talkmagic.co.uk

The Effect

"You introduce several antique photographs collected form around the world. A spectator is invited to freely select one to focus upon. After a moment of concentration you begin to zero in on the spectator's thoughts and reveal the selected photograph. However, in a strange climax, you leave the spectator wondering if they imagined it all when the chosen photograph is turned over to reveal a completely blurred image."

DVD running time is 16 minutes.

Cost

I've bought mine for 22.50 euro's.

Difficulty

(1=easy to do, 2=No sleights, but not so easy, 3=Some sleights used,
4=Advanced sleights used, 5=Suitable for experienced magicians only)

Using this scale the difficulty is 3 (there are some minor sleights used. These should actually be no problem to anyone).

Review

You get a DVD and the photographs.
The basic method used is really simple. It's not innovative, because this basic method is already described in multiple books. I must say, I wasn´t blown away when I watched to performance or the DVD, but I liked it though.

I like the way the effect is constructed. There are to phases. In the first you reveal the chosen picture, in the second, the chosen photograph gets blurred. The illusion of the spectator thinking he created an image himself for the blurred photo is nice.
Because the method is simple, this effect relies on presentation. As in every mentalism effect, the presentation is important. It´s even more important here because of the simplicity of the effect.

At the end of the effect, the attention is drawn away from the actual method.

The nice thing is, if you are creative you can come up with alternatives in this effect. For example an alternative for the prop used to make this effect happen. You can also replace the photographs.

Overall

I like the main idea. The effect is fairly strong. Thereby, Focal Point is easy to perform. This gives you the possibility to focus on your presentation.
Maybe the price - 22.50 euro´s - is a bit high for this, but in overall it´s quite good. I´d give this one a 7.5 on a scale from 1 to 10.

@Ian: I bought this DVD along with some other interesting material and only opened it after a month or so.

I just read that more people are having the problem I had I read that by contacting I-Tricks they will resend you the broken prop.

Nice review, Iceman. How many photos do you get and what is the quality like? Available from www.magicmagic.co.uk for £12.

Thanks!
Didn't know where to find the pound-price, but you've found it

There are 7 photographs in total. I think the quality of them is good.
And something you'll want to know: they are quite small (about 7x5cm).

Thanks for taking the time to put that up Iceman, I will add it to my shopping list for next time.

Cheers.