More Flourishing than Ever?

[fridoliina]

Yes Flourishes are easier even if a flourish is technicaly harder to do it does not need presentation, missdirection, showmanship etc.

And yes videos on the media section is very boring, why? Becaus magic is not ment to be done infront of your webcam while your wearing your pyjamas alone in your room.

If people acctualy went out and did some magic it would be more entertaining.

It would be fun to see how many % of people who are buying magic that acctualy performes.

 

[Jakeh]

Yes Flourishes are easier even if a flourish is technicaly harder to do it does not need presentation, missdirection, showmanship etc.

And yes videos on the media section is very boring, why? Becaus magic is not ment to be done infront of your webcam while your wearing your pyjamas alone in your room.

If people acctualy went out and did some magic it would be more entertaining.

It would be fun to see how many % of people who are buying magic that acctualy performes.

Hm, yeah, I guess you're right about that.

Some people are quite good when doing magic to the camera, but some people just suck really. You're right (again ) when you say that people should go out and film stuff for real peepz, it'd be heaps better for sure.

 

[sean]

wow jakeh quick reply! To me flourishing is easier because one need to only focus on finger dexterity. But for magic, it's so so so so much deeper than that!! dexterity/ sleight (make it look natural or invisible), psychology, patter, presentation, eye contact with the audience, focus pull, knowing when to pause in a routine, spec management, performing surrounded or with 1 or 2 people, is there a table? what can or can't i perform impromptu if so, heckler!! etc etc etc

Again i hate to compare the 2 because it's really not fair but i would think that, say, routining an engaging and astonishing ACR routine is more challenging than, say, stringing together flourishes and cuts. There is more going on in the cranium. Of course i also find it rewarding when the audience give a good reaction.

I actually agree with what copperfield14 said that the magic videos in the media section is boring to him because i feel performing good magic that entertains is infinitely harder than good flourishing.

Again that's my humble opinion.

 

[Jakeh]

wow jakeh quick reply! To me flourishing is easier because one need to only focus on finger dexterity. But for magic, it's so so so so much deeper than that!! dexterity/ sleight (make it look natural or invisible), psychology, patter, presentation, eye contact with the audience, focus pull, knowing when to pause in a routine, spec management, performing surrounded or with 1 or 2 people, is there a table? what can or can't i perform impromptu if so, heckler!! etc etc etc

Again i hate to compare the 2 because it's really not fair but i would think that, say, routining an engaging and astonishing ACR routine is more challenging than, say, stringing together flourishes and cuts. There is more going on in the cranium. Of course i also find it rewarding when the audience give a good reaction.

I actually agree with what copperfield14 said that the magic videos in the media section is boring to him because i feel performing good magic that entertains is infinitely harder than good flourishing.

Again that's my humble opinion.

Yeah, I post ultra quick because I'm ultra awesome.

Egoness aside, , you make a great point again. What was I thinking when I said magic is easier? Whenever I attempt to do a flourish in front of someone, I'm more relaxed.. but when I'm doing a trick, it's a completely different feeling. I wont call it stressed, but it's something similar - I can't find the word.

 

[I_KnowMagic]

I've never been into flourishing. I mean sure it looks cool to other people who do flourishing but I find from my own experience and my friends expericence (they really like flourishing) that to a spectator..... it's not really that amusing to them. That's why I like magic more, it's not just about you it's also all about the spectators and seeing their reactions.

 

[iq92]

Good topic here. Noticed that too. I used to think I was one of the few people who were into flourishing, then I see people performing XCM everywhere. What's more is that many are already so good at it. So good in fact that I actually feel like quitting. I find flourishing quite hard actually, part of the reason why I put it off for now and concentrate more on magic.

For me, magic is going to get me more mileage, or rather, I'd go further with magic than flourishing. I myself would rather be entertained by disappearing objects than packets being thrown around. Don't get me wrong, flourishing impresses me a lot too, just not as much as magic does. I always though of my "flourishing" as an added bonus or accent to my magic. I use it in tandem with magic to make it more flashy and appealing.

The way I see it, magic is a bit more broad and covers a whole lot more than flourishing. What is the point of flourishing anyway, other than to juggle cards, string them well and to make it smooth and beautiful? I say that not to bash XCMers but to stress the point that magic can entertain on a different level. It's not just skill, there's psychology, dexterity, presentation and others.

There was a thread back then that talked about "old school" and "new school" magic. You say that flourishing attracts young ones because it's cool, but I can consider the new breed of magic nowadays to be equally cool. C'mon, with effects like Distortion, Flare and many others, you'd look just as good doing those as you would performing flourishes.

Flourishing and magic have their own style and appeal. As such, different people will get attracted to either one of those two and different people will find either one entertaining. As usual, this is just my opinion.

 

[Aos]

magic and flourishing are not related
magic is _clearly_ meant for a light hearted performer who likes to have fun with his audience
the problem is that that's not how most teenagers behave
they desire to look cool
they want to show off
so 97% of card tricks will not work for them
so they can either follow in the footsteps of the _few_ "dark" themed card magicians like daniel madison
or they can fling packets of cards around
that way they don't even have to interact with people at all!
perfect for youtube
they can put on some kicking rock music and look awesome cool without ever needing to entertain anybody
that's how most teenagers like it
that's why flourishing is popular

not a single response?

 

[Jakeh]

I've never been into flourishing. I mean sure it looks cool to other people who do flourishing but I find from my own experience and my friends expericence (they really like flourishing) that to a spectator..... it's not really that amusing to them. That's why I like magic more, it's not just about you it's also all about the spectators and seeing their reactions.

Yeah, to the spectators it's either a bit confusing or they'll just say "cool" or something because they think that's what you want them to say.

 

[fridoliina]

The thing that i think that most "XCM" people are doing wrong is that they are going for more impossible and harder flourishes all the time but if you want to "WOW" people thats not the way to go. Trust me im out performing magic almost everynight and everytime i do a hotshot cut, springing the cards or something like paul harris instant replay i can get a good reaction from it becaus it looks really hard.

People dont know whats hard and whats easy and cuting the cards into 10 small packets dont look as good as some more easy stuff.

 

[orchestrion]

not a single response?

Were you trying to instigate an argument? It almost seems like you're disappointed...

 

[Aos]

no
i said what everybody here repeated after me in a lighter tone
without commenting on what i have said

there is no argument on this issue
it is very clear
i might have slightly overstated some things
but you cant say you dont agree

 

[42613]

Yes Flourishes are easier even if a flourish is technicaly harder to do it does not need presentation, missdirection, showmanship etc.

You can't just say one is better than the other, while XCM doesn't require the things that you mentioned above, it should by no means be called easy, if you think about it, magic can be faked, skill cannot. That's why you can see many magicians doing fake stuff, but rarely do you come across an XCMer (or cardist) who fakes his skill. Although some magic can take both, such as manipulative and productions. Both take presentation skillz, but one takes actual skill. That's just my view on it.

 

[Aos]

there is an inherent problem with cardistry
its the fact that to be good you have to make it look easy
while performing very difficult moves
in magic to be good you have to make it look impossible
but you can achieve this using the simplest moves out there


but i think that virtually all people prefer a card trick that theyve never seen before
over a fancy way of _essentially_ shuffling the deck that theyve never seen before
so if your goal is to entertain people magic is the way to go
cardistry is a personal challange

 

[copperfield 14]

Funny how you guys say flourishing is easy, because when you guys post videos or actuallt do flourishes you suck. As for magic it's only good to larn a few simple tricks and forget the rest. Spectators like simple tricks, and visual tricks. They don't care about complicated tricks with stories. They sometimes laugh to the trick but they never feel astonished and say how the **** did you do that.

 

[orchestrion]

I think what it really comes down to is the personal opinion of the performer. People are just as easily amazed by technical flourishes as they are magic. I've shown my friends videos of Dan and Dave performing their cuts and they never thought it was possible to do things like that with a deck of cards.

I really don't see any point in arguing over which is better when the real reason we do them is to have fun. It's kind of like people who fish in rivers arguing with people who fish in the ocean over which is better. There are different techniques behind each, but they are both done for enjoyment.

Bad analogy, but you get the point.

 

[Chicken]

i think people (spectators) get into magic more...

With magic, there is audience participation. there is an emotional hook

with flourishing... its like... "watch what i can do"



I actually prefer ball juggling (not contact... toss juggling is more impressive to the average person) than flourishing. Not as many people do it...

 

[PlethZorb]

I agree!

But flourshing is a pretty neat skill to have to enhance the magic. XD