When I first started, or restarted, my journey in magic, I didn't realize there were annual conventions held each year. I should have since there are conventions for just about everything, but I was busy reading and learning and practicing. When I finally started hearing about this and that, well, 2020 hit and they all kind of shut down.
I spoke to some friends about conventions and if they ever attended, I was kind of surprised at the split opinions. I can understand "not attending" vs "attending", but more than one friend was adamantly opposed to attending magic conventions. With engineers (my day-job), our conventions tend to have a lot of vendors; you get swag if you listen to a sales pitch or check out their newest "thing", but mostly it's presentations by other engineers and drinking at the open bar. I would expect a magic convention to be similar except, maybe more magic in between presentations? Either way, I'm pro-attending.
But yeah, back to the main topic! So, things started picking back up this year and I've heard about a few different upcoming conventions from around the globe and wanted to share some of that info with y'all. Also, I'm sure there are plenty more than what I've listed below -- these are purely just the conventions I've either heard about or found when looking for specific areas:
I already bought a ticket for Blackpool in February. I doubt I'll attend any others between now and then, though I really do want to do The SessionandMagiFest but that's a lot of travel, not sure my family would appreciate that too much =P. Maybe the next one though!
There's also Magic LIVE! that is held in Vegas over the summer, but that's so far out from now that I didn't list it above. I've heard that it's quite a fun one, so maybe it'll make its way onto my "to do" list soon.
If you know of any other magic conventions that I didn't list here, please let me know =]
It's Monday and you know what that means... Monday Mail Call!
Each Monday (give or take), I use this feature to highlight a few of the things that have made their way in over the past week or so. Packages, purchases, and emails -- oh my!
First up is technically a list of things. I've been slacking when it comes to adding new decks I've received to the site's library, and really slacking when it comes to simply mentioning them here during Mail Call. Between Kickstarter campaigns, subscriptions, and regular binge ordering, from the last 2 months I have exactly 54 new decks sitting on my desk, unopened. That doesn't include the 2 unopened bricks sitting on the floor off to the side and the 6 or so decks I put in the closet. Yikes!
I'm not going to hit you with a wall-of-text that lists everything that came in (though I will try to provide weekly updates more efficiently). However, a few of the highlights that I received:
There were two other Kickstarters and a handful of random orders too. The Riffle Shuffle Brick of the Month contained 2 duplicate decks, so technically it is only 10 unique decks. However, the actual haul from this brick was well worth the price -- if I had known about half of the decks, I would have bought them at regular price but the fact that I got them for half-off is amazing! Sure, I can't buy decks for another month or two now because I'm broke, but amazing nonetheless =P
Up next is an email from Vanishing Inc titled Our biggest download ever…
The email itself mentions it's a new download that features the work of David Regal. 7 hours of David, no less! I was excited to check it out, so I clicked it, and it took me to the product page with a big ol' "Add to Cart" button. I almost smashed the button right away when I saw that the download was on sale for $50 (normally $75). But then logic kicked in...
If it was "normally" $75, then it isn't new? I started reading more and realized that this isn't a new download, it's David's Masterclass from 2020. I've already watched this Masterclass. Twice! I own it, and it's in my Vanishing Inc account. The same account that they sent that email to. The same account that has it available in the Downloads & Lectures section.
VI, I can understand that marketing emails just blast out to everyone so I can forgive that (though it doesn't take very much code to only send it to those who don't have it), but having a giant "Add to Cart" button on a video download that's already in my account? I have 62 videos in my account right now (way, way more if you include the multiple videos in each Masterclass and other bundles) ... sometimes, I forget -- it would be really nice if your website changed the "Add to Cart" button to something like "Watch now, because you already bought this ya doofus."
Last but not least, Penn & Teller: Fool Us Season 9's premier is this Friday, October 14th! The show's lineup for the first 2 episodes has been released too:
Episode 1 will feature the magicians: Jon Mobley, the Van Hargen Twins, Axel Adler, and Chris Canfield
Episode 2 is named "Sleight of Foot" and features Theron Christensen, Jaana Felicitas, Benjamin Barnes, and Brian Curry
I say that the info has been "released", but it's just that the show's information hit the cable listings. I'm not 100% sure if Episode 1 has a unique name or not, I don't see it anywhere, but it'll probably be more clear come Friday. I'll be traveling Friday night, so I'll have to catch up on the episode over the weekend, I hope it's a good one!
So yeah... a lot of decks lately. I really haven't bought many recently, it's mostly Kickstarter campaign rewards coming in -- some that I've been waiting months for. I don't plan on buying many more decks either, I have too many as it is and can't get through them all. I'll probably start giving them away (or selling some of the more-fancy ones) because I'm legitimately out of space to store them. We'll see though =]
Stay tuned for the next iteration of Monday Mail Call, there's a lot more to come!
Oh also, if you'd like to offer suggestions for books, tricks, decks or if you have questions about magic (performing, routines, sleights, etc.), just reach out here.
In August, Chris Ramsay uploaded a video to YouTube, The State of Magic in 2022. I opened it one day at lunch planning to watch it and then got sidetracked. A month and a half later, I finally got a chance to switch back to that tab and viewed the whole thing.
Coming in at a little over 18 minutes, there's a lot jam-packed in this video. He went to FISM and was pleasantly fooled. He's going to start posting magic tutorials on YouTube again (which he already did in the time between posting the video and me finally watching it). And, a lot of ranting. It was positive ranting though; like, constructive criticism towards specific personalities and opinions.
Honestly, Chris, you should have been in a nice armchair with a fire next to you because this was a perfect "fireside chat" type of video. Next time, make it so ;)
If you haven't seen it yet, check out the video and get the words from the man himself:
One quote I would like to highlight from this fireside chat is:
The audience isn't supposed to think you can do magic. The audience is supposed to think that they can feel magic. They're there to be taken out for a spin and it's your job to do that. It's not your job to be smarter than them, to belittle them, or even to fool them. It's your job to create that astonishment. That wonder.
I've heard this sentiment a lot more in recent years, especially on YouTube. I don't pick up on it too much in books and other video lectures, but YouTube and any time Penn & Teller talk about Mentalism, this comes up a lot.
The sentiment of all of it, at least, the way I interpret it is that "you can't do actual magic, so don't tell people you can. Lie, but only in the performance of the trick. The audience knows it's a trick, don't try making them believe you're channeling powers from another dimension to magically transform a Seven of Clubs into a Queen of Hearts, or a red sponge ball into 20 tiny sponge rabbits. Instead, entertain them and make them question 'how is it possible' while knowing full well that you, the magician, had to have done something." Or, something like that at least.
Magicians are entertainers. They're artists. And like most art, it's meant to be shared. People go to see a comedian because they want to laugh. People go to see a magician to be amazed.
The quote above from Chris resonated with me because of something that happened when I was a teenager, though not magic related. Where I grew up, the local firehouse held a "haunted forest" every year during the last 2 weeks of October. A bunch of us were volunteers, maybe 40 people in total, and we would build mini haunted shacks throughout the woods along a path and we'd each run one with a few friends. We'd see hundreds of people a night come through, it was really fun.
But then one night, someone from the crew came through and gave us a heads up that the last group of the night waited specifically for midnight and wanted to really be scared. Not like they wanted their socks knocked off, but they were saying that they couldn't be scared and wanted us to prove them wrong.
They were the hecklers of the "haunted forest" world.
It made me really question their purpose of attending a haunted forest to be scared if the only thing they were after was to call out how fake it all was. I extend the same line of questioning to the idea of someone attending a magic show if they completely believe it's all fake. Heckler, or magician, or even a regular lay person who just doesn't think they would be fooled -- why attend?
My reasoning is that, if you made the effort to show up, part of you wants to believe. Rather, part of you wants to be entertained and amazed. Just as I successfully got a jump scream out of that group in the haunted forest, I've impressed people who I can only call hecklers with card tricks. Why bother? Because they showed up, and it was my job to do just that.
It's Monday and you know what that means... Monday Mail Call! Each Monday (give or take), I use this feature to highlight a few of the things that have made their way in over the past week or so. Packages, purchases, and emails -- oh my!
This past week was a big one for deliveries, especially because it's the beginning of the month too. Whoa, October already! I have to say, Autumn's my favorite season. Right up there with Winter, Spring and Summer (^_^)
Normally I would pick the top 3 things that came in and highlight them here, but I'm in a good mood so I'm going to share everything! Since there's so much, I'll break it all down by category and will be slightly less verbose. Slightly.
Latest Additions to the Library
A few weeks ago, Vanishing Inc. sent out an email announcing that they found a box of books tucked away in the back of their warehouse. What book was it, you ask? Why it was Counthesaurus, by Jon Racherbaumer!
I've had my eye on this book for quite a while, but it's never been available anywhere. If you're not familiar with it, it's described as "the ultimate go-to reference for false counts and displays." It's an encyclopedic collection with everything from the Ascanio Spread to the Biddle Count, Elmsley Count, Mirage Count, and everything in-between. I know that I have most of the original books that teach the different sleights, but I don't have all of them. And, with Jon's explanations and the large number of photos included, it's a great addition to the collection.
The next new book to join the shelf is Try the Impossible by Simon Aronson. I have Bound to Please by Aronson and I haven't gotten nearly through half of it yet, but I really like his work. When I watched Matt Baker's Masterclass, he had referenced Try the Impossible so I paused the video and went to try and find it. It wasn't that hard -- it's available here on Vanishing Inc!
I don't have the Aronson stack memorized yet -- ah, spoiler alert, this book has a full chapter of memdeck magic -- but it's something I want to have down by the end of this year. I think that Try the Impossible will be a good way to springboard that effort into some great performances =]
Gaffs & Gimmicks
Lloyd Barnes (@lloydbarnes), if you're not familiar, posts some really neat, and very informative, tutorials on YouTube about how to make different gaffs and gimmicks, and often shows full routines using them too. One video he uploaded back in June just appeared in my feed a week or two ago and I really love the premise:
The big secret here, besides minimal sleight of hand, is magnets! Super thin magnets, that is.
I tried finding them on Amazon, but the thin ones just couldn't be found. I did some more research and found a shop online (first4magnets.com) that had exactly what I was looking for. Disc magnets with a 10mm diameter that are 0.4mm thick. I'm going to build the gimmick in the video above first and play with them a bit, but I've already started having other fun ideas. I'll likely only use this kind of thing for online videos and not real-life performances, but if it's simple and fun enough, who knows.
Another thing I got in this past week was a One-Way Forcing Deck. What is a one-way forcing deck, you ask? It's a deck of 52 identical cards!
I've always wanted to have one and now I do. For some reason, my first thought is to record an ambitious card routine using it. Actually, perform every sleight and continue to control the real card each time, but then at the end show that the deck's all the same. It will look impossible, and then at the very end any lay person would be like "hah, I knew it" and magicians would be "whoa."
Silly, I know. But hey, it's fun, nonetheless. If you're interested in one too, check out the Bicycle One-Way Forcing Deck -- I think that this is one of those fun decks to always have around (and I'm glad I finally have it myself).
Monthly Magic Magazines
Fresh off the press, or, rather straight into the inbox this weekend came this month's issue of both The Hermit and Love Letters.
This month's issue of The Hermit features 8 effects by 7 different magicians. There's card magic, thumb magic, and a cool visual reveal with a Frixion pen! The challenge of the month is a crossword puzzle, the first to solve it will get a shout-out in next month's issue. It looks like a fun idea -- I doubt I'll have the time to play with it, but I might give it a whirl.
What's really interesting is the casting call in the issue.
Four to six magicians with personality and chops are required for an online magic competition / show set for a 2023 release.
The Hermit - Casting Call
I have a personality, and I can easily obtain pork chops. I might reach out to see what's up!
Love Letters kicks off with a note to Matt Baker about his Masterclass. I'm telling you folks, it's worth a watch (read my review here).
After that, it goes on to review OTT, a utility move that has, well, different utilities and then Hologram, a multi-phase visual effect that takes place on a card. Three reviews in this month's newsletter, but the reviews do beyond just "it's good" or "it's bad", they each talk about ways to utilize the specific thing being reviewed. I like that -- more magic products should have in-depth reviews like this and not just paid hype.
Subscribers to Genii recently received an email letting us know that the October and November issues are going to be combined into a single issue, published in late October. This was due to a death in the family (assuming the Genii family), and extensive FISM coverage. I didn't get my September issue until late-September anyways, so the delay's not a huge problem. Plus, it will give me time to catch up on the others.
So, there you have it folks! A lot came in and now I have my hands full. I can't wait to see what kind of neat things I get into with all of it.
Stay tuned for the next iteration of Monday Mail Call, there's a lot more to come!
Oh also, if you'd like to offer suggestions for books, tricks, decks or if you have questions about magic (performing, routines, sleights, etc.), just reach out here.
I've watched a few "Masterclass" lectures over the years, often they're multi-part videos and cover a range of topics that center around a specific theme. The Matt Baker Masterclass is no different. Except, it's the first Masterclass I've watched completely through!
If you're interested in card magic, The Buena Vista Shuffle Club, Simon Aronson, math, M&Ms, or a combination of all of the above, read below to see if this Masterclass is for you!
Masterclass Overview
This is a 3-part Masterclass split over 3 weeks. The first 2 weeks are actual lectures, the 3rd week is (or was) a live Q&A held over Zoom.
During Week 1, Matt is joined by Andy Gladwin and a layman, John. In Week 2, layman John returns and another layman named Mike joins the fun.
The theme of the Masterclass is "Mathematical Principles in Magic," and Matt being an actual math professor brings the heat. He covers 10 different routines split between the two lectures, almost each lecture touching on a different math principle.
For more details about the Masterclass itself and where to buy it, see Matt Baker Masterclass.
Expectations
First and foremost, I expected this Masterclass to be all card magic. Three of the routines, however, were not. In addition to the card miracles, Matt also teaches a rope trick and two separate mentalism routines. He never explicitly calls it mentalism, but they are prediction and "mind reading" routines.
Other than that, I didn't really have many expectations. I only recently read The Buena Vista Shuffle Club and really enjoyed it, so I figured that it would be neat to learn from the man himself!
Mind Blowing and Confusion Abound
After introductions, Matt jumped straight into the performance for Single-Fried. My first impression, mid-performance, was that it had too much intro, too much build-up. The ending of the routine though, holy smokes. It was just too perfect! I held on to the edge of my seat with one hand and my deck with the other just waiting for the explanation... and instead, Matt moved on to the performance for the next routine, Piledriver 2.0.
Talk about a deck tease! =P
To touch on Single-Fried a little more, the way he performed it during the lecture he used a marked deck -- specifically to fool the magicians who were watching. He did the full explanation as if the deck wasn't marked. Two ways to perform the routine, nice!! The best part was that the trick isn't very difficult to perform. I practiced it a few times and performed it later that night, without a marked deck, and it floored everyone!
I really liked Piledriver 2.0 too, a revamp of the 21-card trick. I skimmed over the whole description while reading the book since these counting-based routines aren't really my thing, but his performance pulled me in. Knowing the 21-card trick and, well, magic and math in general the routine was fairly clear to me without the explanation but it really did show a different way to look at the whole concept.
I'm going to skip some things and go straight to Twice as Nice. If you read the end of the last paragraph where I said I know math and magic, here's where I undo all of that. Twice as Nice is Matt's A Card At Any Number (ACAAN), except, with two selections and two numbers. The ending of the routine, yup, you guessed it -- the two selections are found at the two numbers. No shuffling takes place, no crazy handling. My mind was blown. He flat out said what would happen, and it happened, and my jaw was on the desk. I haven't performed this one yet, but you better believe me that I've been practicing it. This routine is going in my rotation, and I can't wait to try it out!
Matt demonstrated a straightforward triumph effect with Shuffling versus Mixing, a routine that didn't quite fit into the theme of "Mathematical Principles" but hey, it used the breather crimp so it's awesome in my book!
Card College was a great performance too. I really love the routine from Shuffle Club and now that there's a performance for it that I can reference, all the better!
And now for the other side...
Matt's performances were great, and his explanations were in-depth, very informative, and left me without questions. You really can't ask for much more. However...
However, and I suffer from this too, but Matt's passion for the topics would shine through and he frequently gets caught up while explaining topics and will lose track of what he's done with the deck. For example, he'll be explaining a topic in-depth and backtrack his explanation to cover a different case and will move cards around which leads to finishing the explanation using different cards that weren't part of the original selection. If you're following everything, it works out... if you miss a second of it though, there's a chance you'll have to rewind a few times. Or, scrub backwards.
Be kind, rewind.
I joined the Live Q&A (week 3) before watching Week 2 and he began by talking about Match or No Match and how he got mixed up during the explanation and wanted to correct things. This impacted the way I watched the performance and explanation (when I finally watched Week 2's lecture). I was waiting to see some big confusing scene but really it didn't seem to be a big deal. It was, in my opinion, like how the other explanations were where he just explains, context switches, explains, switches again, explains, and next thing you know you're at the end and all of the different trains of thoughts collect. Now I know what it's like talking to myself =P
Also, I watched the explanation for Crowdsourced Prediction twice and am still a bit confused. And I have a degree in math. Frigg'n professors, I tell ya. I understand the red-black relationship principle, and I was really impressed by the creation of an M&M bag index, but I think that the explanation with the magnet board just threw me off a lot.
Matt's Personality
Some authors let their personality shine through in their writing. With Shuffle Club, we pseudo receive this... except, we don't. Matt successfully shielded it through the introduction of the fictional members of the club. I loved it and thought it was an awesome idea, but it didn't let me "know Matt." This Masterclass very much did!
Professor Baker is definitely a person who's comfortable explaining things that he's passionate about. Watching these lectures, you'll easily feel like you're there with him. He's not robotic in his explanations, but he is extremely thorough. It's a giant brain-dump of information in a friendly way. Well, except for The Impossible Knot when he's ranting about his colleagues... and Twice as Nice when he's bashing Joshua Jay's naming of a false cut =P
On one hand, you may think that it's just performance for a camera. But a good example of who Matt really is comes through in the Q&A when a kid asked a question:
Are there any magic tricks that are fooling, entertaining, and immediately have an obvious connection to Math?
When I read that in the chat, then when the kid repeated it in a more explanatory way, whoa. I'm not sure if he meant it to be rude but to me it sounded like he was asking "do you have any better tricks? ones that actually have math involved?"
Rather than highlight any of the routines covered in the Masterclass, Matt busted out a completely different trick -- remotely -- using a phone's calculator. Super friendly and helpful, and just into magic. If you're interested in that trick, it's The 'Missing Digit' Calculator Trick he wrote a blog post about.
Takeaways
In my introduction up above, I mentioned that this was the first Masterclass I've watched all the way through. I do want to prefix that the reason isn't because going into it I was "super interested," or I was "head-over-heels captivated" -- it just happened that I had the time, and I was really enjoying the material. That, in my opinion, is the best scenario.
I've read many math-based tricks in books, and I've been turned off on the whole concept. Count this, count that, spell out this and make 17 piles of cards with exactly 2.5 cards in each. Yeah, color me biased.
Then here comes Matt Baker and his professor ways. He smacked me with the 21-card trick reboot and it's actually something I would perform. The very night I watched the lecture, I performed Single Fried, and it was a huge hit. I'm already prepped for Twice as Nice and I'm looking hard at Card College too. These are the ones I want to do "right now", but others are on my list also! I'll skip the non-card tricks, honestly, though I have a feeling that the red-black principle taught in Crowdsourced Prediction could be applied in an application more to my liking =]
I do think that because the material aligned with my interests, which I discovered mid-lecture, and because of Matt's way of presenting the routines and explanations, the time flew by. I seriously was surprised when the first week's video came to an end and 2 hours had passed so quickly.
I recommend this Masterclass for anyone who is interested in card magic. You'll learn about marked cards, memorized decks, the Gilbreath Principle, and more. Matt fully credits everything (exceptionally so) so even after you've learned the material in these videos you have so many more paths to branch out on.
So, to wrap up, I just want to say: Thank you Matt, this was a very enjoyable class!
p.s., RE: The Fractal Cut
Joshua Jay gave Matt permission to teach his never-before-taught false cut which he (Josh) named The Fractal Cut. Matt, respectively, disagreed with the name because a fractal is a geometric figure that sees patterns recur at infinitely smaller scales -- like a crystal.
While I agree with the disagreement on technical terms, my first thought when I saw the shape the packets made was of a snowflake. Sure, a weird snowflake, but it was the first thought. I think that the point might go to Josh on this one =P
Matt Baker Masterclass is a video featuring magic presented by Matt Baker and was produced by Vanishing Inc. Available to stream, it has a running time of 2:05 for Week 1, 1:42 for Week 2, and 1:35 for the Q&A.
