Im just wondering how many of you guys out there will walk up to a total stranger and tell him to stop flashing his card sleights(which you learnt for half of your pocket money) in public because he does them like crap.

This is not some moral education class or something so please give your honest views!!


For me persornally, I woulden because I mean, its a free world? People are entitled to do anything they like or want(besides breaking the law).

And most probably IF i do it(which i will never do) and some random guy comes and tell me to stop flashing cause its in public and i am exposing all the card sleights, HONESTLY I would most likely tell him to shut up totally and if he dosen move away or stares at me, I WILL give him a black eye.

What about you guys? Please dont be the macho and give the O I AM AN ANGEL kind of magician answer yea?

Thanks a lot people!

For me, i might ask someone to keep his cards in a not-so-harsh way, and might be able to hook up a chat with him on the train/bus etc.

What I'm trying say is that u know, people have pride and u will hurt them badly if u say something like "hey, please stop whatever you are doing,your sleights is total crap and stop exposing!
But sometimes you'll have to think this in a different point of view, yourself aint that good, maybe you might not be in a position to tell someone off. The sleights may look 'exposing' to you but might not to the surroundings.

- AND IF im the person who is exposing and someone came to tell me off, probably what I'm going to do is basically keep my cards quietly, because I'm at fault first for exposing/practicing in public.
but the situation really depends on the tone that the person gave me.

However, that person must be dumb to expose or practice his sleights in public, its like giving away free knowledge that u bought it with your blood and sweat to the members of the public, some ethics got to be teach here.

Maybe I will approach him and guide him the correct way of doing the sleights, if he was doing crappily :P
Rather than leaving him alone practicing the wrong thing

I had this experience before. I did not stop him, as I don't know how to stop him without hurting his pride and attracting more attention. But I should have stopped him. :(

My girlfriend suggested me to hand him my name card. On the back of the name card, I can write "Practice at home, not in the public k?"

hmmm.. well for me i'd prob just start a conversation with him by asking if he's a magician etc etc then weasel the comment on not practicing in public. But at the same time i'd be encouraging by tell him to keep practicing but just do it at home... =)

some positive reinforcement in terms of practicing but just some tactful feedback on the appropriate place.. =)

If you really give him a black eye, you're too hot headed, I understand that youngsters are like that. Been there, done that. When you grow older, you'll start to think why you were like that.

When I was younger, I use to think that I'm invincible, the most that can happen is just death. Now come to think of it, I'm glad that I have change my perception of life. :off:

Anyway, if I were to see such people around, I'd probably ignore them, let them make a fool out of themselves. Besides, I wouldn't want to get a black eye :) .

Those who play with cards in the public are an eyesore (ESPECIALLY ON THE PUBLIC TRANSPORTS). Be it the moves are executed flawlessly or disgustingly exposed.

Attraction-seekers and show-offs give magicians a bad name.

I think flourishes in the public are fine. Or a well executed colour change.

A few years ago, my friends told me they saw these 2 guys on a mrt doing flourishes. They said they totally kick a**. Seems like they captured the attention of everyone around them. My friends love their flourishes. They are not really an eyesore. To my friends their flourish is really nice to watch.

I seldom "practice" in the public.

I remember one time I just bought a few pack of cards. I was in a barber shop, waiting for my turn. While waiting, I opened the deck of cards and start checking them, at the same time do a few flourish to make sure the deck is working fine.

After a few cuts, I noticed one girl (she is very young, maybe 5 yrs old?) She is standing outside the shop together with her mom. She is looking at me with her big eyes :ph43r: (so cute!!) Her mom is pointing at me, and asked the girl to look at me.

I performed a few colour changes to her and her eyes went bigger :P . Her mom's eyes went bigger too lol.

I was having a bad day that day, but the smile on the girl's face really makes me feel so much better.. :)

There is a thin, grey line between performing and boasting (in a form of action). Like what Ace said, its totally fine if your intention is to entertain the audience, but there are still some who is adopting the "look-what-I-can-do-with-a-deck-of-cards" attitude. These actions just screamed the words "HAO LIAN" (means show-off in dialect) in the laymen's perspective.

These are such a turn-offs, sometimes I have an uncontrollable urge to drag these people faces along the train tracks. :angry:

IMO, I think flourishing is ok, since it doesn't expose anything and ya, it's really a skill that looks good.

But practising sleights like DL, Pass or colour changes is really a stupid thing to do. I wonder why did those guys learn magic for. To show people magic? Or show people they know the moves to magic?

Talking about stopping them, I think the best way is to talk to them, like what bmt mentioned. No point trying to tell people off and eventually get a black eye. By talking to them, you actually "misdirect" them away from playing their cards.

Or to show people how the moves are done :angry:

There is this guy practicing his push off DL on the mrt. He is like showing the world how he push and l*** a D*****. <_<

I'll suggest go up to the person, show him/her your name card (if you have one) then start a conversation. 1st to misdirect his/her attention away from whatever magic he/she is doing, then "remind" them about magician's code of enthic and explain more about exposure...

*Usually the "newbie" will stop doing because they're being approach by a pro (even if they carry on they'll not do big actions).
*If you're not a pro, just strike up a conversation and carry on misdirecting their attention.
*Once they stop about 5-10 mins, hands will not be condition enough to carry on (especially on a cold weather or air-conditional areas).
*Everyone needs a reminder from time to time, I used to practice on the train even thou i know about the code of ethic (most people know but DO NOT KNOW HOW TO APPLY).

Getting a chat with someone having the same hobby can past time/make friends and remind them to be a better magician, so why not?

-Alan-

Transport is a disutility. Time is being wasted when we are waiting for mrts, and while we are traveling in the train etc. Hence some people will try to do something "productive" to make up for the time wasted in traveling.
In this case some magicians choose to practice in mrts or buses. -_-

I think you can do other things while you are on the mrt. For those people who are thinking of magic 24/7, you can try reading a book (magic related books), construct new routines in your head etc. For me I'll just listen to music or sleep :P

Sit beside that person and ask him to join SMC. Lols. But seriously I think it is right for us to tell them to stop exposing the sleights. Some people might not know that they are exposing. So a nice warning to them is good. Don't get too harsh though=) Ha ha. Anyway, I won't want to hold my cards when walking or on public transport because I'm sure going to drop it somehow. Murphy's Law lols.

Buy a PSP or Nintendo DS. Time flies when you are having fun.

The world is not all about magic, its much bigger than that.

Wow hot topic! :off:



Hmmm, i guess some of you guys missed the part where, i mean its a free world??

Yes Magicdow, i do admit im very hot headed haha.


They can expose all they want and all they like i mean? Theres no law stopping them, and if they can show off or prastise in the train, i dont think they will care about the ETHICS of a magician i guess?


They might even call the police for you harrassing them or something?

Just my 2 cents i guess, what do you guys think?

No money! :(

I guess I will stick to sleeping :P

Yup, We cannot stop them. The best thing we can do is to advice them. If they refuse to listen, there is nothing much we can do.

Well, I don't think they will call the police because you are just giving them some good advices or a gentle reminder.

The police won't get involved... unless you start springing cards at their faces or dragging their faces along the train tracks.

LOL :lol:

i think the key is just to positive about it. so it's not so much about telling someone off but just let them know that they are possibly exposing secrets. some people really don't realise. POSITIVITY PEOPLE!!! =)) hahahaha

I leave them alone.

What for? Hurts your magic? I couldn't be much bothered about this.

1. It does not hurt me.
2. It hurts them.

Just a sidenote, if people practicing in public hurts you, most probably you do the moves as bad as they do. (Hurts, but true)

Talking to them does not really help, IMO. Simply because you do not know their intentions. If they are real busy and the only dead time is on public transport and they use it to practice, please spare a thought.

I know of people who got skilled by practicing during long travel times on buses and MRTs.

I personally practice on public transports. I get dizzy reading or playing my beloved PSP, and I get tired of the songs in my PSP. Plus, I like to sit at the back of buses.

IMO, this whole "exposure" thing is rather unfounded. Laymen aren't going to make any sense of those moves anyway. OHTPs don't make any sense to anyone unless you practice card to pocket while standing on the bus. Shifts alone don't make sense unless you do them face up. All other moves, while practicing, generally make no sense to anyone at all.

Exposure = revealing the method of how magical phenomena happens.
Eg. You do a crap OTHP on a bus, you go to your pocket producing the card.

Two things to note
1. OTHP is not magical.
2. Card appearing in pocket is magical.

In this example, you "reveal" the magical part by doing the non-magical part sloppily. That, my friends, is exposure.

Plus point, people don't really care if you keep doing something technical for say, 15+ times. They get bored and look somewhere else. Unless you flourish. I get that all the time. And so far, it does not hurt my performance.

"Hey! I saw that on the MRT train! Someone was doing it!" - A quote you'll never get till the day you get caught.

My 2 Pennies,
Kenneth Yeo

That is true to a certain extend.

However, they sure hurt the image of magicians in general. Magic is supposed to be an art of mystery and deception, and you see people practicing that on MRT and buses!? It sure affects people's impression of magic.

To me flourish is a different thing. If you want to entertain people with some fancy card flourishes, go ahead.

Yup true. They will see that this guy is trying to do a OHTP, or trying to do a DL. They will know what he is trying to do. Then they will look somewhere else. (Damage done)

Yup, it might make no sense to anyone. But like what I said, practicing in the public still affects the image of magicians.

In most cases, you practice because you have not learnt or master the move yet. Chances are you will not be able to execute the move good enough. People will see your sloppy DL etc; it just makes magicians look bad.

For me I'll hide in my room and practice, without anyone seeing. I am too ashamed to let people see my clumsy hands when I was learning a new move. :(

no offences to ace but there arent strangers in your house right? And I'm sure our parents know the techniques to our tricks especially our dads. And I think teaching siblings (especially younger ones) isn't recommended cause they will not understand the prestige of the move or the secret behind the trick and ends up revealing it to others(that's hurting)

I've seen people practise card sleights on train. Especially those with friends, they'll do it standing up which leads to the trick being revealed.

And also, the fact that people will look away from your gig if it consists of you passing a billion times

Haha no my parents don't know how I do my tricks. They don't really care lol. I won't practice infront of them (cos it is likely they will ask me to keep the cards and study -_-)

I still remember the time when I performed some card magic during Chinese New Year in my grandma's house. My parents were so shocked that I could do magic like ACRs and card transpo. :lol:

This is the funny thing. Actually it is my younger brother that got me serious in magic. He started learning magic first, and he influenced me.

Oh ya the pass. If your pass is good, then it should be fine. To them you are just squaring a deck of cards a million times.

Like what I said, practicing magic in the public hurts the image of magic.

KINDA explain why I think this discussion is quite pointless, although worded in a rather extreme way.

Hmm... I don't think the discussion is pointless.

Yes, we cannot stop them. The best thing we can do is to advice them. If they refuse to listen, there is nothing much we can do.

There are alot of things to discuss here.

Should we advice them? Or should we just leave them alone?

Why should we advice them?

How should we advice them?

Is is right or wrong to practice in the public? Will that affect the image of magicians?

Is it ok to do flourish in the public?

Wow. These are good questions that can be explored. I think Ace have raise some good guiding qn for those who feel like pursuing this thread.

Well said, llamalamer. I think this is very true, and it also tie in with the issue of exposure.

Ace, I think that's a doomsday prophecy. Do you seriously think that a kid with attention seeking behavior doing bad sleights will affect so much as people's general perception of magic? Perhaps, may be for those who have not seen any magic show. But most ppl see David Blaine at least. And I doubt in anyway, that the kid will spoil any impression they have of David Blaine, who isn't very good in the first place, at least for his earlier showings.

But for me, I think everyone have their right to do what they wish, provided that they don't interfere with other people's individual freedom. So, all views are highly personal, and I don't think we have the right to interfere with this behavior anyway. Watever your choice, I think the impact is too trivial as well, since the factor of meeting such person, the reaction of the person, and what he is going to do results in very small good change.

Thus, I believe that it isn't worth much time to discuss, but since I am relaxing now and that exam is over, may be i will just write something. I don't force my opinion on other ppl, but if you want to talk more abt this, Ace has pinpointed some of the crux of the issue.

Good point. Maybe you are right.

We can see bad singers on those idol auditions. However, they don't really affect our impression of singers. Their actions affect our impressions of them but not so much on singers in general. Maybe because we don't even consider them as singers in the first place.

Maybe the same thing goes for magicians?

Maybe people don't really consider those kids practicing on the trains as "magicians". They might think they are just kids playing with cards. Hence they would not really hurt the image of magicians, esp. those big time magicians like David Copperfield.

However I believe there are quite a number of young magicians here. I'm sure they don't want to be associated with those "kids that play with cards on the train"

Yes, it might be a doomsday prophecy. So far I have only seen 1 or 2 guys practicing their sleights on the train. It is actually quite rare to see people practice magic in public. Let's just hope the number won't increase.

I would like to repeat what I have said and it is worth repeating.

OHTP and DL are not magical in nature. What kind of damage can it do? People knowing the move when you perform an effect with it? Then in that case you inflicted the damage on yourself by yourself because you did not do it properly.

Affect in a negative way? I doubt so. I hooked up with my current events manager because I practiced in public and he happened to see me.

Example...

*Practicing move in public, stranger walk up to me*

Stranger: Wow, it seems that you're proficient in cards
Me: Oh? Haha, I'm just working on a move. By the way I am a magician.
Stranger: Really? Can you show me something?
Me: Sure

*Tricks done*

Stranger: That was amazing! By the way, I am doing events, do you have a name card? I might get you into some events that require a talent like you.
Me: Erm, no currently. But I can give you my number, here it is: **********.

How do you get such chances? Create awareness. You will never know when an opportunity drops by.

YES. This is so true. I dressed in my flops, T-Shirt and shorts practicing on a bus does not give the impression to people as a magician. So, what kind of damage does it inflict when one practices in public?

After all, kids who fiddle cards in public, "revealing" this and "exposing" that might become a rising star in magic. Simply because they practice whenever they can, unless you spend 75% of your time at home, practicing.

So if anyone tells me to keep my cards because they say I am "exposing" something, show me how good you are before you let that statement sink in. Since people who tell others to keep their cards are usually (I REALLY hope) much better and therefore have the RIGHT to say such a thing.

Correct me if I am wrong. And of course, apologies if any of what I have typed hurts your ego.

Keep practicing!
Kenneth

Yes, DLs are not magical in nature. That's the problem. Magicians doing things that are not magical with objects that are often used in magic (cards).

It won't hurt me. I am confident of pulling off a DL even though the audience knew that move exist.

However, it will hurt them. I have seen people practicing their push off DLs on the train. Trust me, it looks bad. It is so obvious what he is trying to do. What will lay people think when they see a guy trying to pick up a D***** in the train?

By right I don't have to stop him. Why do I have to stop him when his actions don't hurt me?

I have to advive him to stop because he is hurting himself. Just trying to help him here.

If he refuse to listen, that is perfectly fine. He can do whatever he wants.

Congrats! =)

I think for people like Kenneth who are already very proficient with their sleights, you can practice your sleights in the public. You won't really expose anything. Well, people might think you are a show off but that's not really a big problem.

However, I hope beginners won't practice in the public.

Try not to practice a move which you just learnt, or a move that you are still learning in public.

To keep it simple, if you are confident that you won't expose anything, you can practice your sleights in public.

Kenneth, you got your event manager because you are good and you happened to be practicing in the public.

Imagine your event manager sees a guy practicing in the public, but that guy was dropping his cards on the floor, exposing his DL etc. Would your event manager approach him? I don't think so.

That may be true.

Those stars in magic sure spent alot of time practicing.

But it is quite hard for me to imagine David Copperfield, Lennart Green or other stars in magic practicing in the train. ;)

well at the end of the day everyone has different opinions on the issue but what's important is how you handle the situation if it does come your way. If you really feel that it doesn't affect you in any way then by all means ignore it and go about your business. But for those who do feel that's it's somewhat inappropriate and give off some sort of a negative image on magicians and magic in general then the question is how do you go about the situation in a tactful manner?

Ultimately i feel that it's a tad unsightly when any move is done poorly especially when it comes to practicing in public. If you use the Singapore idol analogy, you wouldn't wanna hear someone terrible practicing on the train would you? Like what i said earlier, practice is a good thing and i don't doubt that many magicians may have got real good through practice on public transport, and we shouldn't criticize them for practicing but let them know that there is a time and place for everything. i don't believe that someone who's really interested and wants to get good can't find ANY other time to practice in private. And i don't think you've got to be better than another magician to let them know that you've managed to catch the sleight they've been practicing in public.

Anyways, kenneth so what if someone was revealing the magical portion? like doing a crap OHTP and producing it from his pocket? What's your take on that?

Cheers,
Bryan

Haha. I'd wish if someone were to ask me that question. I have no answers, unfortunately. I'd think I'll stay on the stand of, "I leave him alone".

Ok, if you say so. My opinions on technical moves are non-magical in nature. It's just a "move" (stunt, feat, whatever) unless you're trying to work an effect with it. I feel that these are real personal and I can't change yours. My stand is:

Moves are non-magical.

I'll stick to that.

Ouch. I felt that.

I'll take that in. My bad.

----

Opinions on practice in public is really a broad issue. My stand is that dead time is supposed to be put to good use and practicing stuff is just one of them. I am a pro-"practice-in-public" guy, because I do it. I have no issues when someone "exposes" something, because it does not hurt me and geez, if one thinks that DL, OTHP, pass is widely exposed anyway, do something else. I'm sure there are lots more things out there to do than a DL or OTHP or pass or what-not.

Besides, a well done move flies past almost anyone. My idea is that 15 minutes of DL(insert other moves here) on a bus/MRT everyday will turn undetectable within a week. Fiddling with cards not counted.

I'd guess that's my 2 bucks for now.

Corrections, opinions are always welcome,
Kenneth

I totally agree with kenneth. And I practised by double in public too(not the push off double lift), just the normal ones, i do it slow enough to prevent any mistakes, but everything is still kept in motion so that it's very very very hard to see 2 cards.

Instead of using singing in public as a analogy, I would prefer to say it's like doing your revision. Singing is different, people can look away from your cards but cannot "hear" away from your voice or they'll most probably ignore you as you might be a loose cannon.

What I'm trying to say is(although I'm still a new bird), If you wanna practise your sleights, take it as a time to practise your public performance skills by keeping your mistakes to the minimal, if your cards are going to jog off, my advise, as fast as you can do a under cut and flip the bottom pack facing up and sneeze. Or if you're sitting down, just drop the cards onto your bag at the same time flipping a few more cards over to cover the exposed 2. There won't be anyone in the train that will keep looking at you and waiting for you to flash, unless you flash the moment you take out your cards where the attention is still strong.

My lenghty 2 cts worth