Trout...

Just watched the David Blaine special - the master of leger de main.

What a fabulous magician - far better than that Copperfield crap.

This was him just walking the streets doing tricks - not the sitting on a pole for 48hrs!

Brilliant.

Trout

Devil's Refugee

All staged for the camera me boy.....you're a gullible little chap

TelBoy

Although i think Copperfield looks a bit dodgy, i've never heard a compelling explanation for how he does his "flying" illusion at his shows. That is an exceptional effect.

Devil's Refugee

It's wires

TelBoy

Well, i guess that's the logical explanation, but they're damn well hidden if it is wires. How are they concealed so well? Have you seen it done live - it's unbelievably lifelike...

zoog

Can't abide conjurers.

The Blaine levitation trick can be seen in by every school playground. Copperfield is a loathsome slimeball. And as for that guy with the toupee.....

P1Fanatic

Probably the obvious answer. But how do they make it that he can swoop a hula hoop ring around his entire body without snagging it?

As for david blaine he is quality. The levitation stuff is a bit dodgy. I never saw anyone float both feet a good 1 ft off the floot at school. Ive heard this one is rigged and they use the crowd reaction of the normal slip one leg behind the other little levitation.

But even his cards tricks are amazing. It makes me laugh when people slag magicians off. We know they arent really doing most of the stuff they are doing but thats the whole point - its a frigging illusion. Thats what grasps you - you just cant comprehend how they did it so convincingly. If it was that easy then every man and his dog would be doing it.

I dont recall the masked magician ever showing how any of david blaines tricks are done.

Simon.

GaryK

P1,

Agreed, I think blaine is cool even though most of his techniques have been revealed, all these magicians have to practise practise practise these tricks so they look slick anyway but the levitation trick is rigged which is a shame.

Anyway its about time we saw some new stuff from him, C4 keep trotting out all his old shows which is getting a little tedious now!

Gary

NotoriousREV

The weekend after Christmas there was a Magic's Secrets Revealed on Ch4 (I think) howing how most of Blaine's tricks are done (levitation, dead fly back to life, card that rises from the pack, getting name to appear on his arm in ash etc etc) and in one other progrm they showed how he did his ice block trick.

Very sneaky, very clever, I personally really admire his skill in fooling his audience (which is what magicians do, magic isn't real, you know )

TelBoy

NREV, i missed that. Didn't realise there was a secret involved in the ice block trick. What was the secret then?

NotoriousREV

He had a secret compartment underneath the block, and another person. I beleive (from the program although I didn't see the details of DB's stunt) that every so often they would re-freeze the block periodically causing vapour to rise during which time they would swap places through a trapdoor. Also, the temperature within the ice block was pretty warm, not the ub-zero temps we were led to beleive (ask anyone who lives in an igloo).

Devil's Refugee

P1Fanatic,

If you've seen those expose-type programmes on TV, you'll see that they don't actually pass the hoop all the way around, it's all slight of hand stuff.
Clever admittedly, but all tricks have an explanation.
And Copperfield's famous flying trick is done with those "invisible"-type clear wires. Note that when the trick is performed, there is very little lighting during it. He was exposed accidentally doing the trick at one performance because the lighting engineer forgot to kill the beams, so the wires were visible.

Tiggs

"I dont recall the masked magician ever showing how any of david blaines tricks are done."

the episode where the masked magician RUINED blanes act "ha, ha!" caused a lot uproar in the states and within the magic circle thingy.....some liked it cause they think blane is a wacko and some didnt cause it wrecked his show- having seen how set up and false it is i'd never bother watching a blane act again (dont count sitting on igloo for 9 days, etc, etc as an act)

T

brickboy

Sorry Notorious -- I missed the C4 prog too ... so how does David B do the writing-the-name-on-his-arm-in-ash trick? Looked cool when I saw him do it on his show ....

Devil's Refugee

It's pre-recorded audience reaction tripe. All his street tricks are.
That "masked magician" blew most of Blaine's tricks wide open.
Can't remember the exact details of the ash writing trick, but it was featured on the expose.

Dracoro

anyone know if/when this exposed program is repeated?
Or any websites explaining how blaine/copperfield does their stuff?

the copperfield sawn in half is clever?

I think mirrors play a big part in many tricks.

dsmith

NEW YORK -- At a press conference in Times Square today, FOX's "Masked Magician" revealed the secret of magician David Blaine's latest illusion, where Blaine appeared to fall off a 10-story pillar into a pile of boxes: "Gravity."

"What he does is, he jumps off a pillar," the Masked Magician said.

When pressed for further explanation of the extraordinary illusion, the Masked Magician demurred.

"That's the whole deal," the Masked Magician said. "He jumps off a pillar. First he's on the pillar for a while. Then he jumps off. That's the trick."

Fans, still reeling from the incredible feat of magic and no longer trusting their senses in the face of such powerful mystic forces, pushed for more revelations.

"Look," the Masked Magician said. "It's just gravity. You step off a pillar, and then you apply Newton's second law, F = ma. Any two objects that have mass will have some gravitational force of attraction between them. The amount of attraction decreases as the distance between the objects increases."

The Masked Magician then attempted to diagram the relevant equations on a blackboard, but terrified fans stormed off to burn David Blaine for being a witch.

Well, it made me chuckle
100 ways to while away the day browsing the web...

Deano

scooby_xt_turbo

you want some magic? go to any **** site and your body, or at least a part of it will start levitating, that's what i call good old fashioned magic.
BTW, i don't care how Blaine, Copperfield and the rest do their tricks, what i care is that i enjoy it. it's something like kids and Santa Claus. If you tell them the truth, it's ruined.

NotoriousREV

OK, here's the whole ash-arm trick.

He asks the person to write the name of someone special in the middle of a peice of paper and then you fold the paper in half and in half again. He takes the paper but doesn't open it. Then he says something like "did you write it or print it?, whichever the person says, he says "no it needs to be [whatever]" and he rips the paper up and scatters the peices (except the end peice which actually has the name written on it (sneaky, huh? try it yourself). The person then writes the name again on another peice of paper while DB stands with his back to the crowd. While he's doing this, he reads the name then writes the name on his arm with a grease pencil, goes back over, takes the peice of paper, sets fire to it and "reveals" the writing on his arm. Of course, it's edited so you only see the second half of the conversation.

It's classic sleight of hand and deception and DB does it exceptionally well (as does Paul Daniels, whether you like him or not)

brickboy

Notorious -- thanks for posting that, you're a gent

I love to see close-up magic (like Paul Daniels' "Bunco Booth") cos of the skill. Can't beat watching a pro at work

+Doc+

I Think some "Magicians" can be called talented its all about the hand decieving the eye.
I have witnessed one magician pushing a Budwieser bottle through a table right before my eyes, the bottle was normal, the table was normal, I was a little drunk but it was a great trick.

Butty

iTrader: (2)

Since Bo Selecta took the pi$$ out of him I can't take him seriously.
It just takes a Shazam and a mincey walk and I am in hysterics - but then I'm easily pleased.

Nick

Jooles

Here's the fly back to life bit - he puts the thing in the fridge beforehand, it goes into a deep coma and he then places it on the windowsill and waits for someone to drift on by. Places the fly in the palm of his hand and the heat wakes it up. Clever, but surely a case for the RSPCA or perhaps Rolf.....

markpm

Okay, Okay, I know a lot of it is probably setup but did anyone see the one where Blaine was talking to a couple on the street, and he then pointed into a jewellers window, and there was the womans watch. He then put a piece of newspaper upto the window, put his hand through the window(!) and took out the womans watch with no marks to the window at all afterwards etc etc.
Also saw Paul Zenon do a similar thing on a London street with a car tax disk. He just pulled it out of the window!!
How the hell are those ones done??

Dracoro

The tax disk one is done thus:.

Have an identical tax disk in your hand.

Fishing wire attached to the disk in the car with the wire going throught to the back with a 'colleague' hiding behind in the boot or behind the car. Stop someone ahead of the car, strike up conversation and then onward with the trick. While you are rubbing the windscreen, your mate yanks off the tax disk and hey presto you show him the one in your hand.

I suppose you could also rig up the clear fishing wire in such a way so you could yank it off too if you dont have a pal to help.

DavidLewis

...and I thought Blaine could levitate because he is a Jedi Knight. Worse than when I found out there was no such such thing as Santa

Black Cat

D
how are things in the Artic...???? miss you guys loads.... David Blane despite what anyone else says is the most amazing person on the planet.....

coming this way soon?????

luv ya....kkk
P

Tiggs

just caught some of his old street magic show- "think of a number between 1 and 50 but both digits must be odd numbbers.....is it 37?"

lady had an orgasm at his mystical powers while he smiles in a "look what i sucked leonatdo di caprio in to promoting" way.

blokes slimey!

T

rr_ww

Granted, hes a bit odd. In a mono-sylobic (sp?)/sold my soul to the devil type way. But as ENTERTAINMENT and thats all it is. Hes not bad.

Anyone got his book?

brickboy

Now that's magic. You'll like this one. Not a lot, but you'll like it

Must be said, I do like the prestidigitation with cards and things, I was at a works do once and they had a bloke doing close-up tricks and pick-pocketing, and even though you **know** it's a trick, it still baffled me. But that's not difficult

[Edited by brickboy - 1/3/2003 9:28:46 AM]