The Magic Memories (153)

Hello everyone!

Today’s topics are: The Unexpected Agenda; The Magic Advent Calendar of Good Ideas; Cloned Video With AI – Ascanio; The “Easy” Stuff From Sharing Secrets; The Missing Link; JPG and Video Compression

These are The Magic Memories 153, gone online Sunday, December 3rd, 2023, at 0:07h sharp.

All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020, can be found HERE.

The Unexpected Agenda

First and foremost many thanks to the over 50 (fifty!) who wrote in in answer to last week’s inquiry if you would be interested to have a third (and last) “Agenda”, similar to Secret Agenda and Hidden Agenda. OK, I listen to you, and if all works out well, you’ll have it for the Holiday Season next year, tentatively titled Unexpected Agenda.

Secret Agenda is still available, from me, as a book or as an e-book (PDF), the book signed to your name (request on the order form), from your favorite dealer (not signed…), or from the publisher Penguin Magic directly postpaid (not signed).

Hidden Agenda, published by Vanishing Inc., unfortunately has been out of print for five years now, and I’m tired of asking them if and when they will reprint… in the new year I might try to fight them to relinquish the copyright to me, but they have become tough guys since they are now “the biggest magic store in the world” (so they write on their own webshop). I’ll keep you posted.

The Magic Advent Calendar of Good Ideas

This is a new idea, and I hope you like it: In December 2021 I wrote The Magic Calendar, where I posted one installment for every day from December 1st to 24th, the Advent days of the Christian calendar. Obviously, “Advent” was only a “McGuffin”, as anyone could enjoy it, completely independent from religious connotations, the only condition being a love for magic.

Many have asked me to repeat this, but, the day having only 24 hours, I am incapable to do so.

However, the project appealed to so many, even to myself (the most important thing!), that I decided to bring it back in a minimalistic form, and I call it The Magic Advent Calendar of Good Ideas.

If IT and Internet allow it, I will send out one “good idea” a day, from December 1st to 24th, via the “Newsletter”-app, i.e., in order to receive it you have to subscribe to the “Newsletter” – due to the new laws for the protection of privacy I cannot do that, YOU must do it.

You can unsubscribe at any time, but as most of you know, I’m not a dealer, and therefore you will only receive a “Newsletter” when I publish a new item…

As you are reading this, those who have registered for the “Newsletter” should already have received two installments, with the third on its way. If you did not receive them, it means you have not subscribed to the “Newsletter”, so, please, do it now.

I hope you like the idea 🙂

And if you like it, tell your friends.

Cloned Video With AI: Ascanio

Donato Capitella from the UK sent in a link to a video of Ascanio performing his interpretation of Ed Marlo’s “Torn and Restored Card” from The Cardician in Juan Tamariz’ Magia Potagia, a series for Spanish TV that featured Juan Tamariz himself plus many of his colleagues, almost all from Spain.

The punchline of this, however, is that Ascanio speaks English… thanks to Donato’s time and effort he put into dubbing the video with the aid of AI. Ha!

To watch Ascanio and hear him speak in “his own voice” in (almost) impeccable English, with Spanish accent (!), CLICK HERE.

The “Easy” Stuff From Sharing Secrets

I have already devoted four blogs (!) to the tricks within Sharing Secrets in an effort to make the book palatable also to those who, besides “theory”, are looking for “tricks”.

Check The Magic Memories 78 to and including 81, the articles titled “List of tricks & bits from Sharing Secrets”. You find the list of all The Magic Memories HERE.

Recently a good friend, who is a delightful hobbyist, but has no interest in advanced card magic, asked me if there are also tricks that even he could do.

Here is a list of nine items you can perform once you have read and understood the description without having to learn any sleight-of-hand whatsoever:

• S. 25: “Authentic Prop” – you only need a cigarette case with flap (Tenyo used to have one), or adapt to any other changing device, such as Double Envelope, Himber Wallet, etc. (use your head).
• S. 39: “Visible and Invisible World” – use the Si Stebbins stack; you can replace the False Shuffle with a sequence of straight cuts done by various spectators.
• S. 73: “Managing Management” – you can do this without a jacket, simply with your pants’ pocket. To control the selection use a Key Card and the “Oops-Control” (see Card College Volume 1).
• S. 85: “The Marvelous Book” – the Furoshiki idea can be used in many other situations, and to any professional performer is worth the price of the book, let alone the trick itself; you can make up the bag yourself easily.
• S. 91: “Dice and Aces” – get out your deck and a pair of dice, and you are ready to do it.
• S. 97: “Seeing is Believing” – anyone can do this.
• S. 109: “The Trick That Can Be Explained” – for twenty years I have been fooling the best with this one as part of my lecture on deck switches.
• S. 113. “CardSpeak” – Dr. Jaks would have said, “Sensationell!”
• S. 117: “Triple Prediction” – simple and direct, a gem by Rolf Andra from his book “Eine Kartenroutine am Tisch”.

That’s it, NINE “self-working” tricks in a book devoted to “theory” – and there are more that require just a little sleight-of-hand, but all doable with average skill.

Just in case you missed it, Michael Close’s review of Sharing Secrets is HERE.

The Missing Link

Today’s link takes you to the production process of playing cards in the Fournier factory in Vitoria, Spain.

It is in Spanish, but you can still fast forward through it and see the major manufacturing steps. This is very interesting, as I can confirm, as I have been taken twice on a tour in this same factory, fascinating.

And maybe you can use AI or subtitles to get the English translation (it’s your turn, Donato!). To enjoy the video CLICK HERE.

JPG and Video Compression

BTW of videos: Most jpgs and videos are sent around in a far too high resolution when this is not necessary.

Especially those Zoom conference videos that are interesting to listen to, but there is nothing or little demonstrated, can be compressed to at least half their size; obviously the image deteriorates, but the sound remains the same (as far as I can judge…): I have used VEED.IO, and for jpgs COMPRESS JPEG, both with good results. You simply upload the file, click the compression button, wait, and then download the compressed file again. Done. Very practical, I say.

The main reason I’m mentioning this, though, is that VEED.IO offers a language translation feature in its beta-version, which can be applied to your compressed video, and you may want to try this (I haven’, yet, but let me know if it works).

Wish you all an excellent week!

Roberto Giobbi