by jbasl » May 24th, '06, 01:31
Hey All,
Just thought I'd introduce myself and mention some of my interests. I'll avoid mentioning my non-magic hobbies and bio and skip straight to the magic stuff.
I like magic as a hobby and am not really interested in performance for a broad audience. I am returning to magic after a long hiatus (I took up this hobby as a child and continued through high school but I didn't do anything during my undergraduate career and am now starting again). My interests always were cards and sleight of hand. I'm attracted tricks you can do without any sort of device which is why I've always liked cards. I don't mean to denigrate magic that uses devices, I think this magic takes lots of skill in figuring out how best to use devices and more importantly on presentation. I'm not artistic enough to care much for presentation and instead prefer the mechanics and skill that go into handling cards. That being said, now that I'm starting up again I'm looking into some device magic, especially pk effects, because I think i'll like figuring out ways of shimming objects. I've recently ordered a pro pk kit (micro 5) and am hoping to get some advice on the boards. I'm especially interested in coming up with ways of performing these tricks that don't present the performance as mentalism. Most of the people I'll be showing this stuff (friends, coworkers, grad students, etc) are very scientific and so are going to start looking for devices immediately in the case of pk tricks. I'm trying to think of scientifically palatable performances that will be impressive. For example, I plan to perform something like moving a match or a stamp by claiming that I'd learned online that you can take advantage of normal air circulating in the room to blow stuff around...I'll make a show of blowing air around my hands and feeling how it comes out on the other side etc.,. In any case I'd really like to be able to talk to people about that aspect of magic and get tips on what devices give themselves to scientific explanation that seems almost possible and also hear opinions of my own performance ideas and get others in this vein. Anyway...sorry for the long intro and I hope to talk to some of you soon.
John