appearance. character or identity)
5. Penetration (One solid through another)
6. Restoration (Making the destroyed whole)
7. Animation (Movement imparted to the inanimate)
8. Anti-Gravity (Levitation and change in weight)
9. Attraction (Mysterious adhesion)
10. Sympathetic Reaction (Sympathetic response)
11. Invulnerability (Injury proof)
12. Physical Anomaly (Contradictions, abnormalities, freaks)
13. Spectator Failure (Magicians' challenge)
14. Control (Mind over the inanimate)
15. Identification (Specific discovery)
16. Thought Reading (Mental perception, mind reading)
17. Thought Transmission (Thought projection and transference)
18. Prediction (Foretelling the future)
19. Extra-Sensory Perception (Unusual perception, other than mind)

While these sorts of lists are interesting, I think they’re a particularly magician-centric manner of looking at the tricks you do. Real, normal people aren’t really breaking down the tricks in this manner.

I’m not saying these categories aren’t “real,” I’m just saying they’re not useful. It’s like looking at the 7 basic story plots. In theory, that's a way to categorize stories, but I don’t know how useful it is to suggest that Dracula and Star Wars are somehow the same story.

If you do a card trick where the cards transpose, and then another one where certain cards transform to other cards, and then another one where cards vanish and reappear, those will end up merging in the spectator’s mind into one experience of “card tricks.”

However, if you transform a card from the Ace of Spades to the 2 of Hearts, and then transform an apple into a banana, those will be seen as two wildly different tricks to the spectator, simply because they use different objects.

Similarly, if you make coins appear, vanish, transpose, multiply, transform, etc., most spectators won’t feel like they’ve seen a wide variety of magic. They’ll feel like they’ve seen some coin tricks.

But you can take an appearance and put it into three different contexts and the person will have a distinct memory of three different tricks. 1) The Tibetan “Wishing Ritual” where the object they wished for appeared. 2) The time you hypnotized them to see an apple in the box that they had clearly seen empty just moments before. 3) The time you held a seance and the young spirit’s little dolly appeared on the table out of nowhere.

These are all they same “type” of trick (appearances). But they will be perceived as very different tricks and experiences for people because they’re three very different stories.

If you want to differentiate your effects for normal humans (not for magic researchers and historians) you will want to change up the props you use and the contexts/stories in which the tricks reside.

Those are the things people perceive and remember. When you realize that, you’ll understand that—from the spectator-centric perspective—there are unlimited “types” of magic tricks.

Dear Jerxy: The Multiple Bill Change

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Dear Jerxy,

Did you ever do Hundy 500 or something similar? And if so, did you have a particular presentation you used? —SR

I don’t really use those bill changes to change $1s to $100s or something like that. At least not too often. I usually use that sort of technique in a trick like this, where I’m secretly switching some of the bills.

The trick of changing 1s to 100s doesn’t really need a presentation. In fact, an overblown presentation might detract from the trick because this is so clearly exactly what you’d do with magic powers. So any greater explanation probably weakens the effect.

I will tell you something I did once with Hundy 500 (or maybe Extreme Burn) ages ago.

I was watching The Food Network with my girlfriend at the time and they featured some little chili-dog stand in Pennsylvania on a show. It struck us as looking incredibly delicious. So we decided that the next day we’d take the 5-hour roundtrip and go get some chili dogs. Spontaneous road trips to satisfy one specific food craving are one of my favorite things in life.

On the way there I said I had to make two stops.

First, we stopped at a no-name gas station. I gave my girlfriend a $10 bill and asked her to go in and ask for a five and five ones. “I have change if you need some,” she told me.

“No,” I said, “I need the bills from this place.”

She was confused, but went in and got the money.

Next, we stopped at my friend’s place in New Jersey. “I’ll just be five minutes,” I said and rushed into the house.

A few minutes later I came out with a gallon jug of something that looked like pee.

“The fuck is that?” she asked.

“You’ll see later,” I told her and tossed the jug in the back seat.

The trip rolled on. We got our chili dogs, some tater tots, and some soft-serve ice cream. It was good as shit.

Then we headed back home.

At her place, I got out of the car and asked her for her help with something before we said goodbye.

I removed the five singles she had obtained for me from the gas station. I gave her one and asked her to take a look at it. “Looks normal, right?” I took it back and added it to the other bills in my hand.

I gave her the jug of yellow liquid and asked her to pour it over the bills in my hands.

She was wondering what the hell this was about, but if I wanted to get this pee liquid over my hands, she wasn’t going to stand in my way.

She poured the liquid over the bills, and as it glugged out of the bottle and splashed over the money, the bills visibly transformed from ones into 100s under this golden shower.

“Keep pouring,” I said, “they need to get fully saturated.”

After half the jug I said, “That’s probably enough.” I showed her the bills. All $100s. No ones to be seen.

“Thanks, babe,” I said. I shook the liquid off the bills. She stood there just blinking in confusion/awe. I asked her to cap the bottle. “I’ll save it. It might be good for another batch.”

That relationship was just a summer fling and we don’t really keep in touch much. But hopefully, she’s out there and occasionally thinks of that sunny road trip to the chili dog place, and how we had to get some one-dollar bills from a specific run-down gas station, and a jug of mysterious yellow liquid from a house in the middle of nowhere. And how that liquid just seemed to wash something away, causing the bills to change from 1s into $100s.

And how, the next night, after dinner at the nice sushi place, I gave her a wink and a “Shh” as I dropped two $100 bills on the table to take care of the check.

Influence: The Baader-Meinhof Reframe

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I have a couple remaining influence posts to get to…

During last month’s “Influence Month,” I received an email from Michael Murray who has looked at the influence premise a lot in his work. He wrote:

I stumbled upon this train of thought that I really think you will love….

Note: I don’t have anything fleshed out but do believe this premise is right up your street.

There is a concept in psychology called the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, also known as the frequency illusion, where once you purchase a new car you start seeing it everywhere. The idea is that there is an attentional 'awakening' to the object that now holds value to you.  So, imagine that now that the participant is thinking of their favorite movie and actor/actress they will literally start to see the name everywhere!!!!

I think you can guess the direction this is going in ;)

Anyway, a huge thanks once again for kick starting my thinking, I am hugely enjoying yours as always.

I think this is an excellent idea.

It’s sort of a “gentler” version of the Simulation Reframe I described last month. That concept was that every choice you make gets reflected in the world around you via the simulation “creating” the universe in response to your decisions.

If that’s a bit too “out there” for you (or for the person you’re performing for) then the Baader-Meinhof reframe might be a good alternative.

The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, as Michael described it, is when you buy a new car, or learn a new word, or familiarize yourself with an actor you didn’t know before and subsequently you start seeing that car everywhere, reading that word everywhere, or spotting that actor in a bunch of different stuff.

The reason being, of course, that you just weren’t focused on those things before and now you’re noticing them when, in the past, they just faded into the background.

Using Baader-Meinhof as an influence reframe, you can suggest that any choice we make is subject to this phenomenon.

Then you demonstrate it by having them choose a card, or movie, or location, or whatever your trick is.

And now, instead of saying, “And here are eight ways in which you were influenced to choose __________,” you will instead get to join your spectator in looking for the echoes of their choice in the world around you. And this is something that can go on all night.

Say, for example, I’m using Michael’s Show Reel trick. My friend chooses Tom Hanks. We look around and see the name Tom Hanks appears on the page itself in a couple of locations. Then we see a Tom Hanks movie is the only one slightly jutting out of my DVD collection. Later that evening, flipping around on the TV, we come across Castaway playing. Then I spot a note I was writing to my mom asking if she could sew up my torn handkerchiefs. “Look where I asked her to fix my torn hanks.”

(Is that a stretch? Sure. But you can choose to make the reveals as ludicrous or serious as you like.)

Then we get in my car and the radio starts blasting Chet Hanks’ (Tom’s son) hit, White Boy Summer. “Actually, that’s no coincidence,” I say. “I got this banger on repeat all day and all night.”

The fun thing about this reframe is that the trick wouldn’t end there. Going forward, my friend would be paying extra attention to when Tom Hanks pops up, and I’m sure it would end up feeling like it was happening more often than it was previously. Here the actual Baader-Meinhof effect kicks in and continues the experience for weeks, months, or years to come.

Thanks to Michael Murray for suggesting the idea. I think it’s a great influence reframe.

Mailbag #85

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I was wondering if the next book has a theme to it? Or if you could give any information about it? —SS

Not really. I covered this in the introduction to the last book…

📙My previous books were loosely organized around a central theme. My first book described my basic philosophy towards performing magic. My second book was about introducing “emotional elements” into your presentations. My third book covered my approach to mentalism. And my fourth book focused on “extra-presentational,” world-building techniques that serve to add depth and connections to my performances. 

Those previous books covered the fundamental elements of my style of performing. And at this moment there isn’t really any more groundwork I need to lay. 

Now, I could pretend that each year I have some grand epiphany that there’s some subject I just need to write about. “Oh my god, everyone. I just realized I have a lot to say about Himber Wallets!” And then you’re stuck with some fucking 200 page book about Himber Wallets to read through. But I wouldn’t subject either of us to that.

So this book has no theme. Well, it has no theme other than, “This is the stuff I’ve been working on over the past couple years.” And that’s the plan for this series of books. I will release one every 18 months or so looking at the material I’ve created since the last in the series. 

If and when I do have enough material for a book that’s more narrowly focused, then that will be released outside of this series of books as a stand-alone thing.

So that’s the plan. 📙

And that’s still the plan.

The “reward books”—that is, the books that come as a reward for supporting at the highest tier for a full season—will continue to not be focused around a particular theme, but instead around a time period.

Other books, that I may or may not get to, that are more focused, will be available to supporters at all levels when the time comes.

That being said, there is something of a theme to some of the material in this book. I noticed as I was assembling the pieces that there was a lot of card magic in the book.

Card magic tends to be very reductive. It tends to come down to what’s happening with your fingers and the deck. And it doesn’t just come down to that methodologically, it comes down to that presentationally too. “Here’s what my hands can do with this deck of cards.” Several effects in the book are my attempt at making card tricks more expansive. It wasn’t an intended theme when I started the book, but it came up time and time again in the routines I was creating during this time.

I don’t like talking too much about what’s in the books, because the upcoming book essentially sold out a year ago and trying to hype the book at this point seems stupid.

Are you open to being sponsored by a magic company? Or are you already? I notice you usually link to Penguin on your site and in the newsletter. If a new magic company was willing to give you a monthly stipend would you be willing to link them instead? [Disclosure: I’m part of a team behind a new magic retail site.]—SM

No, I’m not sponsored by anyone. I usually link to Penguin or Vanishing Inc. because those are the companies I use most often. Generally, I look up the product on both sites and then just link to whichever site is offering it cheaper. That’s the extent of the thought I put into that.

Would I link somewhere else if they were sponsoring the site? Yeah, of course. But I doubt it’s going to happen. They would have to be okay with me continuing to write whatever I feel like and I don’t think that’s what a sponsor would be looking for.

I guess you’ve seen this but isn’t Airprint your idea called The Look of Love? Have they nicked this idea or done it with your blessing?—KF

Vanishing Inc. sent out an email for the SPIX app (I guess the names “beaner” and “wetback” were already taken), and I got a few emails suggesting that the “Airprint” feature of the app was based on my trick, “The Look of Love.”

It’s definitely similar in the sense that you ask for an object and then a color and you use a mini photo printer in order to generate a photo of the predicted object in that color.

Airprint is pretty much that basic idea but stripped of the charm and the context I gave it. Presentationally it’s 10 steps backwards, but as a tool, it may be useful (although it only works on a couple of discontinued printers, which is not ideal).

The Look of Love was originally written up on this site in 2016. It also appeared in a Penguin Magic Monthly at some point.

The way I do it now, which requires no outside help and no special app was written up in this post in 2020.

(I never did end up trying out the printer I mentioned in that post. If anyone else did, let me know.)

I don’t think the idea was “nicked,” nor did I give it my blessing (not that they needed my blessing). The French Twins did contact me when the app was about to be released to ask about the Look of Love and possibly mentioning it in the instructions, but I don’t know if they did or not.

Influence Month: Summary

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There was a trick I used to do growing up. I’m not sure where it comes from. I’ve googled around for it but haven’t come up with anything. And now that Max Maven is dead, I don’t know who to go to for this kind of thing.

The way it worked was this. You’d write down this random code on a piece of paper.

23b692708

Then you’d have someone pick a card, for example, the 8 of Spades.

Then you’d show them the mirror reflection of the number you wrote down.

I guess I shouldn’t say, “for example, the 8 of Spades,” because obviously, that’s the only card it works with.

Let’s take a look at this trick through the lens of some of this month’s posts.

The Bombardment Principle - Tells us that if we’re doing a straightforward influence premise, then we’d want this reversed writing cue to just be one of many that have been put there to “guide” the spectator.

The Fleeting Reframe - I ask you to stare in a mirror for two minutes while I repeat a “special code” for your subconscious. I read the code off a piece of paper while you look in the mirror. After the two minutes is up, I say, “Quick, let’s try something.” I have you look at the faces of a deck of cards and then select one blindly. You picked the 8 of Spades. I reveal my prediction to show that I knew you’d pick the 8 of Spades.

I then explain to you how it really worked. “Staring into our own face in a mirror is known to lower our psychological defenses for a moment because we’re looking at someone who presents no danger. Because of this, it makes us especially susceptible to influence in those moments because our guard is down.

“Now, me reading the code actually had nothing to do with the influence I was trying to use on you. It was actually those couple of times when I adjusted your head and the post-it in my hands was briefly visible in the mirror. Look….”

I hold the post-it up to the mirror to show the reflection looks like the 8 of Spades.

The Holmesian Reframe - After asking you to drink some tea I request your help with a little experiment I want to try.

I’ve written down some notes on a sheet of paper from a private website my friend let me access.

My notes say:

Username: TennisStar19
Password: 23b692708

Step 1: Spread a deck of cards toward the participant.

Step 2: Ask them to stare at the cards as you pass them from hand to hand. As they do this, they should count backward from 100 by threes.

Step 3: Spread the cards face down and allow them to touch either one.

I go through this process with you and before you touch the card, I say, “Just understand there is a particular card I want you to take. Consider everything that’s happened and touch the one you think I want you to touch.”

You touch one. It turns out to be the 8 of Spades.

“This is fascinating. If I was doing this as a magic trick I’d pull out a prediction that says ‘The Eight of Spades,’ but I didn’t bother with that. That tea that you had earlier was Lapsang Souchong tea. It’s an exotic black tea that’s smoked over a pinewood fire. It was actually Sherlock Holmes’ favorite tea. But here’s the crazy thing… The Sherlock Holmes stories were written in the late 1800s. Then 80 years later at some university in Texas, they were studying the effects of different drinks on different cognitive abilities. And they found out this one particular type of tea just happened to have a strong effect on people’s perception and deduction skills. It works more on a subconscious level. So it was, like, the perfect choice to make as Sherlock Holmes’ favorite tea. But it was just by chance.”

I point out the light behind me, and how when I was reading the instructions, their mind picked up a clue I planted for them: the image of the “password” reversed.

(And, ideally, there would be some other “clues” you picked up on as well.)

The Simulation Reframe - After having you touch a card from a spread of cards (let’s say…hmmm…the 8 of Spades), I explain how some believe our choices are reflected in the world around us as we “author” the simulation we’re stuck in. I start looking around for evidence of this. Look… the cord to my iron is looped around on itself forming a black eight on the floor. There’s got to be more… I move some stuff around on shelving behind me as I look. A book falls to the floor. David Spade’s autobiography. I flip through it but nothing jumps out. “Wait… David Spade. Day-vid Spade. Eight of Spades. It’s so obvious.” I continue to look, with your help.

I check out the receipt on the table.

Then I look at the doodle on the back.

“Is there an 8 in there maybe? I don’t see it. Wait… look at the batch number from the opposite side.”

The nice thing about the simulation reframe is that you can have the tiniest little things be “reveals” of the simulation premise. Things that never would be fathomable as being part of any “influence.”

This is the final post for the month. I will return on Monday, April 3rd.

Supporters will receive the next newsletter on Saturday, April 1st.

And, of course, I’ll be celebrating National Peanut Butter and Jelly day with you in spirit on April 2nd.

Later. ✌️

Mailbag #84

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If you just met someone and you were going to show them three tricks over the course of the time you were spending together, would you perform your strongest trick first? Save it for the end? Put the weakest trick first or in the middle? What would be your plan of attack? —TT

Okay, assuming this is someone I’m meeting once and will never see again, then I would start with the weakest effect and build to the strongest. There’s no reason, in a social performing circumstance, not to build, build, build in intensity.

Traditional structure would be to start with your second strongest and end with your strongest. That maybe makes sense for your restaurant gig or something else where people are watching your “show.” But in a casual performing circumstance you don’t want a noticeable dip from one trick to the next.

If I was meeting someone for the first time and I knew I’d be seeing them again, then I wouldn’t really waste any particularly great tricks on them. There’s no need to. A good trick will get the reaction of a great trick from someone who hasn’t seen much magic.

Instead, if I was going to show someone three tricks over the course of an interaction (which would be pretty rare) I would probably do three good tricks.

I might start with a good card trick - People are familiar with card tricks. But you’d want something that takes it up a notch from what they’ve seen their Uncle Ted do.

Then a good visual trick - Something with coins, rubber bands, rings, or something like that.

Then a good mentalism trick - This takes things in a more personal direction and has the potential for some more interesting presentational elements.

The temptation is to do your strongest material whenever possible. As a social performer, that’s a notion you need to put out to pasture. Or you’ll just be doing weaker and weaker material for people over time. It’s terrible structure for long-term performing. So start good, not amazing. I’d really recommend one or two tricks for someone you’ll see again soon. Leave them wanting more and set yourself up nicely for the next time you see them.

Tell me if you think I’m crazy or not. Remember the whole debacle with Craig Petty and Michael Weber? I think it might have been fake. STAY WITH ME.

It seems like with many of Craig Petty’s recent releases there has been some sort of controversy:

Quantum Deck - Whether it was examinable or was the advertising deceptive
EDCeipt - Whether it was original
Lucky Lotto - Was the advertising deceptive

These tricks come out and generate a lot of conversation with people bashing or defending Craig. But all the while the thread stays at the top of the Magic Cafe’s Latest and Greatest section for weeks. Some people go overboard attacking Craig and then he gets to post a video on youtube where he gets to play the victim.

It’s a pattern. If you look at the thread for EDCeipt you’ll see there are not many posts from people who are performing it and enjoying it. If it was just a thread with those people it would be a couple of pages long. But because of all the hubbub it became dozens of pages long. I’m sure that sold a lot more than a thread that was short and disappeared soon after.

Lucky Lotto is such a mediocre trick that it doesn't even elicit a reaction in the demo video. He has to ask them to applaud. But because of the controversy, it has many more posts than a number of good tricks. Nobody would be talking about it if it weren't for the controversy.

I bet an average trick that people are debating about will sell more than an average trick that is simply forgotten. That is why I believe the EDCeipt thing was fabricated. I believe the Weber incident was planned and then spiraled out of control. —TS

You wrote: “Tell me if you think I’m crazy or not.”

You’re fucking crazy.

I don’t believe Weber and Petty planned anything.

And, more generally, I don’t believe Craig releases effects and adds controversy to them in order to get people talking about them. If he did do that, he might be a goddam genius, though.

I don’t disagree with your thesis that if a product has 2 pages of positive comments amidst 40 other pages of debate, then it probably sells better than one with just 2 pages of positive comments. But again, I don’t think he’s doing that on purpose. If he is, he’s my new favorite magician.

You’ve been writing about your journey through magic for almost 8 years now. I’m hoping the answer is “no” but do you have an end date for the site in mind?—NF

Not really. I take it about a year or so at a time. I’m not running out of stuff to write about. But the time involved is always a factor. Working on the site, newsletter, books, etc., is a big investment of time. Not just writing, but creating, and trying out different ideas. The supporters of the site make it worthwhile, but it also means turning down work that is more lucrative and easier. At some point I may have to shift my priorities some, but not in the immediate future.