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Designing Miracles

Book by Darwin Ortiz
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Designing Miracles

49.95 usd

Book by Darwin Ortiz ()

 In stock.

Darwin Ortiz is one of the most important close-up figures of our time. With Strong Magic he wrote himself into the annals of conjuring; that instant classic will be studied for years and years to come. Vanishing Inc readers know what fans we are of Darwin’s work, and that book.

Designing Miracles is the sequel, and it too is an absolute must-read. Many have argued convincingly that it’s a more important book than Strong Magic, only because it tackles a subject never before covered in such depth: how to structure a magic effect for maximum impact.
Here Darwin leaves presentation to focus on the actual mechanics of a trick’s plot, and how to squeeze as much impact from a trick as possible.

Ortiz writes with authority and good humor, and raises all the right questions. It’s a smaller book, which makes it manageable to read in several sittings. But Designing Miracles is an investment for life, as you will return to this book again and again.

More info on Designing Miracles:

In Designing Miracles, Darwin Ortiz continues the task he began in Strong Magic: to explore and raise the level of craft in magic. This time he presents a groundbreaking study of how laymen think and what it takes to amaze them.

Darwin has earned a reputation for creating some of the strongest card effects in modern magic. In Designing Miracles, he reveals for the first time the principles and techniques that he follows in doing so. These insights will help you choose stronger effects, create stronger effects, and strengthen those effects that you've already performing.

If you've ever been puzzled by an audience's reaction or lack of it, this book will dispel the mystery. It gives you a new set of tools for understanding how magic works, why it sometimes doesn't, and how to make it work better. Never again will you be at a loss as to why an effect isn't playing well. Never again will you be at a loss as to what to do about it.

If your goal is to provide your audiences with an unforgettable experience of impossibility, you'll find Designing Miracles filled with insights to help you do so. It will teach you how to use the audience's own thinking patterns against them. It will show you how to turn puzzles into miracles. It will do something that few magic books can: change with way you think about magic.

"Here we have an outstanding new book by one of the modern-day masters of card magic, Darwin Ortiz. Darwin lays out a new way of looking at how the mind is fooled. You will look at magic effects differently, and your thinking about magic will be stimulated and challenged. Without studying the principles set forth in this book, no magical education can be complete. Books like Designing Miracles, and Strong Magic that came before it, are more rare and important today than ever before." - Whit Haydn

Darwin Ortiz is widely recognized as one of the world’s leading sleight-of-hand performers with playing cards. He is also the author of some of the most popular and important book son magic ever published, including the best-selling book, STRONG MAGIC. He also serves as an international consultant to the casino industry on the prevention and detection of cheating. His eleven DVDs and six books, including Darwin Ortiz on Card Cheating and Gambling Scams, are widely used as reference and training tools in casinos throughout the world, and he is called to testify as an expert witness in casino cheating cases. As an entertainer and expert consultant, Darwin has performed on every continent except Antarctica.

Pages 200 - Hardcover 

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Customer reviews for Designing Miracles

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Reviewer

Stoyan

Another wonderful extension and addition to Strong magic. You can not go wrong with Darwin's materials. One of my favorite theory books on magic. This book will help you develop and create a different look in perspective for magic. A valuable investment in raising your level. No doubt it goes to my constant re-read list of books.

 
Reviewer

Anthony

Anyone who wishes to create and publish magic must first read this book. This is not your abstract, 'what-if' kind of book; it contains purely practical, logical, and no-nonsense analyses/illustrations drawn from decades of performing experience. Whether your focus is on cards, coins, etc, this book is guaranteed to make you wiser on which effects you should learn and which ones to stay away from, as well as constructing effects for maximum impact. This is one of the few existing gems on magic theory; a must-read (along with his other book 'Strong Magic')!

 
Reviewer

Gerhard

This is an outstanding book. I actually prefer this to Strong magic as I find it a bit more practical. It's really well written and compelling. If you are serious about magic and are philosophically minded you will enjoy this book a lot. Highly recommended!

 
Reviewer

Christopher

This is the stuff that miracles are made of. The next book after Darwin's "Strong Magic" is incredible. There is so much insight about performance and what to think about when designing effects and performances. If you want to take your magic to new levels of performance and showmanship I recommend that you get both of these books!

 
Reviewer

Larry

You can't even begin to understand how far above EXCELLENT this book is.

It's truly a masterpiece. I've had more fun reading it, trying to apply it's suggestions and thoughts to my own material, and have had a fairly high success rate.

The things I've changed have improved my show. Some slightly, some quite a bit. One topic actually solved a trick I'd been struggling with for 2 years.

Well worth the price.

 
Reviewer

Rick

This book should be on every magician's bookshelf. I've been searching for good resources on magic psychology/theory and this fits the bill. Ortiz talks about how to craft methods that are entertaining, strong, and logical. If you want to take your effects to the next level don't hesitate to buy this!

 
Reviewer

Sergio

Designing // Miracles. Construction // Perception. If you feel the need to approach magic with an analytical, bottom-up, trial-and-error kind of approach, then this book is a must. If you like Darwin Ortiz both as a peformer and as a lecturer, you won't be able to put this book down. And yet you will have to, because every sentence is packed with information, and there is only so much knowledge one can absorb at a time. No words are left to chance. Every piece of information is priceless.

 
Reviewer

Matan

If you want to perform for real people and fool them succesfully this is the book to buy !
some people won't bother to read this wonderful magic book becuase they don't think very highly of Darwin Ortiz, My opinion of him does not matter and yours should not either. When Judging good advice i truely belive it does not matter who provides it , some say that Ortiz is dry, speaks in a monotone voice and presents magic in a very dry boring manner. I completly disagree , however I understand where the people who think this way are coming from, but let's listen to the facts please Ortiz is a professional and it shows , Ortiz performs almost exculsivly for real lay people and we should listen !

With all that being said , when reading this book , read activly and feel free to talk back to him, write footnotes and use a highlighter marker as well. the re is more to this book than just theory, it is theory in practice and it is colored with more than a few examples for every concept explained. Moreover Ortiz creates a whole new langauge of terms and concepts that I believ magic should adopt, while every other profession or craft has its own terminology magic is borrowing from too many fields (Kane,2007 ).

We should all read this book , it is that important, i truely belive it will lead to better communication amongst magicians ..

Just my two cents
Magicmatan

 
Reviewer

Steve

If you have ever contemplated about choosing to make a living and career by performing magic, or close-up magic in general then this book is an absolute MUST have in your collection. As the sequel to Strong Magic this book tackles some of the most important and rarely discussed aspects of what it takes to both perform and create a magic effect. The psychology that Darwin Ortiz discusses in this book is absolutely priceless information and truly delves into the insight of a professional performer that you will be hard pressed to find written anywhere else.

This book forever changed my perspective on everything there is in Magic. In the first couple of chapters I was made aware that I was looking for magic effects and presenting magic effects from the Magicians point of view, when the point of view you need to explore and understand is the spectators point of view. A perfect example would be a certain type of card trick where I might previously know a method, but a new method would be sold that didn't require a certain sleight, for example lets say not having to use a pass or palming the selected card. Before purchasing the effect using a different sleight, I would think that this would be easier or more impressive because a sleight that I either didn't know or could not perform would make the effect more magical from my perspective. Then once receiving the effect I would be disappointed because all that it taught was a different way to get a card for point A to point B, or having to give up a particular method and change to a different/new/improved method that would accomplish the same effect which would impress the spectator all the same, but quite possibly not the performer.

In essence, it would be similar to actually expecting a new method to be performed as if by pure magic with a gimmick that would do all the work for you. The effect to the spectator would be the same but the way to achieve the effect would not impress the performer. And this is what is so important and one of the main topics Darwin Ortiz discusses and changed my perspective on Magic. That would be to no longer look at the effects structure from the magicians point of view and focus on what truly matters and that is how the spectators perceive the effect.

Darwin goes into tremendous detail on how a spectator will watch and attempt to analyze the performance of the magician, and will try to find a logical way of how the effect works. Or at times, they will not even have to be correct in their assumption, all they have to know is that something happened at a certain time, thus the magic is gone and the magic effect turns into a puzzle; which is the enemy of good magic.

So if you have ever noticed that the impact of a certain effect is received much better from another performer and not the same for you, then you owe it to yourself to purchase this book. In fact, I suggest purchasing both Strong Magic along with Designing Miracles and you will be blown away at how the incredible insight and years of experience that Darwin Ortiz accumulated throughout his entire career in performing close-up card magic, will forever change how you view, understand and perform magic for the rest of your life.

 

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  • Charles asks: I am primarily a mentalist but am trying to complete my magic library and would like your advice as to which book would be the most important for me to own : Designing miracles, The Magic way, Strong magic, The Books of Wonder or The Magic Rainbow? Please advise Thanks

    • 1. Vanishing Inc. Magic responds: Ask different magicians and they will all give you different answers on that. As the host of our podcast, I can let you know that all of them are recommended frequently by guests, but out of that list, The Books of Wonder are probably the most frequently recommended as "must haves". Hope that helps.
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