At Sekigahara

The picture in this blog is first time I went to visit Sekigahara. Sekigahara is where, well, the Battle of Sekigahara took place on October 21, 1600. It is where Ieyasu Tokugawa was able to gain power and become the Shogun of Japan. Anyways, this battle it probably one of the most famous battles not the most famous battle  in Japanese history besides battles during World War II. Why am I writing this? Well it is about expectations. This visit was in August of 2006 when I lived in Shiga Prefecture which is about a 20 minute car drive to Sekigahara. I always wanted to visit this famous battlefield. I had always imagined it as a great field where some of Japan’s most historical Samurai fought in some very interesting circumstances and  with controversial betrayals in Japan’s history. However, when we drove there I saw there was no more field but just the City of Sekigahara itself where the field once was. No longer was there the great field where Tokugawa claimed victory. The train station is very close to where Tokugawa sat at his camp and is located in a small park with overgrown grass. There is a small museum next to it and if I remember right it costs about 300Yen (about $3.00 US) to enter. It was good to see and see some of the real armor, swords and stuff actually used in the battle. Anyways, Sekigahara was WAY different that I had always imagined it, not really in a bad way but just what time does to places over a 400 year period. Anyways what is my point? Oh thats right I am going to attempt to tie this to magic. LOL I am kidding myself? Going for it anyway.

Ok this is about expectations and how what you perceive exists or what will happen in the future is often very different than reality. So when you routine a magic performance your presentation must lead the audience in some cases down a road of expectation that does’t exist in reality at that moment, and you as the magician control it completely. However, unlike my Sekigahara excperiance where I expected something that I thought existed but didn’t, you as the magician have to ease the audience out of the false experience so that they never knew it even existed. This way you can work some powerful effects and your magic can truly feel like real magic to the audience. This is something I hope to attain one day. How to do it? Well all I can say is that you must work on presentation as much, if not more as, the actual technical part of the magic. My thoughts anyway. Enjoy and good luck! May you become a Shogun of magic.

Aaron

The Dove

Today I wanted to talk about the magic  delay. What is this? If you are experienced in magic you know about this concept, if you are new magic you may not have encountered it before unless you have used specific effects that use it.  Again in this explanation I will not use any specific magic examples to explain  the theory but explain the basic theory the best I can. The idea behind this is that there is a delay between when some effect is started and the the revelation of the effect.  The time delay hides the method, so that an audience can not backtrack to find the method, because too much time along with other events in the performance have happened that people’s short term memory can’t remember the point where the method occurred. Make sense?  Now the thing is to use the time delay technique effectively for certain effects a well structured routine or show is required. You need to really think and write and test the routine to find the proper time delay that fits in with the routine. This idea is VERY powerful and some of the best performers in the world use this theory. However to use it effectively you really need to think about your show and routines as I mentioned. This is a very short explanation but if you have any thing to add to the idea please post it in the comments on this website or send me an email! Until next time!

Aaron

Working Hard

Since I have started blogging about different aspects of magic and magic theory I have met and talked with many great magicians over the ideas I have posted as well over what others have posted. This has a been a great experience. One of the people I regular talk about these with is Steve Dickson a magician from Vancouver BC Canada and he presented a theory to me. This is theory is using the spectators own life experience as a way to deceive them but in they really fool themselves because of what they believe. This concept is something I have thought about and have seen other magicians mention from time to time. It is also used as a way to explain how magic fools people. However if a magician can use this concept as a method rather than a way to explain why magic fool people it can be a powerful tool.

Ok now I will talk about what this is and hopefully I make sense. Again I won’t talk about any specific effects but rather the basics of the theory to make you think. Ok every person has their own life experience that influences how they understand the world. In magic we can use this to have the spectator deceive themselves by having them rely on what they know about objects and situations from their own experiences. Ok an example. If I you see a cup you know what it is. You know it is a object used to holds liquid so that you can drink it. You know how to use it and how it works with out any explanation. You also naturally understand the properties of a cup because since you were a child you have used one, and probably everyday. The instant you see one you know what it is how to use it and what its purpose is. Your brains does this all automatically with out any kind of conscious thinking.  Now as you can see how this is used to explain why magic fools people as if you do magic with the cup that goes outside what a person knows about the cup it seems like magic. If you fill a cup then turn it upside down and the liquid inside does not fall out its magic. But what I want to explain is how to use this theory to create a situation that a spectator will assume is normal because they relay on this life experience. In this because the spectator will assume a certain situation exists when it doesn’t because of what their life experience tells them. Steve Dickson gave me this great example. “We go through life knowing what we believe we know through life experiences such as pushing doors that have brass square plates on them because that’s what the plates are for, to push, we don’t need the word push on them to understand. We pull on doors with handles on them, again we don’t need the word pull to understand, the object tells us what it is and what to do”.

When using this idea in magic with objects the magician uses the life experience as a tool. By presenting a certain everyday objects the spectators assumes certain things about it and understands it’s properties. In certain effects a magician can use an object that appears to be normal, however it has been modified to create a magical experience. From the spectators point of view they assume certain things about and the magician takes advantage of this. This theory relies on the object not being switched in most cases because the audience fools themselves into it being normal by their brain assuming it’s naturals properties. Then the magician does something that is not characteristic of it’s natural properties which creates the magical effect. This works for situation magic as well were the spectator naturally understands the natural properties of a real situation from their experience and the magician has created a false version of this which then in turn creates the magic from the situation. Now again I did not mention any real effects that use this concept because I don’t want to expose any specific magic effects, but rather have magicians think about this theory.  There are of course many popular effects that rely on this concept. Now my homework for you is to think about it.  I know because I didn’t use any real examples it may be hard to understand but this is a great psychological tool we can use as magicians. If you have any comments please let me know! I would like to thank Steve Dickson for presenting this topic to me.

Aaron

Performing Magic!

Today I want to write about consistency with your magic. This will be a bit deep and abstract as this is a public blog I won’t mention specific magic methods or effects. A lot of magic has consistency problems that are needed for the effect to work and these consistency are missed by the audience. This is like consistency problems in movies and TV shows that are overlooked when watching a movie but then on a re watch can be caught. I won’t be talking about these kinds of inconsistencies. What I am going to talk about is creating false consistency. This is sometimes referred to as  ”subtly” or a “convener” in magic. What I am talking about is that during an effect you will have a situation that SHOULD exist of the situation was real but because of the method of the effect this can’t exist. So what you do is make it look like this natural condition exists even though it can’t. Does that make sense? LOL Hang in there. The thing about this is that you CAN NOT call attention to this situation that SHOULD exist. You need to move and handle the props or situation as if all was normal even though the real natural situation doesn’t exist but a false version of it does. If you call attention to it it will destroy what you are creating. To the audience nothing seems abnormal but on your side a natural situation that should exist is completely faked so the effect can work. Whew. Still with me? If you want an idea of kind of what I am talking about watch Teller’s from Pen & Teller taking out a cigarette and lighting it routine. That is a bit of what I mean. Things look natural to the audience but the real situation is very different. Ok whats is my point. Well many effects can be improved if you create some kind of fake consistency, that is shown only through a natural situation to make a stronger image in the spectators mind. As I mentioned you CAN NOT call attention to it or it defeats the whole purpose, as if it were a real situation you would not call attention to it. Doing this I believe will create stronger effects with effects with objects, mental effects, and with situation only magic. The thing is you need to do is think about and construct the routine to include this false consistency. One way to do this is to act out what an effect would look like without doing the effect but just going through the motions and imagining what things should look like if everything was real and the magic was real. Now that your head hurts good luck!