Vanish Magic Magazine no. 39

lock of video that is devoid of visual ‘wow’. If they get bored
watching your video, how likely do you think they are to want to
book the act?
I recently got involved in a correspondence with someone
interested in entering the cruise market. His initial video, which
was unavailable online, contained two items that were palpably
unsuitable to send to anyone booking this kind of work, and I
pointed this out. Next he wanted to know whether a video featuring
needles and razor blades was suitable. NO, not particularly for
this market!
This leads me to one final statement on videos that are designed
to raise work in a specific area. Make sure they are suitable! With
a family audience, it is highly unlikely that any booker wants a
performer who presents magic that could influence young people
and possibly cause them to cause damage to themselves by trying
to emulate it. Look at your market, look at your repertoire and use
your best instinct. If in doubt have several videos (or one video cut
several ways) to cover the various markets you are interested in.
The Wonders of I-Mag.
It can be a wonderful blessing to have a video camera blow up the
action that is taking place on stage, but there are a few points I
would like to make.
1The only point for video support is to supply close-up shots
of the action, important props, selected cards, facial expressions
etc. If the video is just a long shot then it does very
little good. In fact in my opinion it can do harm, as the audience’s
attention is split between the live action and the screen(s) and you
have split the focal point of your audience.
58 VANISH Magazine www.VanishMagazine.com