Hey everyone,
I have purchased upto vol 5 in the Ammar series and was wondering if these tricks work in the real world, and if I should buy them all. I would like to start at restaurants but I'm not sure if these tricks would work for that situation.
thanx
greydon

Ammar's DVD are top of the line. As for restaurant magic some effects will work some will not.

Effects like Triumph (vol.1) would work in a restaurant performance, others like Further Than That (vol.1) need to be set-up (some like the one I mention need a lot of set up).

Their are also effects like Card Warp (vol.2)that need set up bet mmultiple can be set-up ahead of time (Can someone else name one like this other than Card Warp [I can come up with Card Warp]?).

Let me qualify my statements below by stating that I am not a professional magician. I've just been into magic for some time. I've seen and heard many things.

All the tricks will work in the real world. Some wouldn't work for table hopping, but many would. Also, it takes years, even for someone very talented, before they would be ready to work in a restaurant.

First, you have to be able to do a trick so well that it becomes totally automatic, so that you can actually watch yourself do it as an observer. There are few card tricks that aren't like that. And you have to know enough tricks to deal with repeat customers. A local professional knows 150 tricks cold. You don't need that many to perform in a resteraunt, but you do need more than a dozen since some people will come back many times.

You have to have your scripts down cold. (For some inexplicable reason, some magician's apparently hate the word "patter," so I'll use "scripts" instead). This can really only be done if you practice the script with the trick.

Before that, you have to create your script. That takes time if you don't want them to be boring. You'll have to try them out on people and refine them. You'll also have to learn what is best performed when, and in what order. This takes both reading and performing in front of people, or, if you are very lucky, a magic mentor.

If you start charging money too soon, you'll get a bad reputation. It's very hard to lose a bad reputation and get hired again.

If you buy those DVDs, consider getting the books mentioned in them. The books are better than the movies!

The Royal Road to Card magic is a good book to start with. There are a great many other terrific card books you can find with the search engine.

Finally, most of the tricks in the DVDs are not Michael Ammar's, just his refinements of other people's tricks.

Michael Ammar is a F.I.S.M. winner at close up magic and an excellent magician and teacher, so I do recommend anything he puts out, but even he will recommend on the videos that you get the books that contain the tricks he teaches. Those books contain so much more than what is shown on those videos.

You might want to try to get reprints of something Jim Sisti put out years ago called the Magic Menu. It's full of great effects for restaurant performers and not all of it is card magic.

All the effects will work in real time in real situations. Some do need setups but most don't. I have almost all of his dvd's and all are highly recommended. Personally one of my favorite things that he teaches is on volume 6. He teaches Darwin Ortiz's Jumping Gemini and Larry Jenning's Impossible. Great effects.

Volumes 1-6 are definitely the best in the series. I personally think it was a mistake to do 7-9. I've learned several of routines from these and use them professionally, one of the best being "play it straight" by John Bannon. The last 3 volumes really contain some "pipe dreams" as well as tricks that I think are just not good. And if Ammar can't make it look good, it just ain't good.

The tricks from Ammar's ETMCM series can all be done in the real world. It's just a matter of mastering the tricks and routining them so that it suits your style.

The videos by Michael Ammar have a lot of tricks that you can do in Restaurants. I work in a restaurant here in Brazil, twice a week, and some good tricks that I use Michael put on his video.But like some people said a lot of tricks are not good for this situation.

If you realy like to start on Restaurant Magic, I will recomend 3 Books that I read and help me a lot, when I started:

Eugene Burger Restaurant Magic
Kirk Charles Restaurant Magic
Jim Pace Restaurant Magic

EXCELLENT BOOKS! After you read these ones, you will know wwich tricks you can use or not.

I hope this help,

All the Best,

:bikes: Mesquita

Hey,
Thanx everyone for all your help and Mesquita I will pick those books up thanx again everyone for your help,
greydon

Mesquita-
Do you have links to those books?

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/patter

1. To speak or chatter glibly and rapidly.
2. To mumble prayers in a mechanical manner.

1. The jargon of a particular group; cant.
2. Glib rapid speech, as of an auctioneer, salesperson, or comedian.
3. Meaningless talk; chatter.


Bill is, by the way, correct on all counts.

Kirk Charles- LLPUB -

http://www.llpub.com/zenshop/index.php?m......ts_id=67

Jim Pace - LLPUB -

http://www.llpub.com/zenshop/index.php?m......s_id=135

And Eugene Burger's restaurant book, I think you can't find it anymore... maybe with some magicians, or in a library. Or.. maybe I'm wrong and you can find it in some place.

I hope this help,

All the Best,

:bikes: Mesquita

I am considering purchasing Volume 3, as I can get a good deal on it @ the moment.

Any feedback on that volume?

Ammar's ETMCM is practical in the real world. The tricks do not involve difficult sleight of hand or angle prone sleights (Tenkai..etc)
They are a collection of some of the strongest card magic effects ever created that are not that difficult to master

HENCE THE NAME!