@tophatter Reminds me of black electrical tape.

He would have been better off if that's what he had used - it would save you a step - and one less thing to use

@Quade Walker Oh wow, I just this second saw some of the instructions and you will not believe it! It instructs you to SUPER GLUE the gimmick to your bare arm! In 2 places!

Yes, he does - but that's why SHIN LIM steps into the instructions - he kinda breaks the tutorial and says "wait wait wait, if you don't want to super glue your arm...."
and then he chimes in with his thoughts.

Yep. There’s no need to use that method. Shin teaches an alternative and (in my opinion) better set up in the tutorial video.

Best wishes
Dominic

Dominic, would you ever set this up and use it at a gig?

I’ve got an inkling he wouldn’t.

Hi Quade

Yes, I can see a place for this for specific work.. I don't think it's a strolling/walk-around effect though. Definitely valuable for creating effects with companies logos. Perhaps an effect to do with a venues logo when pitching for a meeting with the events manager… If you are cold calling a business, It could be a lovely way to get attention by attaching a very short video of this effect using their brand logo..

What residencies do you have? Could they use this for their own social media? Lots of ways to add value here for a client.
Do you do wedding exhibitions that have a show/catwalk through the day? Perhaps during your showcase performance, you could make two wedding rings link using this principle..?

You know, not every effect needs to be table hopper material to be useful.. just like not every effect needs to come with loads of physical material to be valuable.


Hope this helps you
Dominic

Company logos is a good idea. I know for a fact Screwfix sell electrical tape. Not a bad start.

And grip-ties Keith..?

All those moaning about what you actually receive, who cares? The question you should be addressing is does what you receive allow you to perform the trick as shown.

Magicians are SO hung up on the perceived value of the physical items you receive they so often forget about the value of the effect you are creating.

Hi everyone,

here is my review of Inkling by Abdullah Mahmoud.

Hope it helps






Best,
Kaan

With Egyptian Ink and now Inkling, Abdullah Mahmoud may want to stay away from ink related effects in any future releases because his track record so far is pretty dismal.

Thanks for confirming Kaan.

Kaan, it's a fair review. I'm disappointed for what I paid for. It is a neat idea in theory but not as a worker.

The fact that Kaan can't perform it on video for fear of exposing it says it all.

Jeez, you'd think they'd have a practice run through of the explanation before filming it. Based on Kaan's review, I reckon they had the idea for the trick and threw this project together in a day.

Thanks Kaan, had Egyptian Ink and that was a dud. Love the line "you get enough to make the gimmick, probably for a lifetime, since you won't ever use it" LMAO!!!

It's easy to earn money with magic these days.

Be friend with Shin Lim and ask him for editing advice, put his name on the product, people will buy it.

Sorry, from the first day of the duplicate signature scandal, I don't trust this guy. And this time he proves me right somehow again.

Alex Hui

That’s strange because if I see a product with his name on it I steer very clear. Soon everyone else will too. Like sans minds, you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.

"I steer very clear" don't know if that was intentional or not.

Sleepy

Crazy glue the gimmick to your arm. Some Magis go to great lengths for an effect these days. Actually, they have been going to great lengths since the beginning of time. Blaine practiced controlled regurgitation for his frog production. (No frogs were killed or injured....etc., etc.) This reminds me of something I wanted to use as my signature stage effect with the French Guillotine. The lovely assistant puts her head into the Guillotine, the blade drops, but ooops...a rather bloody malfunction. However, not to worry, there is a doctor in the house, the very magician himself. (The fact that my training was in internal medicine and not vascular surgery is not relevant.) This is where the I do my signature effect, the cut and restored head. It really is a great effect and I am not talking about video editing....it is the real deal...blood spurting out of the carotids with each heartbeat. The problem I encountered is that the head restoration is kind of a hit or miss thing. It is just not reliable. As a consequence, word got out and it became exceedingly difficult for me to get those lovely little assistants to work for me.

What I find interesting is that I am sure that more than one of you at first thought I just might be serious about my signature cut and restored head effect just as we want to believe in just about every new miracle sent our way, despite the fact that something in us tells us that it is just another one of those made for video try and sell this one dud effects. Why is this?

The reason is simple. Despite the fact that we are rational grownups, it is that childlike fascination with being able to do the impossible, or at the least make it look that way, that motivated us to get into magic in the first place. One would think that as magi who know the drill, have been there and got that tee shirt we would be immune to this sort of thing. However, it is just because of we are these childlike magi that want to believe that makes us the biggest potential suckers out there. Please, note the important qualifying word....potential. Every time I encounter a new effect that seems too good to be true, I come here to see what others think. More often than not, just like in other aspects of life, if it is too good to be true, it most likely is.

This brings me to this. I must say that unlike the days before the Internet when the only way I purchased an effect was either having seen it in a live demonstration or buying the parts, making it myself after reading about it from a reliable written source, magic has become something it wasn't. In the old days, there were not so many duds. Sure, you might have that, I paid for this!!! thought after learning the secret of an effect but it was not because it was an unuseable dud but because it turned out to be so simple you thought you should have figured it out. However, you were not upset because that is what we were paying for, to learn the secret of an effect that we could not figure out.

Nobody, and in particular we magi, do not like to be had. More and more I think this is true if an effect looks too good to be true, it probably is going to be a dud. Invariably, the advertising video will be one of these production deals with crazy cutting meant to distract us from being rational. I would love to see a mass boycott of any effect that has such videos. There is absolutely no reason that an effect cannot be advertised with a simple demo. The video should be shot in the manner commensurate with how the effect is going to be done (for the most part.) If it is stage effect, show us the effect from the audience perspective. If it is intimate close up, shoot it in that manner, walk around, street...etc.

If we as a community were smart, we could start right here by not allowing any of these videos to be associated with the site....no embeds....no links. Boycott them. We are consumers just like any other and I think we do have the power to have an impact on those who essentially want to hustle us and take our money.

I was curious about this product, and bought it. Having bought it, watched the instructions and reflected on if/how it could be used, I have decided I probably won't (ever) use this. I think some people might like this, but I don't feel it is convincing enough for me to use. However, other people may love it and use it a lot.