talkmagic.co.uk

nickj wrote:Barnabas, I think Stevenmagic was making a statement that he knows for a fact, not making an assumption, that some of Angel's effects are achieved by camera trickery. I am also certain that his post was in no-way intended to be confrontational or trying to bring the argument to a standstill as that is not the way things are done around here (nor do we tear people apart for expressing an opinion that differs from ours, so you can rest assured on that front too).

Thank you for your kind words nickj, yes i was stating a fact and was not being confrontational!, i have stayed out of this thread as passions are running high about this topic. It has been interesting to read the different view points.

Demitri. I did not expose any magical secrets to lay people. What I did do was inform them that what they saw Blaine do, was not what the spectators saw. It was in essence a camera trick and completely uneccessary. The genuine reaction of the sprctators to the balducci levitation is testiment to how good it can be when performed well, and in the right conditions. The extra footage of a completely different levitation implying that this is what everyone saw does nothing but bring our art into disrepute. If we embrace camera tricks then, I agree with some previous contrbutors, surely Harry Potter is the greatest magician.

Yeah, Harry Potter really is the best.
Although I must reply to this message concerning David's Levitation. I myself have no evidence to prove how he lifted himself of the ground. And I have also heard some comments about him using wires and then digitally removing them (but still using real reactions). Yet I find this without validation. Maybe he in fact did a simerlar leviation to that of Chris Angel. Now if Blaine himself accually stated that he cheated this leviation then I think that would be proof enough.

I,m fully behind Kolisar on this one
He says

For the record I like neither Criss Angel or David Blaine. I think that they can perform sleight of hand and stage illusions well, and they have brought magic back into the public eye, like Copperfield and Henning back in the early '80s, I just do not personally like their performance styles but I do not deny them their success and fame for the things that do not use camera tricks. My concern is the reaction of the public when they learn that camera tricks were used.

My added concern like a previous contributor is that lesser mortals like myself who try and earn aliving from Magic are often asked "go on levitate like that Blaine bloke" and when I try and avoid this, I am told "he can do it in a street surrounded by people why can't you? and this implies I am in some way inferior as a magician (maybe I am but not because I can't do the trick) It is at this point that I have to tell them that Blaine can't do what they think he can do.
A performer should build a reputation as a great illusionist/magician on his own skills and not on those of the cameraman and studio editor !!!

Demitri: One trick which involved camera editing was in episode 4 (walk on water ep). It was the first trick he did when he stood on a table with a beach towel and disappeared. If you want me to go into detail then PM me.

Lownatic wrote:My added concern like a previous contributor is that lesser mortals like myself who try and earn aliving from Magic are often asked "go on levitate like that Blaine bloke" and when I try and avoid this, I am told "he can do it in a street surrounded by people why can't you? and this implies I am in some way inferior as a magician (maybe I am but not because I can't do the trick) It is at this point that I have to tell them that Blaine can't do what they think he can do.
A performer should build a reputation as a great illusionist/magician on his own skills and not on those of the cameraman and studio editor !!!

This is an extremely valid point, and in some cases, I might be inclined to agree with you. However - I feel this kind of situation is largely based upon circumstance, and as such, specific instances cannot be applied to all scenarios. I for one cannot do any of the "big" effects David Copperfield has done - nor do I have any desire to do so. Yes, occasionally you might get a "do it like so-and-so" line - but this isn't the standard. In fact, I myself have NEVER heard such a thing (nor have I been asked to do something like that Blaine fella did).

I heard Jay Sankey say - they may have seen Copperfield or Blaine or some other guy - but they've never seen you. They've never seen your magic. I agree with him. I think the larger majority of spectators will just enjoy the magic you present to them and not typically go beyond that. Comparisons may be drawn later on - but you can hardly control that.

Also - as to a someone building a reputation as a skilled performer - while I can't speak for David Blaine (don't know much of his history) I think it is quite clear that Criss Angel has built his reputation on a very solid foundation. He had a popular stage show long before his TV series came around. As well, I can't imagine the Academy of Magical Arts would name him magician of the year if his work was just camera tricks and post-editing.

I dont care who they are, how famous they are , or how charismatic they are, if they use camera tricks they dont do the jobbing magician any favours. By the way I must get asked once a month at least to levitate like Mr B. Usually while I'm working the tables, from people who has a drop too much at a wedding or dinnerdance.

Posted on another simerlar thread/

First off, I do think Criss Angel is a talented magician. He has done many good legitimate magic tricks. However, am a concerned about the direction TV magic is going. In the olden days TV magic shows showed you exactly what you would see if you were there in person. Later David Copperfield pushed the limits of what was acceptable on a magic trick TV show with the trick where he made the Statue of Liberty disappear. Over time magicians have progressively pushed the limits of what they can pass off as magic tricks on TV. Now he people like David Blain and Criss Angel who are getting into some really questionable territory. If the trend continues, we might see some new magicians come out who go beyond the borderline camera tricks we see now to flat out camera tricks. My hope is that this trend stops and we go back to the days were they just show exactly what you would see in person.

In the olden days...

Gee its becoming hard to make peaceful critisism. I can tell you right now without a doubt that David Copperfield did not, what-so-ever use a camera trick to make the Statue of Liberty vanish. I don't care what someone four year old wants to belief or what some masked magician claims to debunk - THIS WAS FOR REAL.

1) No staged audiance
2) No staged New York
3) No fake Statue of Liberty
4) It was an ILLUSION

If I wasn't bond to my own code of ethics to not reveal other performers tricks, I would flat out tell you excactly how it was done. And there are no camera tricks at all involved.

Barny,

You are absolutely right....There were no camera tricks involved in David's illusion. There are camera tricks, and there are ingenious other methods.....That was an ingenious other method....Let us not cause a revelation of the secret here....

It is difficult to keep from offending on line, due to the lack of inflections, grins, and other body-language factors....Problems are caused when people just will not accept that there is more than one opinion about a topic....

I think the important points have been covered regarding camera tricks....

.....but, of course everybody has a right to just keep on keeping on....and on....and on....hahaha

All the deciples went out into the world and kept on and on in their own Free-Will way.....

opie

I've been following this thread for a while and thought I'd add my thoughts. This isn't necessarily what I believe to be right or wrong, just something to think about.

We're magicians, our job is to perform magic to amaze people. We use all sorts of different techniques to do this, at what point does it become cheating.

Sleights- We're doing some under hand moves here to fool the spectator.
Gimicks- Are they fair? Using some tool to perform an impossible feat isn't much of a show of skill.
Stooges- How fair is that on the audience?
Lighting Tricks- Stage magicians use lights, mirrors etc. all the time to fool the audience.
Camera Tricks- In this case the audience is the TV viewers, are camera tricks just another tool that we can use to impress and amaze our audience?

I signed up just so that I could comment on this subject, but after activating my membership, coming back to the forums, writing a note in the introductory forum (because in some circles people flip out if you don't {mine is labelled Lancaster Massachusetts}) and navigating back here, I find that I am out of time.

So let me just say this. In the fifties and early sixties when people were still enchanted with television there were many "tricks" which were just camera edits.

Any magician coming onto a television show for many years had to go to great lengths to prove to his home audience that his illusion was not done with cameras.

It became almost a standard speech that magicians would give. Even so many still thought that some of the magicians tricks were done using camera techniques. Unless they knew otherwise, why wouldn't they assume such things.

So Television magicians began appealing to the audience imploring them to witness to the folks at home that everything they see is the same.

This caused new problems, because now the camera had to keep switching between the magician and the audience. Sometimes I had the impression that an elephant could have been walked on stage between camera views.

So this became the approach that magicains generally took on stage to try to convince their audience at home that everything they saw was legitimate without any video trickery.

Copperfield was one of the first that I saw that started blurring the line.

First there was the vanishing of the Statue of Liberty. I think most know there is but one way this could be done. Without explaining the effect, the statue does not actually (gasp) move. It was a great effect and I was right with him enjoying the illusion (despite the fact that I had paid for up front tickets to a live performance and here he was showing me a movie of something that had been on television) until there was a cut-a-way to the "camera located in the helicoper" which showed the empty pedestal.

I have to run now. Try to get back later.

Let me once again play the part of the annoying laymen.

Magician: So what did you think of Chris Angel walking on water.

Stupid Me: Yeah, it was great and all but there's no way that could be done without a camera trick. Its just not possible.

Magician: But it wasn't a camera trick, it has a very logical explanation.

Stupid Me: No, I think your wrong. No magic can fool me. Any magic done on television is ALWAYS a hoax. Trust me I know.

Magician: But you've never watched a magic show besides this one.

Stupid Me: I KNOW IT WAS A CAMERA TRICK. It can't be done in real life. All the people at the pool were in on it. They're all lyers.

Magician: Is there any way to convince you otherwise?

Stupid Me: All magicians on TV like Chris Angel are stupid magicians.

Was that a great story or what. The funny this that this happens every day when some ignorant laymen watches something he can't understand.

Even the Masked Magician makes it very clear when he starts every one of his shows that their are no Camera Tricks involved. Pretty ironic isn't it. Even he wants the viewers at home to relize that no video edits are used. Yet he himself claims that the Tank and Digger Vanishes were originally false audiances and tricky camera moves.

I can see it now. Some idiotic child will watch his show and still think that the Masked Magician is using Camera Tricks. Even after he shows you how its done, the kid will be like...

"Hey mom, did he really do that!"

And she'll respond...

"No son, all television magic is camera tricks. You know that."

-

Sleights- We're doing some under hand moves here to fool the spectator.
Gimicks- Are they fair? Using some tool to perform an impossible feat isn't much of a show of skill.
Stooges- How fair is that on the audience?
Lighting Tricks- Stage magicians use lights, mirrors etc. all the time to fool the audience.
Camera Tricks- In this case the audience is the TV viewers, are camera tricks just another tool that we can use to impress and amaze our audience?

Quote from a member from penguinmagic "A camera is not a magic trick prop, gimmick, or tool! It is the eyes and ears of your television audience that allows them to be right there with you so that they can see your magic." I could not state it any better than this.

I don't think people are saying the Blaine's levitation was a camera trick in the sense of wires being digitally removed. Jonathan Goodwin did a levitation that looked identical (to me) in the first series of 'Monkey Magic'.

The issue is about a separately filmed segment being inserted in the middle of 'street' footage and portrayed as being what the 'genuine' spectators saw, live and in the middle of an ordinary sidewalk. It is a question of misleading editing being used to enhance an effect.

To me, there are two aspects to editing. One is to convey an accurate impression of what it was like to see the effect live. To this extent, the camera may cut away when a move is done, or only show a favourable angle. I have no problem with that.

The other is reordering, refilming, adding, or taking away stuff solely to make the effect more impressive. I'm not sure about this, but I am convinced a lot of TV magicians have done this, including a famous British one. This isn't conjecture; I have actually spotted things that reveal this.

Then, there is the question of fake audiences/spectators. I'm told that TV shows in the USA often have paid audiences, so they will howl with laughter, even after a sitcom joke is shot for the tenth time.

The vanishing digger effect falls into this category. I am not too happy with the 'genuine studio audience members' being paid and having signed a contract with a healthy compensation clause hitting them with a $5,000,000 lawsuit if they talk (or whatever it is). The studio audience is part of the viewer's reassurance that all is happening as seen.

What next? "I want you to think of a card...any card. You're thinking of the four of spades...in fact, you are thinking of the four of spades from a charity card pack you had when you were a child. Look inside that envelope. Is that the exact same card from your childhood deck, even with the guide dog on the back?" That sort of thing is pointless if it's just acting and a paid spectator going along with it. It's like a juggler waving his empty hands around and adding in flaming torches with CGI.

Then there are 'real' camera tricks. I don't regard using the camera as a fixed viewpoint to be a terrible way of doing an illusion. It's not the 'fairest', but magic is hardly fair. The problem is having fairies dancing on your hand (as David Nixon discovered caused him problems) and other CGI addtions or subtractions, or projection.

There is one effect I have seen, a famous one, and I thought I was going mad, because it was obvious (to me) that the performer used a camera trick to make it look dangerous, when in fact there was no danger at all. No one ever mentions it in the discussions about Blaine and Angel. The performer in question is extremely well known. Recently, I was talking to another magician and it turned out he had seen exactly what I had.

Strange, isn't it?

No, I am not going to say who it was, or name the effect. Many of you will have seen it and you should keep your eyes (and minds) open!