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Attack of the bag by Craig Petty

Price: : £15

Difficulty: 2-4 / 5 ( depending on what you want to do.. its all about creativity.. but plenty of 2 & 3 effects on the difficulty scale with more advanced stuff if you want it )

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

Description

The coin bag has been around for years, chances are you have one lurking at the bottom of a drawer somewhere. Craig first saw the coin bag about 13 years ago and having brought it he played with it for a little, then promptly forgot about it.


Fast forward several years to when Craig was booked to work at a trade show for a company that sells magic tricks to joke shops. They wanted Craig to show their customers how to demo the simple tricks they had for sale to their customers.

Because of this Craig tried to develop exciting presentations for hundreds of cheap tricks. The prop that attracted Craig the most was a coin bag - after playing with it all week at the show he had developed a number of moves that made several new effects possible.


Craig has been using the coin bag now for over 6 years and it is something he uses in real world conditions all the time. Over the years he has developed over 100 effects with the coin bag and on this DVD he presents 9 of his very best routines.



EFFECTS

- Chop Bag
- Piggy Bank
- Coins In Cartoon Motion
- Strange Exchange
- Recorded Delivery
- Wild Thing
- Money In The Bag
- Scofield Coins
- Multiple Selections



Review

I had the pleasure of seeing Craig perform some of the routines possible with this earlier today. And I have to say it was simply brilliant watching him perform. I came, I saw and he conquered!!

The change bag is very nicely made and specially designed for easy use. I have never owned a change bag and never much cared for one but after today I see the amazing potential of this thing. You actually get 2 change bags, in case you lose one and there is also a routine that uses both bags where the coins transfer coins from bag to bag.

The Dvd is well made and the explanations are clear and concise and everything is explained in fine detail. Craig goes to a lot of effort to make sure things are clearly put across.

The routines themselves are very strong. ALL of them. I will certainly be putting them to some use and getting a lot of mileage from these, as well as creating my own effects.

I dont think there is a need to go into every single effect. They are all strong and all show ways of making coins vanish, re-appear, transpose and do all sorts of magical things. There are also a couple of niuce sleights taught well which are used in the effects, although the sleights are by no means taxing.

Overall

Rating: Effect/item: 9/10, Quality of goods: 9/10, Value for money: 10/10

For a poxy £15 you get a lot, and you will have so much mileage from the change bag it really is a bargain.

Whether a beginner or pro, the possibilities really are endless, you should really pick this up.


NOTE

In addition to these routines, I was also in a very priveleged position to witness Craig demonstrating a number of effects from his upcoming project. All I can say is the new release he is about to release is going to take the world of coin magic by storm. Im sworn to secrecy on this project, but I got a sneak preview and a bit of an inside look and the next project is going to be a bloody killer!! I kid you not!!

The routines I witnessed were absolutely mind blowing and are definately workable in real world settings.

I can't say too much more, but do get excited.. because if you are into coin magic you will love what's coming, and if you're not you will be!!

I first met Craig when I saw his lecture late last year where he demo'd a number of these routines. I then bumped into Craig at World Magic Shop just before Blackpool and had a good chat with him about the DVD which had just arrived.

Craig's a nice guy, has some very good routines and I think that we'll all hear a lot more from Craig in the future. I seem to recall that this was the best selling DVD at Blackpool earlier this year, outselling Coinvexed which of course is a lot more expensive.

Also noted that this DVD got a good review in the latest edition of Magic magazine.

Got my AotB yesterday, and have now sat down, and run through most of the DVD.

Hmmm...on a superficial level, I'm quite impressed, as Craig ably demonstrates just how much can be accomplished with the humble bag.

On the other hand, though, I was a little disappointed with the DVD production values (some parts are really quite dark, and difficult to see, and the sound/music mix is quite overwhelming at times too).

Also, the supplied bags - whilst being adequate for practice - appear to be quite shoddily-constructed; the outer netting on the one I used for no more than two hours, on-and-off, yesterday is now saggy and out-of shape (and this is with gentle handling), whilst the gaff seems readily-visible, due to the internal needlework.

I guess you might be asking what I expect for a measly fifteen pounds, and you'd be entirely justified...but I'd have easily forked out an extra tenner, just for props of a higher quality, as I really cannot see myself using the ones supplied in front of an audience

6.5/10

Rob