Getting Caught.

King Mob

Was watching this. http://itricks.com/news/?p=6306
I felt the poor sods pain.

So any good stories about getting caught?
Any tips for recovering?

6th

That is brilliant! Why is it we love to see others fail?

Anyway the only reason he was caught is because he wasnt controlling thesituation properly.

oeb

King Mob wrote: »

Was watching this. http://itricks.com/news/?p=6306
I felt the poor sods pain.

So any good stories about getting caught?
Any tips for recovering?

There are a couple of different approaches to this (Mind you as you know, I am speaking from a close-up only background).

First one is just don't make mistakes. Practice till you can do the moves in your sleep.

Second is just don't take yourself so seriously. They know you don't have secret powers, they know it's just tricks. Laugh it off, and move on to something else.

I used to get caught often enough at the start but it just stops happening once you get into the preformer mind set. Now I don't get caught even with new effects (Which I make sure to get to a certain level before showing to the lay public). This is because as your skill level increases, you get a better sence of timing, you naturally tend to do things on the offbeat, you learn how better to misdirect using body actions or patter. You would be supprised exactly what you can do in front of a person.

The preformer in that Vid made a number of mistakes, the first was passing of the prop to a person who was on the sidelines. The girl was not directly engaged by the magician so she had feck all to do, and had what is frankly, in these days, an unusual item to have. When was the last time you saw a non magician use a wallet of that size? He was finished with the prop, he should have just ditched it.
Secondly, he completely froze afterwards. Sure, it's embarrasing, but when you get egg on your face you really need to smile and wipe it off, because by freezing like a deer in headlights you really ruin your credibility.

I have seen magicians practicially throw tantrums when people catch them out (And everyone, even the greatest magicians get caught out sometimes), and it's childish. It effects your credibility as a preformer, it pisses off the spectators, and it ruins any rapport that you have built up with them. You are going to make a mistake occasionally, and you are going to meet people that try to burn you the entire time (Burn is an expression that refers to some spectators habit of staring intently at your hands etc in a deliberate attempt to catch you out), or sometimes a spectator will just glance at the wrong moment. Just laugh it off, admit that you f*cked up the trick, joke that maybe that bit was not in the instruction manual, make up some outlandish (but yet amusing) lie, and just move onto something else.

I find it helps to have a few powerful effects, that are nearly impossible to mess up that you keep in reserve for times like this. It is a bit of a knock to the self esteem when this happens, and you could do with a boost afterwards. Try something like "A simple transposition", or even use an ID or a good packet trick like NFW or Colour Monte.

Just because I can't go over this enough. DON'T TAKE YOURSELF TOO SERIOUSLY. If you do, you will alienate people and come off as a pompus ass. (Mind you, if you deliberately want to build up a persona like that for yourself, it might also be worthwhile).

???

Punch and run!!! Hahahaha no. My favourite one is to look at the coyly and say 'What were you expecting? Magic!?' and then move on to something more powerful.

An interesting one I've found is that if you lose a break or however you're controlling a card. Shuffle the deck, put it back in the case. Deck switch on an off beat or with misdirection to an ID and then get them to make there card turn over. As long as they are unaware of the deck switch, this plays much better than the standard 'now I actually made a prediction before I came out' patter you get when a magician loses there break!!!

The other thing is that if you are working with people likely to be burning your hands then don't try tricks that they are likely to catch. There are a number of great tricks that require simply a DL: Chicago Opener, the Transpo as Ian said, you could get through a couple of phases of ACR, etc.

Another thing you can do is try the Lie Detector, or the soon to be release Lie Detector x4!!! (I'll post it when I'm happy with the patter etc. It's the same as the standard but you do it with four people at once).

Put simply, tricks don't need to be complex to blow people away. Kill them with something simple and then in the massive off beat that follows try your more difficult tricks.

And if all else fails, punch and run.

zuroph

my god. is that guy a pro? he freaked, totally. Terrible performance.

my number one tip for getting caught ; laugh it off and admit it, unless u can move it on to make it look like part of the act. in this case, ALWAYS have an ID in ur pocket, its the perfect out.