Outside Magic...

[Rneogy]

Outdoors Magic

Well, hey guys, long time no post? well then, on topic.


SO I'm having an outside gig soon. Its pretty much a huge picnic thing. This would be my second outside performance, my first one being last week, which ended pretty badly. Well badly for my standards.

So I usually do a half an hour show, which I've got down pretty well. I do these shows inside at a museum, and they always love it. But when transitioned outside, things changed.

So my routine starts out, by asking, what do all magicians have. And they say "a wand!". And then I just do a simple appearing wand, flashy, quick, works well, gets their attention. Then I usually continue with D'Lites, which everyone always loves. So there comes my problem. Outside, D'Lites don't work at all. So, I absolutely lose my opener.

Do you guys know any tricks that work well outside? Another problem I had was card tricks. I don't know, I can do card tricks in a pretty big sized room, but outside, even if its the same size people, I don't think I can do it. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I just didn't want to even try, because if they can't see it, thats another bad mark on my outdoor show.

Thanks,
Rupayan

 

[Aaron.Williams]

Well, hey guys, long time no post? well then, on topic.


SO I'm having an outside gig soon. Its pretty much a huge picnic thing. This would be my second outside performance, my first one being last week, which ended pretty badly. Well badly for my standards.

So I usually do a half an hour show, which I've got down pretty well. I do these shows inside at a museum, and they always love it. But when transitioned outside, things changed.

So my routine starts out, by asking, what do all magicians have. And they say "a wand!". And then I just do a simple appearing wand, flashy, quick, works well, gets their attention. Then I usually continue with D'Lites, which everyone always loves. So there comes my problem. Outside, D'Lites don't work at all. So, I absolutely lose my opener.

Do you guys know any tricks that work well outside? Another problem I had was card tricks. I don't know, I can do card tricks in a pretty big sized room, but outside, even if its the same size people, I don't think I can do it. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I just didn't want to even try, because if they can't see it, thats another bad mark on my outdoor show.

Thanks,
Rupayan

Judging by your post and the video I saw on YouTube, you set seems pretty prop-based. Which isn't a bad thing when you're in a stand-up setting. But it seems like you need to revise your show a little. I would try to stay away from cards in general, not because you're outside, but because you're gonna be in front of a lot of people and they might not be able to see, unless you're gonna do something super visual that looks just as amazing in the back as it does in the front row like a rising card or something like that.

Try checking out some of the classics. Do some Cups & Balls, Spongeballs, Magic coloring book, or the jumbo 3 card monte. Those are just a few suggestions. Just check out some stuff that fits your personality and act well. A DVD that might be able to help is Exposed by Jeff Hobson.

 

[Zac Eckstein]

Get up closer to your audience and do your d-lite routine. Walk around the audience and make sure you are able to show everyone a piece of the routine. Simple fix, that should work bud.

 

[RealityOne]

D'Lites just don't work outside unless it is a dusk or at night. A good substitute is spongeballs. You could even have one of the spectators use the wand to make the balls multiply. Come up with a presentation other than "look, now the balls have multiplied."

As for cards, you can do an invisible deck routine where you select a volunteer and hand them a beach ball and a deck of cards. The volunteer tosses out the beach ball and whoever catches it names the color (red or black) and then tosses the ball up again and whoever catches it names the suite and then tosses it again having someone decide whether it is a court card or number card and someone else decide the value. You then take the deck from the volunteer and proceed with the reveal. You can do the reveal holding the cards up so the audience can see the reversed card. Have the spectator yaks that card and look at it (the audience will see their reaction and start to react) and the say what it is and show the audience (second waive of reaction from the audience).

Also consider using Jumbo Cards. There is a great effect in Mark Wilson's book called Bigger Card that makes a great transition from a regular deck to a Jumbo deck. You could produce a regular deck by asking "what else do magicians use?" then showing hands empty while asking "does anyone have a deck of cards?" and then producing the deck. From there go into Bigger Card and then do a routine with the Jumbo Cards.

Tossed out deck is another card effect that will work. Just make sure you play the effect to it's fullest and not just name three cards. I like Wayne Dobson's version in WD40.