Improvising Training Routines

Dec 29, 2008
29
0
Singapore
Hi all! I'm new to the forums (and magic), and I am happy (and a little nervous) to join this community.

Anyway I just started out doing magic for a little over two non-intensive months, during with i sought out dvds and books here and there. I guess I am able to perform a couple of effects for people now, and sort of not sure how to carry on from here. I would guess training and practicing would be good, but sometimes it just gets a little boring to keep repeating a sleight over and over for so many hours. Is there any good methods to spice up the training routines so as to make it more enjoyable?

Thanks in advance for anyone taking the time to reply to this. I appreciate it. =)

Cheers,

Dennis

P.S. I'm still a rookie, but I hope I can stay long enough and grow enough to be able to contribute to this community too =)
 
Apr 27, 2008
1,805
2
Norway
Hi Dennis, and welcome to the community of awesome!

One very interesting way to spice things up is to go up to a relative, borther, mother, father, sister - and do the trick. It won't matter too much if you mess up, because they will be seeing alot of your magic in the coming days :)

I use my relatives as training, to see whether a sleight is polished enough or not. And if you do, you get an idea of what it is like to do it with someone watching ;)

Or, you could likewise do the sleight over and over in front of the telly, or some other sort of visual entretaining device...you choice.

Food for thoght;
Gustav
 
Feb 27, 2008
72
0
France
Hi,
After all magic is just like flourishes...For perfect it practice is the word what that mean is that you'll need to practice years hours days and months for going into the perfect, gorgeous, eye-candy, in ya face looking, super effect.
Remenber what ed marlo ( or lepaul don't remenber ) thought : before showing any routine to anybody he practice one year. What a interessant concept, considering the point that now most magician practice a less than a day before perform.
But in facts what is magic ? Performing or practicing or maybe a mix between those two ?

So if you want to be a magician and a good one you need practice, that the key. And if you think that it si boring well magic should be boring?!
And for responding to your questions : yes there is ways to make your practicing seance less boring but you need to find it by yourself.

Hope it's help

Cheers

Sorry if there is any grammar mistakes.


And, man welcome to magic.
 
May 3, 2008
1,146
4
Hong Kong
Hi Dennis,
Welcome to magic and what not
Practising is a very hard subject to give advice on as everyone learns differently
I myself am fine with practising over and over again as I find it fascinating.
I heard or read somewhere is practising a move over and over again until you perfect it, after that, you practise until you get sick of it. Then its fine.
Anyways, you can find many forum threads on it as well.
But basically the first step is to get the move exactly right. Dont practice how you think a move is done. Find out exactly where everything goes and how it goes. This will cause your practice to improve a lot faster. You might want to find tips and advice on the specific practice subject from others as they might have experience the problem you are meeting. After that, practice everything in slowmo. Every step at a time so you know you got it right. Then go at normal speed till you fool yourself. use a camera. I dont recommend a mirror as some times your mind ignores things you dont wanna see. Some people may blink extra long when they see themselves do a pass in the mirror. They try to avoid their mistakes. A video doesnt blink.
To make it more interesting... listen to music? i dunno. I watch tv shows and movies while practising.
I also use practise as an escape from work so its more of a thing I want to do. I get bored of work and start practising. Its not something which makes me go like "OH CRAP! NOT MORE PRACTICE!!!!!!!!!" its a "WHOOPEE! CARDS!!!!!!"
 
Dec 29, 2008
29
0
Singapore
Thank you Gustav, Original, datskanars and sciffydof. =) It's awesome that you guys got back so quickly.

And yes, I practice is essential and I'm going through the motions again and again to internalize it. It's just that I don't perform at home often, and I'm pretty much stuck with the mirror. One thing I don't like about the mirror though is that I tend to look at myself in the mirror. I guess I'll need to invest in a video cam real soon.

But still, thanks guys, I appreciate it! :D
 
Nov 20, 2007
4,410
6
Sydney, Australia
Hey Dennis, welcome! Well as far as practicing sleights go, why don't you practice while watching TV, a DVD, or chilling to some music, or something like that? Just have a deck/coins/whatever in hand while you sit there. You could even practice while reading a book or something like that.

The other thing I wanted to mention, since you mentioned practicing in front of a mirror, is this: When we practice in front of the mirror we get used to adjusting ourselves through our reflection. So, make sure you can practice while facing a wall as well yeah? So you don't get dependent on having that reflection there, so practice in different spots :)
 
Dec 29, 2008
29
0
Singapore
Hi praetoritevong! Thanks for the advice. =)

By may I ask, practicing in front of a wall, would it be drastically different from practicing without the mirror? Since I'm currently on mirror on/off mode but I never tried the wall method, I'm curious what's the rationale. Is it to make the body accustomed to having a presence at the side?
 
Jun 24, 2008
493
0
Harrisonburg, VA
Welcome to T11 Dennis!

I don't practice in front of a wall, but I often time don't practice with a mirror either.

I usually find good friends of mine which I perform for. They make me aware of angles, sleights and other things that we not on cue as they should have been. I also perform a lot for my family.

I pretend I have a spectator in front of me bearing down on my hands at all times, this way I pay close attention to the angles this person (though not actually there) is seeing as well as if they actually noticed the sleight or not. Seems silly, I suppose but it's a great method for me :)
 
Sep 20, 2008
1,112
3
i practice when im talking, walking or whenever im idle really. my friends are cool with me flourishing as i speak, it doesnt bother my attention span, it doesnt bother them, unless i do a long distance spinner or vertigo then they're allright with it and we can both hold a conversation.

I practice whenever i can.

oh and welcome.
 
May 3, 2008
1,146
4
Hong Kong
I dont get the mirror thing said earlier.
But i would get you should practice the actual move first. You should worry about angles later as its just a little thing which you need to tweak. I would get the move flawlessly in effect then adjust the way you perform to match it. The mirror is finally seeing it in the point of a view of a spectator and what not. The good thing about a mirror is you can turn to certain points and walk to different distances to see how and where an effect works.
As I have said before there is always the chance of you ignoring your mistakes. Some people lean away, blink, blur their vision, when they do a hard move just to trick themselves into thinking that they did it well. I used to do this when i was practising the pass and got bad results because of it.
Thats why I practise by doing the move sitting around and what not. Once I get it "down", I go for the video. This way I can get it "downer" haha. I will be able to see perfectly whether or not it is what i want it to look like. Then I got to the mirror where i can test all angles and distances. Then its to the audience!
 
Nov 20, 2007
4,410
6
Sydney, Australia
Hi praetoritevong! Thanks for the advice. =)

By may I ask, practicing in front of a wall, would it be drastically different from practicing without the mirror? Since I'm currently on mirror on/off mode but I never tried the wall method, I'm curious what's the rationale. Is it to make the body accustomed to having a presence at the side?

It will feel different; the reason for doing this is, when you practice in front of a mirror, you can't help but look at your reflection in the mirror. Your reflection can tell you if you're flashing a sleight, doing something wrong, etc - it basically provides you with the spectator's point of view. But when you actually perform for someone, you won't have the advantage of seeing what they see. So it's more to make sure that you don't get accustomed to relying on the mirror to help you in a performance. Say if you palm a card for the mirror, by looking into the mirror you can see exactly where your hand should go in relation to the deck in order to palm it indetectably. If it doesn't cover the card completely, you can see it, and adjust, because of your reflection. When you're performing in the real world though, if you're used to palming by looking at your reflection to get your position right, you'll be in trouble because suddenly you don't have your reflection to work off. Does that make sense? ^^
 
Oct 13, 2008
91
0
First of all, welcome.

Second of all, I would say to you that improvising and skill both require significant amounts of practice. As you learn more sleights, you'll be able to incorporate them as you go. When I began, I never aimed to be able to improvise on the spot, but as you get to the point where you can pull off a sleight off the cuff, you'll be able to improvise more freely. The same goes with flourishing, but I would suggest getting some experience under your belt before you go into serious packet flourishes.

Third, I haven't read any of the other responses to your original post, so if I've repeated anything, I apologize. :)

Sun|Sky
 
Dec 29, 2008
29
0
Singapore
Hi Sun|Sky! Well I think I can probably say I'm just (literally) into flourishing. I'm more of a magic man I guess, but I figured having some flourishes would be good for manual dexterity. As such, I figured I should pick up some flourishes and practice them seriously.

And yes, practice is essential. I'm just trying to find new ways of practicing that will spice it up instead of just repeating the action over and over in from of the television. =)

Thanks again for the reply folks. I appreciate it.
 
May 8, 2008
1,081
0
Cumbria, UK
Another idea is toi listen to/download this. It is about the bottom deal, but a lot of what is said applies to any move. Near the end, they give some drills for bottom deal practicing. These won't really help unless it's the bottom deal you're practicing, but if you listen to it (it's brilliant) then you might get some ideas of drills you can do for whatever move you may be working on.

I'll keep this post short because all the other tips I could think of have been given, so with that, all that's left to say is this: WELCOME TO THE FORUMS!
 
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