theory11 — Magic Tricks & the World's Finest Playing Cards
Enough With Card Flourishes?
- Thread starter Sands
- Start date
.. flourishing is like dancing after a touchdown.. it celebrates and "brags" a bit... love it! Flourish on!
No magic is cliched, broing or whatever...
If you prove to your spectators that you really ARE the best maician they've ever seen (as Lee Asher says) then it doesn't matter if you do it with cards, coins, tissue paper, or fart gas.
With your presentation, PROVE to the spectators that you are great. Make them say "SHOW ME MORE!" instead of "Enough cards already...."
If you prove to your spectators that you really ARE the best maician they've ever seen (as Lee Asher says) then it doesn't matter if you do it with cards, coins, tissue paper, or fart gas.
With your presentation, PROVE to the spectators that you are great. Make them say "SHOW ME MORE!" instead of "Enough cards already...."
Wall of Text crits you for 65432 damage.
You die.
To the OP: When you can edit in some form of breaks and paragraphs I will take the time to read it.
--Jim
Katie,
With all due respect I seriously doubt the future of magic is flourishing. Before the cardistry and flourishing guys tar and feather me I will tell you that I respect your skill immensely and simply love to watch the things you guys and girls can do with a deck of cards. Its a skill based manipulation stunt though there is really nothing 'magical' about it to me, even though it is incredibly impressive and seemingly impossible. To really clarify that, I think juggling chainsaws is impressive and seemingly impossible but I wouldn't call it 'magic'. Would you?
I think it will get better and much more creative. Flourishes have always been a part of magic but they were never the magic. I like what Dan and Dave did with their recent releases including magic effects and routines as part of their flourishing teachings. I think that including new and innovative flourishes as part of a card routine is certainly going to take off to make a routine look incredibly more impressive.
Hopefully this isn't taken as an insult to the cardistry and flourishing gurus that I have the utmost respect for in all honesty.
--Jim
Who says if you do cardistry you have to look the same as everybody else? You aren't limited to what you can do really. You may be limited to what moves you can learn off other people, but you can still develop your own style and moves.
And if you look at theory11.com, it does say "Magic & Cardistry Epicenter" which is pretty explicit that it's not just about magic here.
Though some cardists agree that the fact that the website also includes magic is a bad thing
I think both arts can learn off each other, and mix to create something powerful.
And if you look at theory11.com, it does say "Magic & Cardistry Epicenter" which is pretty explicit that it's not just about magic here.
Though some cardists agree that the fact that the website also includes magic is a bad thing
I think both arts can learn off each other, and mix to create something powerful.
I think Katie's spot-on in that analysis. It's already at the point where if you don't flourish at the XCM level, other card manipulators question your skill. How long is it going to be before the layman expects it?
We already have a whole generation of breakdancers, skateboarders, and freestyle BMXers out there, and the recreation is constantly getting more and more sophisticated. I was a pretty competent breakdancer and skateboarder in the 1980s, but the things people do today are simply beyond my ability - and it's not going to change. Even though basic card and coin tricks are still impressive to the aficionado, you have to go way beyond that to get anywhere in this business today.
I have had this on my mind for a while but didnt want to offend anybody.
it is quite annoying from my point of view because there are more flourishes in the media section than magic.
My personal opinion (i hope no one takes offense from this) is that flourishes are great to practice, but never to peform.
When you do a flourish you are immediately clasified as a card manipulator, i dont want my spectators to say "yeh but your really good with cards, you did a funny move" i want them to say "holy ****! how did you do that?" and to get this reaction i have to convince them that what iam doing is magic and not sleight of hand, unfortunately i have noticed that flourishes enforce the idea that your using sleight of hand.
One last thing which i dislike about flourishes is that it seems people are doing it to show off more than anything, now iam not talking about everybody, just some peoples attitude towards flourishing annoys me.
for example:"other card manipulators question your skill. "
So? why should we care? we as magicians shouldnt care what other magicians think of us, as humans we shouldnt even care what anybody thinks of us(otherwise you will end up being like a sheep following every fad/fashion .etc), as long as your audience enjoys your magic, that is all that matters.
dont get me wrong though, I know everyone has theyre own peformance style and i respect that, and I am VERY impressed by some of the flourishes on this website. I just dont like the attitude some flourishers have.
it is quite annoying from my point of view because there are more flourishes in the media section than magic.
My personal opinion (i hope no one takes offense from this) is that flourishes are great to practice, but never to peform.
When you do a flourish you are immediately clasified as a card manipulator, i dont want my spectators to say "yeh but your really good with cards, you did a funny move" i want them to say "holy ****! how did you do that?" and to get this reaction i have to convince them that what iam doing is magic and not sleight of hand, unfortunately i have noticed that flourishes enforce the idea that your using sleight of hand.
One last thing which i dislike about flourishes is that it seems people are doing it to show off more than anything, now iam not talking about everybody, just some peoples attitude towards flourishing annoys me.
for example:"other card manipulators question your skill. "
So? why should we care? we as magicians shouldnt care what other magicians think of us, as humans we shouldnt even care what anybody thinks of us(otherwise you will end up being like a sheep following every fad/fashion .etc), as long as your audience enjoys your magic, that is all that matters.
dont get me wrong though, I know everyone has theyre own peformance style and i respect that, and I am VERY impressed by some of the flourishes on this website. I just dont like the attitude some flourishers have.
How many of the top performers working today in magic are remotely proficient to the level of being considered an "XCM'er"? Better yet how many of them actually even utilize it in their show?
My point is you don't have to do anything simply because the XCM is becoming popular from your point of view. Most magicians consider heavy flourishing during a magic act to do more harm than good. Personally if you are showing off your card manipulation skills and suddenly you make their card appear on the top of the deck the audience is going to say "man he can really work those cards" instead of "wow that was impossible how my card magically rose to the top like that".
I would disagree that plenty of guys are at the top of this business (magic) and do next to no flourishing or what would be considered XCM. Hell even some of the hardcore XCM guys don't even like to have magic associated with what they are doing.
Personally I don't care what other magicians think of my skill. I don't perform for or design my routines to fool or play to magicians. If your interests lie in impressing other magicians with your manipulation skills with a deck of cards I would say you are in for a pretty rude awakening in that most of them could care less if you can do a Cobra Cut or Jackson 5.
--Jim
You're missing the point.
It is inevitable that this attitude will spread - first to the people who hire magicians, and then to the people that watch them.
You may not care what other magicians think of you, but you'd better care what your audience thinks.
Thanks. I didn't miss the point, as your arrogance clearly shines through once again.
Two things are inevitable according to the old saying, death and taxes. If you think it is inevitable that XCM will be all anyone else is talking about and the 'magicians' will simply have to catch up, by all means pursue that path.
When the greatest XCM'er in the world starts selling out more theaters than Copperfield I will be fully convinced by this line of thinking. Until then...
--Jim
Very good. Now remove everyone from that list who was already at or near the top when XCM first entered the picture.
Do you even have a list anymore?
I say build a better mousetrap.
De'Vo vom Schattenreich performed regularly for the US embassy in Belgium at one point doing nothing but XCM. Apparently, they liked it.
DO YOU THINK FAMOUS MAGICIANS GOT TO WHERE THEY WERE BECAUSE THEY WERE LIKE SOME OTHER GUY!?! DAN AND DAVE WEREN'T COPYING SOMEBODY, THEY BROKE THE MOLD AND YOU'RE TRYING TO BE LIKE THEM. WHILE YOU'RE COPYING, I'M MAKING MY OWN SENSATION!!!
Do you think anybody ever got taken seriously by typing in call caps with gratuitously excessive punctuation?
And if you have to tell me what a sensation you're going to be, you're just blowing smoke.
Honestly, you sound like every other wannabe out there except that you've copped more of an attitude to make yourself feel smarter.
What an adorable attempt at an argument.
I think the issue here is that a lot of magicians are boring showmen in general, but manage to temporarily mask that behind a lot of fancy manipulation. They give themselves a touch of the exotic, and can briefly fool people into thinking they're interesting.
All my gigs I've gotten booked on had to do with me just being a likeable guy, not with how slick I was with a pack of cards.
Is there anyway people can volunteer to moderate different videos?
I.e.
2 - 3 mods for Cards
2 - 3 mods for Coins
2 - 3 mods for Mentalism (We hardly see any of these... Which is a shame)
2 - 3 mods for etc.
Get my drift?
- Sean
I.e.
2 - 3 mods for Cards
2 - 3 mods for Coins
2 - 3 mods for Mentalism (We hardly see any of these... Which is a shame)
2 - 3 mods for etc.
Get my drift?
- Sean
It's not arrogance, it's superiority. Notice how you make something up and pretend I said it:
I didn't say that. I said I agreed with Katie that XCM was the future of magic, because the audience of the future will be more sophisticated and have higher expectations. I believe the most likely candidate to fill that need is XCM, and that magicians who work with cards will naturally and normally integrate XCM techniques and practices into their routines, because I am already seeing this expectation from other magicians.
Just like in the early 1990s, I began to see skateboarders expecting flatland freestyle to be integrated into street skating competition, and breakdancers expecting more acrobatics in a routine. At first, this expectation was only among the professionals; after a few years, it extended to competition judges; and a few years later, it was expected by the audience.
That's called "experience". One day, you might have some.
What an amusing example of deliberate fallacy.
And how, exactly, does your PAST experience bear on my prediction of FUTURE trends?
How would that equate to XCM being the future of magic, especially considering that the most dedicated practitioners of it don't even consider it to be magic in any way, shape, or form?
I'm not understanding the leap of logic.
You're saying no magician has gotten to the top without XCM since the whole thing got started. Can you actually back that up?
Merely this: we're performing artists. The content isn't nearly as important as whether or not you're capable of holding people's interest without the tricks and flourishes.
I don't care how much you blend magic and XCM. If you're still a moron and a wanker, audiences will go with the juggler or the mentalist who bends forks and coins over you.
And before you jump on my back over that, I was using the pronoun "you" in a non-specific context.
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For those about to complain about the long post: this is what happens when I make short posts. People jump out of the woodwork to complain that their dysfunctional brains have manufactured some ridiculous monstrosity out of my succinct and concise statement, and demand that I back it up.
Which means I have to explain that their little delusion is not what I said, and that what I said was in fact something else, and why they are not the same thing. And that requires a long post.
It doesn't. It's the first half of the equation that ended with XCM being the obvious thing one would add to magic - because, after all, it's not magic - to satisfy an audience.
But you conveniently removed the second half of that equation, so you could claim not to understand it.
Most ignorance is willful.
Deservedly so.
No, I said that most if not all of the top magicians reached the top before XCM was well-known. That is a substantially different claim.
Well, I can back up what I actually said. Take the date that XCM became well-known, and compare it to the date each of the top magicians became famous.
I can't do this for you, because our list and our dates will not be the same. Use your list and your dates, and you can see for yourself.
Here's a better one. Make a list of top card magicians and top XCM performers for the past several years. Now go down each list and make a checkmark next to each magician who also had XCM skills at that time - even if he's not a top XCM performer - and do likewise for each XCM performer who also performed card tricks at that time.
Each list will have more checkmarks - more crossover performers - than the preceding list. The XCM community is adding magic, and the magic community is adding XCM. Just like flatland freestyle and street skateboarding gradually merged until they became indistinguishable, so too will XCM and card magic assimilate into one another. There will still be XCM people, just like there are still flatland skaters, but it will no longer have any appreciable existence apart from the combined art form.
See, you don't have to be humble when you're right. You can just be right.
That's a false comparison. Compare over here, the magician who shuffles the cards in a traditional riffle and bridge, then spreads them in both hands to ask a spectator to pick a card.
Now, over there, we have a magician who - in the same amount of time - performs a dazzling series of flourishes before popping the cards into a one-hand fan and asking the spectator to pick a card.
From this point, they go on to perform the exact same trick. The first magician completes the trick and springs the cards from one hand into the other; the second completes the trick and performs a beautiful cascade of the deck into his other hand.
Who is the better magician?
Technically, neither is really a better magician. The magic is identical. The only difference has been the addition of a few XCM moves. But in the eyes of the audience, the magician using XCM is the better magician, because his presentation required more skill.
The fact that it didn't require more magic skill is a trivial detail. The audience still prefers the more skillful performer, even when the skill isn't magic. We already see this with comedy magic; the trick surrounded by comedy is preferable to the same trick surrounded by 1940s-style patter, because modern audiences demand more from their performers - not because there's some sort of flaw or imperfection in the 1940s version.
Which means I have to explain that their little delusion is not what I said, and that what I said was in fact something else, and why they are not the same thing. And that requires a long post.
It doesn't. It's the first half of the equation that ended with XCM being the obvious thing one would add to magic - because, after all, it's not magic - to satisfy an audience.
But you conveniently removed the second half of that equation, so you could claim not to understand it.
Most ignorance is willful.
Deservedly so.
No, I said that most if not all of the top magicians reached the top before XCM was well-known. That is a substantially different claim.
Well, I can back up what I actually said. Take the date that XCM became well-known, and compare it to the date each of the top magicians became famous.
I can't do this for you, because our list and our dates will not be the same. Use your list and your dates, and you can see for yourself.
Here's a better one. Make a list of top card magicians and top XCM performers for the past several years. Now go down each list and make a checkmark next to each magician who also had XCM skills at that time - even if he's not a top XCM performer - and do likewise for each XCM performer who also performed card tricks at that time.
Each list will have more checkmarks - more crossover performers - than the preceding list. The XCM community is adding magic, and the magic community is adding XCM. Just like flatland freestyle and street skateboarding gradually merged until they became indistinguishable, so too will XCM and card magic assimilate into one another. There will still be XCM people, just like there are still flatland skaters, but it will no longer have any appreciable existence apart from the combined art form.
See, you don't have to be humble when you're right. You can just be right.
That's a false comparison. Compare over here, the magician who shuffles the cards in a traditional riffle and bridge, then spreads them in both hands to ask a spectator to pick a card.
Now, over there, we have a magician who - in the same amount of time - performs a dazzling series of flourishes before popping the cards into a one-hand fan and asking the spectator to pick a card.
From this point, they go on to perform the exact same trick. The first magician completes the trick and springs the cards from one hand into the other; the second completes the trick and performs a beautiful cascade of the deck into his other hand.
Who is the better magician?
Technically, neither is really a better magician. The magic is identical. The only difference has been the addition of a few XCM moves. But in the eyes of the audience, the magician using XCM is the better magician, because his presentation required more skill.
The fact that it didn't require more magic skill is a trivial detail. The audience still prefers the more skillful performer, even when the skill isn't magic. We already see this with comedy magic; the trick surrounded by comedy is preferable to the same trick surrounded by 1940s-style patter, because modern audiences demand more from their performers - not because there's some sort of flaw or imperfection in the 1940s version.
Whoa guys! Calm down! Don't let this get out of hand. If you agree, that's fine. If you disagree that's fine. No need to bash me though because you have no idea. Last week I made over $650 on magic alone and I'm just a sophomore in high school. I'm not bragging, I'm not trying to take away what you guys think but when I see EVERY video EVERY message EVERY topic just cards cards flourishes flourishes it makes me mad. They have their place, I love Dan and Dave and Katie, they're awesome. But please think before becoming a poser. Do I try to be like Dan and Dave? No. Do I try to be like Criss Angel or David Blaine? No. Why should I even try to BE anybody? You never see somebody famous and say "That's cool! They're just like that guy!" they're themselves which is who I'll be. Let Dan and Dave be Dan and Dave. You be YOU. I'm not saying don't use cards. If they're for you, use them. If you're truly into coins use them but don't try to be like some coin guy you like. Use them for your own personality. I like mentalism mixed with magic but you don't see me saying "I want to be like this guy" I'm trying to make MY place in this world. So if you want to keep flourishing like thousands of other kids go ahead. Dan and Dave made up the flourishes. THEY MADE THEM UP!!! They didn't watch a DVD and get famous because they could do it. They MADE it you see? So while you're copying somebody else, I'm going to make something that thousands of kids like you twenty years from now will be copying.