I've been thinking lately about Roman History and also about "Billoon" by Mark Jenest where a bill appears inside a balloon.

With changes in presentation it can be used for other things. Something could be "put" inside a balloon and blown up and tied and later verified to be inside.

Then it can suddenly disappear and be somewhere else.

Mentalism also came to mind. A prediction hidden safely inside a balloon.


Has anyone else been thinking about this and come up with other ideas?

Frank

I haven't been thinking about it but I think it's a GREAT routine that's pretty much been overlooked by just about everybody (Except you Frank!). Mark Jenest is a great performer and a very solid thinker.

I perform Billoon in almost every show. It has totally replaced bill to lemon in my street act (for all the reasons I gave in the Bill to lemon thread).

As to using other objects? I have performed the “signed card to balloon” a dozen or so times in bars (Mercury fold guys).

Last night at a party I was caught off guard and asked to “do that thing where the ring disappears and ends up with your car key”. I was ready to do the reel-less ring flight routine and had planned to perform it later in the night. Because the guy had tipped the ending I decided to go another way.

I simply performed “Ringloon”. That is the guy’s finger ring ended up in the balloon. He picked it up out of the burst pieces and was duly impressed. I then asked to see it to clean off the powder that is inside the balloon, vanished it giving it back to the guy only to find it on my key ring. The sound in the balloon is not as authentic as for a bit of paper in the balloon but passes.

I have also performed “Coinloon” or the vanished signed/marked coin to balloon a number of times (I make a slightly different sound gimmick for this, which by the way would work for the ring version too).

If it is small and it can be vanished then it can end up in the balloon. The signed bill to balloon is still the best use of the idea.

I have an old issue of Genii that shows a method in which, after stealing a watch, the watch ends up inside a balloon...REALLY inside the balloon.

I think it was Harry Anderson's. The method was very simple and ingenious.

Rick

Barrie Richardson teaches a prediction effect called "The Totally Isolated Prediction" in his acclaimed book, Theater of the Mind. The effect uses the same basic principle that Billoon uses.

You may want to check out Barrie's routine not only for the method of revealing a prediction inside a balloon (which you already know) but also for the chicanery he uses to predict the five items (geometric shape, color, playing card, random letters and numbers as called out by six, repeat, six persons) that end up in his prediction list inside the balloon.

Leo
Manila, Philippines

Hi,

A signed coin is easy to do and gets a good reaction.

Paula

Billoon is really a great effect with a balloon.

I agree.

The funny thing is that it is one of the only effects I figured out when I saw it. And I never figure anything out.

So I was a bit hesitant to start using it but I'm very glad I did.

I keep a large pin embedded in a 1/2 cork (for safety) and that is inside a Brian O'Neill mini coin purse.

The purse and its contents alone provide quite a bit of misdirection at the proper moments.
Everybody wonders what's inside such a curious little purse.

Frank