Ye Olde Magick Blogge

This was originally published on the old ye olde on March 14, 2007.

Here’s a sobering quote from John Carney’s Carneycopia. It’s in the middle of some commentary aimed at the current magic scene.

There also exist collectors of secrets who hoard information, which is never put to use for either bettering their lives, or the edification or amusement of others. When one of the hoarder’s secrets is exposed, he feels as though his home has been burglarized, his possessions ravaged. General outrage erupts, petitions are signed in magic societies, and the offending “traitor” is ostracized. The truth is, more secrets are revealed through incompetence and insensitivity than through flagrant exposure.

As someone who feels he can testify to the harms of exposure, that was a hard thing for me to read. I worship this man, and deep down I know he’s not trying to belittle me specifically (or, at least, I desperately hope he isn’t), but as someone who was a proponent of a recent anti-exposure petition on Youtube, I couldn’t help but feel stung by the comment, a little bit trivialized, as though he was mocking me personally. The fact that I’m a bit of a hoarder of secrets myself doesn’t help matters, but the depiction of the magic community felt like a harsh caricaturization (regardless of however much truth there might actually be in it). If nothing else, it made me wonder how he could feel so separate from said magic community.

It occured to me later that perhaps I was reading too much into the paragraph, but let’s consider the possibility that I wasn’t, that here was a magician who felt little to no sympathy for those of us who are steadfast in our desire to keep our secrets a secret. Consider that this is a man who makes his living off of secret machinations. Where could that paradoxical point of view possibly come from?

The answer (in our hypothetical scenario) can be found in the nature of the magic that Carney himself does — namely, how hard it is. It’s really hard, and it’s not just hard in the sense that the moves are difficult, but the necessary timing must also be precise, and the boldness needed to be able to practice that timing live on spectators must involve a brass pair. Now, put yourself in his shoes. If your performing repertoire consisted of routines that were difficult for other magicians to duplicate, would you care as much about exposure, at least compared to someone whose most advanced card sleight is a DL and who’s just seen the Masked Magician give away the DL on Fox?

We’ve got to step away from the Carney quote and figure out our demographics here. Lets look at the people who are drawn to magic. There are magicians who care about magic and aspire to perform it at a professional level (even if they wish to remain amateurs), and there are the members of the public who like to watch magic. There’s also a group of people who are somewhere in the middle, perhaps best categorized as being in a transitional phase between “layman” and “magician”. Not being able to take a survey on these groups, I can only go with my personal experience. I believe, based on that experience with these transitional magicians, is that they are the ones who are the driving force behind exposure. They haven’t yet made the commitment to magic, and don’t see the idea of magic secrecy as being vital to what they do. These are often called “amateurs”, which I think can be a little unfair to those amateurs in our community who really do take the art seriously. I suppose they could be termed dabblers, but I’m going to be flaterring and call them transitional magicians. Oh, and one other aspect about this group? These are guys who often have the motivation and ability to bust a magician on a move.

Now, let’s be honest. A lot of us have actually been in that group, having taken a more casual route between amateur and professional, who probably have come across a certain amount of magic knowledge illegitimately. I’ll state it frankly — way back before I was even a proper amateur, about eight or nine years ago, I first learned about the DL by searching the internet looking for tricks. Youtube, or the equivalent, wasn’t around back then, but despite that, with a little ingenuity you could still find good stuff. Besides the myriad of basic techniques available, two methods stuck out in my research: the DL and the pass. Here’s the funny thing… some of the stuff on the pass was taken straight out of Expert Card Technique, complete with scans of the drawings. At the time, you couldn’t ask for a better bit of exposed material, but even though I tried my best to learn the pass, I couldn’t figure out. On the other hand, because of the simplicity of the concept behind the DL, if not the simplicity of the move itself, I was able to start learning DL-based tricks straight away.
Maybe it was laziness, or maybe it was just a desire to just build up a repetoire as fast as possible, or maybe a bit of both, but in any case, I went along with the path of least resistance. If I can be so arrogant as to make an assumption, I think that the majority are going to be the same. They’ll gravitate towards easier techniques because those are the ones that’ll get them performing tricks faster, and now that all of these great tricks that rely on the DL are being exposed, some of them have a professional’s repertoire (even if they don’t have the ability or desire to perfect the handling or develop their showmanship). I think, from their vantage point, there’s a little bit of empowerment to be had in that. I can testify that there’s a definite market amongst up-and-comers for tricks that are easy to do but still pack quite a wallop. If everybody you know is doing the 21 card trick, and you can whip out a transposition or an in-the-hands change, you’re going to feel like the man. If Youtube can help you do that, you’re not going to have a problem with Youtube exposure. After all, if you need help, a computer with the internet is going to be much more available than a living, breathing magician who can foster your growth in a more responsible manner.

And it’s not always these transitional amateurs who are looking for easier methods. So many tricks within our industry are marketed as being easy to do, and people (even professionals) often justify this by saying that a simplified handling allows you to focus on presentation. Now, I’ll be the last person to say anything bad about focusing on presentation, but I’m wondering if this hasn’t also led to a preponderance of generally easy magic. Darwin Ortiz rails against this in Strong Magic when he talks about No Palm Card to Wallet effects. He states that sometimes these will have excessive handlings in them (I can’t comment on that, being generally unfamiliar with all the CTW plots out there), and they dampen an effect (violating the no-touch principle, etc.) simply for the purpose of removing the palmed-card aspect to it. Why would a magician do this? Because palming cards is hard to do well, and it’s also stressful. It’s not the only thing that magicians tend to avoid, either. Both Daryl and Michael Ammar (two guys who are well-known for their prowess with cards) rarely use the pass, and few magicians tend to do the Cylinder and Coins because of how difficult it is as a routine. I think this is why you’ll find Daryl’s and Ammar’s instructional card videos being circulated more rampantly that Carney on Ramsay or Kaufmann’s On The Pass.

In any case, this essay might be putting forth a slightly more unconventional idea than the others, but before we get to the idea, let’s establish the premise, which is this: the majority of methods getting bandied about by transitional magicians are generally simple. That’s not meant to trivialize the nature of the moves, most of us know simple moves can be powerful, which makes them doubly attractive — and to this day I’m still amazed that the glide hasn’t been exposed to the degree that the DL has. In any case, my main point is that a passable DL can be achieved with far less work than an invisible-looking pass. That means that tricks that rely on the DL — if my theory on transitional magicians seeking the path of least resistance is correct — are more likely to circulate and are more likely going to be exposed. Think about it yourself. How many routines do you know that actually MUST use the pass? How easy is it going to be to find an exposure video for it?

It seems like common sense, but if there’s merit in that observation, though, then this idea naturally follows: If you want to help make sure that you’re not going to get busted on an effect, add harder, more sophisticated methods to your repertoire that others aren’t going to be as likely to want to reproduce. It’s the easy moves you’ve got to be careful with.

So, what makes an easy move? It’s hard to categorize them, but I personally think the easier moves generally rely on cover, straightforward technique (false transfers of a coin that happen deeper in the hand), have built-in misdirection, or some inherent subtlety. The harder ones are bolder, require more practice and/or a finely honed touch, need better timing, involve more commitment and study, or strong misdirection. Things like a memorized deck, an invisible-looking pass, a good false riffle shuffle, a good false deal, the faro, a coin pass at the fingertips, palmed cards, a top change, or a deck switch are examples of moves that fall into the latter category. For the most part, if we consider the transitional magician as a filter through which all magic knowledge must pass before potentially being released onto the general public, the moves I’ve listed above are the ones less likely to make it through. Easier ones like the CT, the DL, the BLev, etc. are going to sneak through. They offer the path of least resistance for someone who’s just starting out in magic, which means that they’re more likely to be (a) seen by an audience, thereby conditioning them to any tells associated with those moves, or (b) exposed outright through lack of concern for secrecy or basic carelessness.

So, step 1 is to choose something difficult. Tackle the pass, or memorize a deck, nail the classic force, learn a better Center Tear, learn to palm cards, try Tommy Wonder’s Cups and Balls routine, etc. Figure out which move you’ve been putting off learning for a while, and then hunker down and learn it.

Step 2 is to practice on magicians until they can’t see it. Magicians arent always able to appreciate the significance or entertainment value of a magic trick, but they are good at spotting handling problems and flashes (and are often quite happy to, perhaps some residue from their transitional phase?), and they might even be able to help you out with options to make it further deceptive. They might even point you in the direction of better methods… but be wary of those who suggest the simplest method because the audience “never notices” or it “flies right by laymen”. What’s simplest and most direct isn’t what’s always best. Even something as conceptually simple as a card or coin palm can (and sometimes should) be broken up for the sake of hiding tells. Again, refer to Carney’s Cylinder and Coins and Thoughts on Card Palming to see what I mean about this. He’s a perfect example of a guy who, when dealing with an audience who knows about a method, can still fool them while using that method.

Step 3 is to take it live. This is necessary for two reasons. The first is obvious — just because something is impossible to figure out doesn’t mean it’s entertaining, and you need to figure that out early on to know if your routine’s worth investing any more time in it. After all, some magician foolers aren’t all that commercial. The second is that magicians and regular audiences have different attention spans, and oddly enough what might work with a magician because they’re burning you perhaps might not fool a spectator. It’s not always likely, but it happens.

Incidentally, it’s not just sleights. You can take it to the next level by working with gimmicks or gaffes that are just impossible to figure out. The Raven is relatively simple conceptually, and consequently it’s been exposed, but Tommy Wonder’s Nest of Boxes is insanely complex, but because it’s such a simple, humble effect, it’s not gotten the same treatment that stage illusions got from the Masked Magician. That same lesson can be applied here… take a simple effect and find a complicated, gimmicked way to pull it off, and when your handling is that much cleaner than what’s required for the most common method to do it, you can get that added pleasure of knowing that exposure has less of a chance of affecting you, not to mention the joy rubbing other magicians’ noses in it.

If there is a caveat emptor to the advice above, it’s this, and it’s extremely important: a complicated method is alright, but a complicated effect can be disastrous. Ramsay was able to fool all the other magicians out there because he used misdirection and devious techniques to pull off his sleight of hand. However, he also had some incredibly complex routines, some of which were so convoluted and designed with feints to fool the magicians that, in the hands of a poor showman, fooling magicians is all those routines would be good for. The same goes for gimmicks. Guys like David Regal and Tommy Wonder had their routines with complicated setups and insanely intricate gimmicks in play, but they didn’t let that interfere with the clarity of effect. If your way can be complicated without actually seeming complicated (requires too much handling of the props, for instance), then you’ve got something you can work with. Part of the complexity of Regal’s and Wonder’s gimmicks is based around the fact that, from the audience’s point of view, they remove steps from the magician’s processes, rather than add to them. A no-palm card to wallet, on the other hand, might require extra moves, and while it can still play strong, probably won’t have the same feeling of impossibility that a palm-based effect can have.

The nice thing about this is that you don’t have to actually go hardcore on the new technique and make it the centerpiece of your routine. You can practice your classic pass in a sandwich effect, by using it to have the Jacks disappear into the middle of the deck looking for the other card. So long as you don’t mess it up to the point that cards go flying everywhere, even if they see the machination behind the vanish, that disappearance is a secondary effect that shouldn’t ruin the revelation. Tommy Wonder’s Magic Ranch is a simple routine, a pick-a-card effect where a miniature version of the chosen card appears inside a plastic egg, with a kicker ending. What makes this routine such a valuable learning tool is that it offers you a chance to make that egg appear magically (the man himself describes how in Visions of Wonder), except that if you’re busted, it doesn’t matter, because it’s not the most important effect, nor does its appearance really explain the most important effect. Practice it well, though, and you can use your developed powers of misdirection in a more advanced routine. I’ve already put up a simple card routine here that can give you a chance to try out the Classic Force, which, if you miss it, still gives you an opportunity to switch to using the force card as a keycard, and continue on with the effect as described. With a little imagination, you can probably figure out many ways to practice using the harder techniques in live situations where, even if you happen to fail, nothing is actually lost. Successfully forced your card and don’t need the deck again? Practice your false shuffle once before setting it aside. And so on…

Some of the stuff above may sound like abstract conjecture, but I really think there’s something to it, and I think it’s why guys like John Carney have that disdain for the magic community’s worries about exposure. Exposure doesn’t affect guys like Carney — alot of his magic is just too difficult to pull off. Most magicians are afraid of it, let alone the newcomers. The only way to truly understand what makes his magic work is to study it intensely yourself, and if you’re the sort of guy who is willing to do that, you’re also probably the sort of guy who’s dedicated enough to magic that you’re not going to spill the secrets willy-nilly. And even if you did explain it, those explanations are more likely to be misunderstood than those for a DL-based effect. As such, if you’re looking for added protection against exposure, look at what’s getting exposed, and realize the potential that’s waiting for you at the end of the path of greater resistance.