In the retention of vision vanish, the magician places a coin or small object between the fingers and the thumb of the right hand. The left hand is palm up with the palm slightly tilted towards the audience. The right approaches and displays the object on the left palm for a second or so, held on opposite sides of a diameter. Then the right hand moves away empty as the fingers of the left hand close over the object. After a brief pause the left hand is shown empty and the coin has disappeared. In some versions the right hand can also be seen empty, leaving no clue as to where the coin went.
Magic, along with its subgenres of, and sometimes referred to as illusion, stage magic or close up magic is a performing art in which audiences are entertained by staged tricks or illusions of seemingly impossible feats using natural means. It is to be distinguished from paranormal magic which are effects claimed to be created through supernatural means. It is one of the oldest performing arts in the world.
A coin is a small, flat, round piece of metal or plastic used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in order to facilitate trade. They are most often issued by a government.
Originally attributed to T. Nelson Downs, a famous magician from the late Victorian and Edwardian eras who specialised in coins, the vanish has been improved by Dai Vernon and many other 20th-century magicians who all added variations to improve the original concept that an object displayed for a short length of time leaves an image on the retina that may persist for a further short time after the object has actually disappeared.
In the history of the United Kingdom, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardian period, and its later half overlaps with the first part of the Belle Époque era of Continental Europe. In terms of moral sensibilities and political reforms, this period began with the passage of the Reform Act 1832. There was a strong religious drive for higher moral standards led by the nonconformist churches, such as the Methodist, and the Evangelical wing of the established Church of England. Britain's relations with the other Great Powers were driven by the colonial antagonism of the Great Game with Russia, climaxing during the Crimean War; a Pax Britannica of international free trade was maintained by the country's naval and industrial supremacy. Britain embarked on global imperial expansion, particularly in Asia and Africa, which made the British Empire the largest empire in history. National self-confidence peaked.
The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history covers the brief reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910, and is sometimes extended to refer to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victorian era. Her son and successor, Edward VII, was already the leader of a fashionable elite that set a style influenced by the art and fashions of continental Europe. Samuel Hynes described the Edwardian era as a "leisurely time when women wore picture hats and did not vote, when the rich were not ashamed to live conspicuously, and the sun really never set on the British flag."
Dai Vernon, a.k.a. The Professor, was a Canadian magician. His expert sleight of hand technique and extensive knowledge, particularly with card tricks and close-up magic, garnered him respect among fellow magicians. His influence was considerable in the magic world of the 20th Century, and he was a mentor to numerous famous magicians. He lived out his last years at the Magic Castle, a nightclub in Hollywood, California.
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Leg spin or can simply called as Leggie is a type of spin bowling in the sport of cricket. A leg spinner bowls right-arm with a wrist spin action, causing the ball to spin from right to left
in the cricket pitch, at the point of delivery. When the ball bounces, the spin causes the ball to deviate sharply from right to left that is, away from the leg side of a right-handed batsman. The same kind of trajectory, which spins from right to left on pitching, when performed by a left-arm bowler is known as left-arm orthodox spin(ORO) bowling.
In mathematics and physics, the right-hand rule is a common mnemonic for understanding orientation of axes in three-dimensional space.
Coin magic is the manipulating of coins to entertain audiences. Because coins are small, most coin tricks are considered close-up magic or table magic, as the audience must be close to the performer to see the effects. Though stage conjurers generally do not use coin effects, coin magic is sometimes performed onstage using large coins. In a different type of performance setting, a close-up coin magician will use a large video projector so the audience can see the magic on a big screen. Coin magic is generally considered harder to master than other close-up techniques such as card magic, as it requires great skill and grace to perform convincingly, and this takes a lot of practice to acquire.
Finger binary is a system for counting and displaying binary numbers on the fingers of one or more hands. It is possible to count from 0 to 31 (25−1) using the fingers of a single hand, from 0 through 1023(210−1) if both hands are used, or from 0 to 1048573(2^20-10) if the toes on both feet are used as well.
A thumb tip is a magician's prop designed to fit over and appear to be the magician's thumb used for vanishing, producing, or switching small objects. A classic effect is to have a silk handkerchief or other small object pressed into the top of the left fist. After pushing it well in with the right thumb, the left fist is opened to show the silk has disappeared. Alternatively, a lit cigarette, liquid, salt or other small objects can be made to disappear in a similar manner.
This is a glossary of conjuring terms used by magicians.
The French drop, also known as "Le Tourniquet", is a sleight of hand method used by magicians to vanish a small object such as a coin. It is one of the oldest methods of vanishing, however it is still effective when properly executed. Although the method is known as a vanish, it can also be used as a switch or transformation, giving rise to numerous possibilities.
Palming is a technique for holding or concealing an object in the hand. It is used frequently by magicians to conceal a card, coin, or other object. When it is done skillfully, the hand containing the palmed object is perceived to be completely empty.
Retention of vision is a conjuring term referring to the perceived image of an object during a vanish. In a retention of vision vanish, the spectator sees a coin placed on a palm and as the fingers are closed around the coin it is secretly removed, but because the retina still retains a fleeting image of the coin for a fraction of a second, the spectator will be convinced that the coin was placed in the hand, when in fact it wasn't.
The Magician's Palm is a method for hiding a playing card, in which the card is placed in the hand lengthwise, the hand is curled inward slightly, and the card is thus retained in the hand. It is important with this palm that you do not have one's thumb sticking out as if "hitchhiking" as this is a "tell" or sign that a card is being palmed.
David Roth is an American magician widely regarded as one of the world's greatest living coin magicians. Roth was an important contributor to Richard Kaufman's Coinmagic an influential text on contemporary coin technique; his major work was chronicled in David Roth's Expert Coin Magic, a book co-written with Richard Kaufman. Roth is now associated with Fantasma magic, a magic manufacturing and retail company in New York City.
The bill in lemon is an effect in which a magician requests a currency note from a spectator and makes the note vanish, then proceeding to slice a lemon open to show the note inside. Variations include the coin in orange, and more generally "something in fruit".
Spoons can be played as a makeshift percussion instrument, or more specifically, an idiophone related to the castanets. They are played by hitting one spoon against the other.
Close-up magic is magic performed in an intimate setting usually no more than ten feet from one's audience and is usually performed while sitting at a table.
The Tarbell Course in Magic is a notable encyclopedia of magic amongst professional and amateur magicians. It has eight volumes; the first five were part of the original home-study correspondence course compiled in 1928 by Dr. Harlan Tarbell, the remaining three volumes being added on later.
Chink-a-chink is a simple close-up magic trick in which a variety of small objects, usually four, appear to magically transport themselves from location to location when covered by the performer's hands, until the items end up gathered together in the same place. Variations, especially the Sympathetic Coins, have been performed since the 1800s. Popular variations are Shadow Coins, Coins-n-Cards and Matrix. A variation using playing cards as the objects is known as Sympathetic Aces.
The Gunnister Man is the remains of a man found by two Shetlanders in a peat bog not far from the junction of the A970 road in Gunnister, Shetland, Scotland. The bog body was found on 12 May 1951 as the men were digging peat for fuel. It was discovered at a depth of about 75 centimetres (30 in) at grid reference HU3290 7330. A stone placed by the Northmavine History Group now marks the find location.
