Ryan Swigert
Inventing Magic For Top Magicians
Harlan Live! by Dan Harlan
Just a quick post to let you know that the Harlan Live! by Dan Harlan DVD is out. I was actually at the the filming of this DVD and helped Dan with the Ritual Necklace effect. There is some great stand-up magic taught on this DVD that packs small, but plays big. For example, “The World’s Saddest Trick”, which was a staple in my repertoire in the early 2000’s.
Tags: dan harlan, dan harlan DVD, harlan live
Review: Homer Liwag’s The Rice Papers DVD
I just finished watching Homer Liwag’s recently released DVD titled “The Rice Papers”, which features three of his favorite routines. These routines involve producing a giant contact lens, shrinking and expanding a Sharpie marker, and an extremely visual card effect.
Before going into the details of the DVD, here is a Homer Liwag story for you: Homer grew-up literally five minutes away from my house in Cincinnati. In the late 1990’s, I was working at a magic shop in downtown Cincinnati that was owned by Tom Frank. A co-worker of mine at this magic shop was Jason Wethington. Tom Frank was friends with Homer from when they were young teens first getting started in magic. So Jason and I would always hear these stories about Homer from Tom, i.e. Homer borrowed The Complete Works of Derek Dingle book and went through it in one night. The next day, he could perform every trick and sleight in the book.
About 90 minutes from Cincinnati was a magic restaurant called Illusions. This is where Chris Kenner, Michael Close, and Homer Liwag would perform magic. Chris and Homer left Illusions when they started working full-time for David Copperfield. However, every now and then Jason Wethington and I would hear rumors that Homer was in town and was performing at Illusions. Whenever Jason and I heard these rumors, it was a given that we were making the drive to Illusions restaurant for the chance to see Homer perform.
One of these nights, we arrived at Illusions and immediately saw Homer when we walked in the door! So sure enough, after Jason and I finished our meals, Homer approached our table to perform magic. He knew us from working with Tom Frank and he said “I’ll have to show you guys some good stuff then…” What he ended up performing was the material that is on The Rice Papers DVD…
The material and production value on this DVD is top-notch. It was also great to see him mention magicians such as Nick Lakin and Chris Korn (both of them also worked at Illusions) in the credits. I can see at least one of these routines going into every serious close-up magician’s arsenal. The magic is strong, to the point, and visual. In the DVD, Homer references making it seem like magic is just happening at your fingertips ala Cardini – And that’s exactly what seems to happen when you perform the effects on this DVD. I highly recommend it for all students of close-up magic!
You can purchase The Rice Papers DVD by visiting: Theory 11
Magic Lecture: Cincinnati
I wanted to give all of you a heads-up that I will be presenting a magic lecture in Cincinnati on Feb. 26, 2010.
This will be the first opportunity to purchase my Subtle Methods lecture notes in-person. Some of the effects that I will be teaching are: Skalini Time, Moments, From Me To You, and Ode To Ose. So if you are in the Cincinnati area, come out and learn effects with playing cards, coins, gift certificates, business cards, and more!
Date: Friday, February 26, 2010
Location: Haines’ House of Cards, 2514 Leslie Ave., Norwood, OH 45712
Time: 6:45pm
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Twitter Quote
“A picture does not need to be worth a thousand words. It only needs to be worth 140 characters.”
- Ryan Swigert
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