My Thoughts on Bobo

[RediSpades]

Okay, so I have been tearing apart coin magic for the better part of a year and a half now, mainly because I suck at it and that is the way you get better. When I first got into it, everyone pointed me to Bobo. I got it, I read it, and I was lost, not understanding what the heck was going on. Then I started getting some DVD's (Metal, Ammar, In the Beginning, the list goes on). It slowly started to click. At first I was worried that I would never amount to anything with coin magic because I couldn't get a simple back palm down and to this day I still can't, but now I am beginning to understand something. The New Modern Coin Magic is not the best choice for beginners. I am not knocking its place in the coin magic world; it pretty much has everything and lacks little in the coin magic world. But on the same note, so does a dictionary. And I wouldn't tell anyone to learn a language by pointing them to a dictionary. I love my dictionaries, I use them all the time. But I learned some of the fundamentals from other places. I think DVD's win the starting point in this field because coin magic is an extremely visual art. Through seeing some of the masters work their charm, I think one begins to understand - at least to a level - what needs to be done to master the art. That is when you start reading the dictionary.

[DecisiveAmbivalence]

There is a DVD for Bobo's book which I used when first getting into coin magic. It's very detailed and well-explained and gives you that visual cue, while still giving you the great teachings of Bobo's book.

[RediSpades]

Decisive, you are absolutely correct. I have those DVDs (I have way too many DVDs on coin magic, that is how much I wanted to learn) but in comparison, the Metal series, In the Beginning, and Michael Ammar's DVD were more instructive. Tap into David Stone's DVDs and David Roth's Expert Coin Magic Made Easy and you have an awesome combination. After that I would advise the Bobo set of DVDs. It is good, but I feel those are better.

[RaymondBaker]

Hey I also want to get through coin magic will Bobo DVD work with me and tell me locations from where I can find it.

[MrPurple]

hi,


I think you are right : the bobo is the foundation of coin magic BUT it's not the easyer way to learn and start coin magic... Personnaly i start with '' L'encyclopédie des pièces de jean pierre vallarino'' then i buy bobo, and i think i most appreciated the book because of i have watched dvd's before...


sorry for my bad english,
bye

[YRAMagicMan]

I have the opposite story, I didn't get into coins until I read Bobo. I had a VHS of Ammar's intro to coin magic. I learned some from that, but was never very good. Then I got In the Beginning There Were Coins, this helped some, but I still wasn't really good. Once I got Bobo, I started to understand how coin magic works. EMC also helped because I saw the pros, but reading gave me the understanding I needed. I'm still many hundreds, if not thousands of hours away from being anywhere close to the level that Ponta or David Roth or Eric Jones have achieved, but Bobo has helped me a lot.

Also, on my journey I learned a lot of other magic, which taught me how misdirection and rhythm play a huge role in any magic performance. This, probably more than any thing, helped me once I picked up Bobo's book. From my experience, I wouldn't recommend that a beginner start with coin magic until they've been learning other forms of magic seriously for a year or two. This way that have a solid understanding of misdirection and rhythm.

[Chaser]

BTW the Bobo dvds are selling on Amazon for 22.95 right now. Amazing price for that set.

[magic.42]

The way I learned coin magic from Bobo's is I read it like a textbook first, front to back. When I got to the tricks, I read the effects only and used a book marker to mark the ones I liked. When I finish it, I had a good understanded of the different sleights and what they were for. I then went to the effect I wanted to learn first and started. Try to remember that Bobo's was written as a reference book with tricks added. You don't have to be able do every sleight in it for now. Learn and practice them as needed. Try to stay with the method in the instruction of the trick when possible, but if you know of an easier sleight that does the same thing - Use it. The only rule you need to follow is to "be able to do the effect well" . The most called on sleight in the book is the classic palm. To learn it I took a coin of my choosing(half dollar) and had my father drill two small holes in the face, about a 1/4" from the edge and 1/2" apart. With a string I wore it like a bracelet. The coin hung parrallel to the palm. I was able to practice palming this way. If I dropped it, it was still near the palm with no embarrassing noise, didn't have to pick it up. I could practice just about anywhere, at anytime. I had it on most of the time and by adjusting the string I could practice finger palm, Etc.... ( Just A Piece of My History)
Good Luck and Take Care - magic.42
P.S.- I started with " The Amateurs Magicians Handbook" , Bobo's was second!

[christian1894]

i think that the best place to learn coins for a beginner is the coin magic section in bill tarr's book, the go with bobo.
i dont think you need to buy a dvd to learn coins, in youtube you can find many videos of david stone ,roth, luis piedrahita,etc performing on tv, and there you can see how things are suppossed to look