Just curious - did you ever check out the "advice for magicians" at Ian Rowland's website?

On 2010-04-06 13:17, epoptika wrote:
J.G.,

Just curious - did you ever check out the "advice for magicians" at Ian Rowland's website?

And as already mentioned there is nothing funny about throwing a fake rock at your audience - on the street or anywhere else. You could, perhaps, get away with it with your friends but it is not likely to amuse anyone else. Stick with the fruit.

On 2010-04-06 15:18, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-04-06 13:17, epoptika wrote:
J.G.,

Just curious - did you ever check out the "advice for magicians" at Ian Rowland's website?

And as already mentioned there is nothing funny about throwing a fake rock at your audience - on the street or anywhere else. You could, perhaps, get away with it with your friends but it is not likely to amuse anyone else. Stick with the fruit.

I did not see anything saying advice for magicians but I saw something titled How To Perform A Miracle. Talking about donating blood and just doing it if that is it?

On 2010-04-06 19:22, Bill Palmer wrote:
I disagree. He didn't look past the password. If you don't know the password to the Magicians Only section, you won't find the advice.

I'm going to spoonfeed you the first part of what epoptika is referring to:

http://www.ianrowland.com./Gateways/Pass2ForMagiOnly.php

enter the password. If you can't figure it out, google the name of the illusion.

That will take you to a page with several buttons. Click on the one marked "Advices."

Read the next page thoroughly. Print it out. Have it tattooed on the inside of your eyelids. Well, maybe not that.

Now you don't have any excuses.

On 2010-04-06 22:16, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-04-06 19:22, Bill Palmer wrote:
I disagree. He didn't look past the password. If you don't know the password to the Magicians Only section, you won't find the advice.

I'm going to spoonfeed you the first part of what epoptika is referring to:

http://www.ianrowland.com./Gateways/Pass2ForMagiOnly.php

enter the password. If you can't figure it out, google the name of the illusion.

That will take you to a page with several buttons. Click on the one marked "Advices."

Read the next page thoroughly. Print it out. Have it tattooed on the inside of your eyelids. Well, maybe not that.

Now you don't have any excuses.

I rechecked the site without your link just to see if I could find it without it and I don't know how I missed it. Anyway shame on me for not looking hard enough. Thanks for the link, and I thought of Houdin as well like it said a lot do. However I didn't think that sounded right anyway. I can try the magic pedia of Genii magazine. If not I think one of my Jim Steinmeyer books speaks of it. If not their are dozens of library books I could run through. My local library has many of the magic books from the golden age of magic. If they ever discard any I have got to get my hands on them.

On 2010-04-06 23:35, Bill Palmer wrote:
One clue would have been this. The person most people call Robert Houdin was not named Robert Houdin.

Here are a couple of links that might help you understand this:

http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/searc......=5538192
and
http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/searc......=4651034

This may sound silly to you, but I think that knowing this is very important.

And you would have known that since "Houdin's" first name was Jean, not Robert, it could not have been the correct answer.

On 2010-04-07 09:29, epoptika wrote:
You are very lucky if your library has older magic books on their shelves. If they have "Our Magic" or "The Amateur Magician's Handbook" by Henry Hay you should definitely read them (several times).

I have a set of very heavy Gazzo cups, in guild metal, that I'll let you have for a mere $350 if you don't want your cups blowing over.

Hey Bill, I found this quote in one of my notebooks -"Practice everything you know until it becomes boring, then practice it until it becomes beautiful." I found the quote in a magazine article. It was attributed to one Bill Palmer, author of How To Be A Professional Entertainer. Was that you?

On 2010-04-05 18:56, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-03-20 23:29, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-03-11 23:42, Bill Palmer wrote:
You need an act.

Repeat.

YOU NEED AN ACT.

The problem with most magicians who don't know how to work a crowd is that they don't have an act.

It doesn't have to be a long act. But it has to have a certain amount of structure.

Get Kozmo's DVD.

If you can't figure out an act on your own, copy someone else's. But don't just go out there and inflict magic on passers by.

It strikes me, after re-reading your orignal paragraph that you really don't have a clue about what you are doing. Have you ever seen anyone busk? Do you really know what that is?

You are more concerned with your equipment than you are with your act or your audience.

You keep referring to doing street magic and strolling. Maybe you need to go over to the street magic section.

You won't get many tips doing street magic, though.

Working on my act now and once I get some material on street magic or whatever you may call it that will really help. Ideas are coming faster than I thought. I could use some input how is this?

Things to use- cards, coins, cups and balls, billiard balls, sponge balls, shell game, wooly worm, thread, invisible thread (body hook ups), wax, loops, matches, linking rings, ring and string.

Attention grabbers- linking rings, billiard balls, wooly worm, cards, cups and balls, thread.

Routines
1. Do a little pencil stuff with thread combined with the wooly worm and a cup from your cups and balls set. Once their attention is there and a bit of a crowd gathers go into my cups and balls routine to go into my sponge ball routine. Proceeded by my billiard ball routine.
2. Do the linking rings and once a crowd gathers do some ring and string effects possibly even cut end resored rope once you are though with the ring. Followed by quarter through ring and floating ring. Going into Hindu and dragon thread followed by string from eye and or maybe even thread and needles.
3. Start by doing the hummer card once a crowd gathers put the card away and pull out a deck doing tricks with cards. Obviously coming up with a routine with cards. Probably including Monte routines somewhere along the way.

I was thinking I cant go from a cups and balls routine where I end with three sponge balls to a sponge ball routine. Because I then half to put the sponge balls back in my pockets and the audience knows that they are there. Thus ruining the magical transpositions. For the same reason I couldn't go from a sponge ball routine to a cups and balls routine. They know the sponge balls are in my pocket so when I produce the sponge balls they will think back to me reaching in my pockets placing the other balls in. Putting two and two together figuring it out. Perhaps I could though if I had something different between the two so they forget that stuff. However considering Bill Palmer said I should finish with the cups and balls unless my sponge ball routine turns out to be weak being good for the smaller effects he said I should start concluding with. I should put the sponge balls first. Build up the crowd with my wooly worm and animated pencil. Go into the sponge balls proceeded by perhaps the billiard balls concluding with the cups and balls.

On 2010-04-07 09:29, epoptika wrote:
You are very lucky if your library has older magic books on their shelves. If they have "Our Magic" or "The Amateur Magician's Handbook" by Henry Hay you should definitely read them (several times).

I have a set of very heavy Gazzo cups, in guild metal, that I'll let you have for a mere $350 if you don't want your cups blowing over.

Hey Bill, I found this quote in one of my notebooks -"Practice everything you know until it becomes boring, then practice it until it becomes beautiful." I found the quote in a magazine article. It was attributed to one Bill Palmer, author of How To Be A Professional Entertainer. Was that you?

On 2010-04-07 14:27, dmueller wrote:
Some of the more experienced performers here might shout me down for this, but I'm not sure how good cards would be for working a crowd on the street. Up close they are great but I would be concerned about wind. Just a thought, and if I am wrong, by all means, someone please correct me.

As far as the sponge ball thing: as long as you keep the 3rd ball either in plain sight or have a spectator hold it to ensure "no funny business" while you perform the rest of your routine, you should be OK. If they see a 3rd ball and it goes back into your pocket while you perform with the other 2, then yea they are going to be suspicious. But guess what, you are performing magic, they are already suspicious or very stupid.

Or if you want to start with sponge balls, vanish one and produce a "cups and balls" ball and use that as a lead in to your C&B routine. The only thing really holding you back is your own imagination.

RNT2 makes complete sets, chop cups, and combo sets. MJM has some good prices on entry level cups and combo sets. I just got a Bazar De Magica combo set, as a barter for some graphic design work I did for a friend. I am by no means an expert when it comes to cups, but they seem sufficient to the task at hand to get me by until I am sure that a nice set from RNT2 is going to be a worthwhile investment based on how much I will use them. I believe the retail price from MJM was less than $40. Food for thought. Yet again, if I miss the mark here, please correct me somebody.

On 2010-04-07 15:25, Bill Palmer wrote:

Quote:

On 2010-04-07 09:29, epoptika wrote:

Hey Bill, I found this quote in one of my notebooks -"Practice everything you know until it becomes boring, then practice it until it becomes beautiful." I found the quote in a magazine article. It was attributed to one Bill Palmer, author of How To Be A Professional Entertainer. Was that you?

Yep!

On 2010-04-06 22:20, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-04-06 22:16, J.G. the magnificent wrote:

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On 2010-04-06 19:22, Bill Palmer wrote:
I disagree. He didn't look past the password. If you don't know the password to the Magicians Only section, you won't find the advice.

I'm going to spoonfeed you the first part of what epoptika is referring to:

http://www.ianrowland.com./Gateways/Pass2ForMagiOnly.php

enter the password. If you can't figure it out, google the name of the illusion.

That will take you to a page with several buttons. Click on the one marked "Advices."

Read the next page thoroughly. Print it out. Have it tattooed on the inside of your eyelids. Well, maybe not that.

Now you don't have any excuses.

I rechecked the site without your link just to see if I could find it without it and I don't know how I missed it. Anyway shame on me for not looking hard enough. Thanks for the link, and I thought of Houdin as well like it said a lot do. However I didn't think that sounded right anyway. I can try the magic pedia of Genii magazine. If not I think one of my Jim Steinmeyer books speaks of it. If not their are dozens of library books I could run through. My local library has many of the magic books from the golden age of magic. If they ever discard any I have got to get my hands on them.

I was right Houdin was too long ago and was actually invented in 1965 by a guy which I will not say because it will give it away to others.