Levistick

Well, I made one, and it is a fun diversion.

Of course, it could have been better (the cord kept twisting up) but it was ok.

*wonders when HoP will have one of these for sale* - for the less skilled craftspeople who can't make them for themselves, such as myself

Point_Blank: When I see my girlfriend (who I made it for) again, I can take some photos if it would help.

Basically need a length of dowel (I used about, tape to decorate, some string/cord/fishing line etc and possibly some prestik or a few coins/washers for weighting it.

Drill a small hole through the middle of the dowel. Wrap the whole dowel in tape and put the cord through the hole. Fasten it securely. Give it a whirl. You can probably just wrap more tape around the bottom if you need a bit more weight, other prestik is nicely adjustable. There should be very little difference.

I also added some embroidery thread tassles on the ends for the look of it.

I just went and got me a flow wand Cost a fair bit for delivery but I just got my travel expenses for college and thought it would be a brilliant new toy for me to play with, cant wait!

Aston, that'd be great if you could get some photos, but I have to ask, what is this prestik of which you speak? I've never heard of it.

Is a reusable putty to stick things to other things.

From wikipedia:


Hmmm.... Did not realise it was RSA only....

Will get some pics up asap.

anyone have experience with the DIY? I have been experimenting with cheap wood dowel but I cant keep the stick vertical. The string is 1/3 from the top.

Is this a problem with technique or construction?

Get it closer to the centre?

My string is barely off-centre (+-1cm) with a bit more insulation tape at the long end to get it balanced.

Also, the string may twist up which will prevent it from being vertical anyway.

has anyone actually tried measuring the difference in weight from one end to the other, when balanced across the exact middle?

Thanks for the tip. I'll try moving the hole much closer to the center and see if that helps.

When I get hold of mine again, I keep forgetting to get it from my girlfriend, I can get some weights and measurements up.

any luck on the photos and specs?

We bought a flow wand and a glow and fire wand not soon after from salsa.

We just modified the glow and fire wands because they were very off balance and quite unusable. The glow wands would not stay vertical. We've moved the holes by 5mm now and they are both much better.

In fact I performed for the first time with the fire wand on Saturday night. I'm very glad I didn't burn the string!

Though - how has everyone else blackened the string? Marker? Because it wasn't that invisible...

Agreed, the salza string is easily visible.

I mean kevlar is pretty much your best option for this, unless you trust yourself not to get heat near the string.

I didn't have balance problems, but some times it did just seem to be unwieldy. It was my only wand so I have nothing to compare to.

New flow-wand video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsWtMDGv2ow&feature=channel_page

But I'd like to work with fire now...

/wanders off in search of kevlar

I have a very nicely balanced Dancing Cane from a magic shop. there is only 1 hole and the string's attached to a weight so it drops down the inside of the hollow tube when the cane is in the hand meaning you don't have any loose string. there is a really nice magicians glowing cane but it's $99. I've yet to find a good fire one. but I am planning to build one if I can can get around to buying some kevlar thread. I'll probably blacken mine with dye by unrolling it and leaving it in a bowl then winding it back up.

Hey, we've started using the levistick in our performances now, fire and glow. But the problem is, you may do a flawless performance ten times but then that one time you knock it against the string/yoursef and it goes wobbly. Anyone got any tips for recovery/making it look like you meant to do that?

There are a few moves that involve low hortizontal spins

But you'd need to touch it to make it spin and then correct it to make it vertical again?

how do you hold the string? should be 1 large open loop from the stick just looped over the thumb. It's probably harder with fire on the ends to recover as you cant do stick isolations with end grabs, however if its going awry move you non-holding hand to the string and get it in the L shape between your first finger and your thumb and draw the stick to the middle of your un-looped hand.

Any spin "should" eventually turn into a flat wall plane (there may be a bit of contact with the hand and the stick but keep it gentle and it won't make things worse) and as it reaches your hand it should turn into a really cool effect with the stick appearing to spin on your flat palm facing the crowd (like your stopping traffic). It can then be caught in the middle and you can continue with the floaty stuff by gently releasing the stick again remembering to allow the string so slide passed your thumb.

the other alternative is to get your other thumb through the loop and pull your hands apart horizontally, but that way is much harder and I normally just get a horitonally spinning stick between my hands rather than a vertical one, it may depend upon your type of stick / string attachment too, mine is hollow with a padded weight so the string retreats back into the shaft of the stick when close to my hands, so the excess string isn't visible.

I suggest practicing recoveries of the things that normally go wrong, try different ways to recover, the probelm with a levi stick is as you say any mistake can ruin the illusion completely. you can always lower to the floor then do a levitation back to your hand. check out videos by david mann for some move ideas.

[url=]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fth11-UHkJY[/url]

omg that must have been one of the sweetest levistick performances that I've seen, Mynci



OOOOOOOOOOOOOh creativity at work

I also have the tutorial to learn every move in that performance the best move for tricking an audience is in the video below. the hands behind the back hover move. easy to do but need great timing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UA_crI8VN7k

And It can be done with fire a great way to confuse people who know it's on a string as if done well and not very long they can't work it out quickly enough.

and if you want the daddy levistick the best lookiing one out there:

http://www.magicworld.co.uk/magic-shop/catalog/Dancing-Red-Cane-Lighted-p-218.html

if you want to learn, look for Dancing cane tutorials they have so much more than levistick.
Another good tip is to regularly change the hand you use so people get confused. they see it and say "its attached to his/her hand" then when you change they get a seed of doubt and always come up and ask how it's done

do you know any store in europe tha i can order a levistick or fire flow wand?

check this one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdq7_Op5nhY&feature=player_profilepage

do you know how can someone construct something like that?

Hiya

You can get fire ones here:
http://www.salza.se/category.php?c=37

or you can make your own, they are quite easy.
Aluminium tube
kevlar wick
Kevlar thread / string

just make the hole a fraction above the balance point (centre of gravity).

i still haven't understand where the string is going and how you use it!

It is basically a stick with string going through a hole just off centre. i,e,


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The string is doubles in a loop. People chose to put different parts in the loop. Some people put both hands, this limits the moves down. Most people put ne hand/finger/thumb in and then hold the other hand nearby to create an illusion that it is controlled by both hands.

So you pick it up, find out which end is more likely to head down, stick it up vertically and start 'swinging' it side to side. Its very much like stalling poi side to side. You can't just swing it because then it doesn't stay in the same plane.

After you have the basic stall sidwe to side move you can bring it around your head or behind your back and between your body and your hand.

Basically the trick is to keep the stick vertical and to not hit the string with the stick (as this will make it wobble and fall over)

Best thing to do is find someone with one and practice for an hour to get the feel of it. *nods*

You should have 1 loop of string through the whole in the middle, then tie a knot as close to the stick as possible leaving 1 large loop, this can go over the thumb and extra wraps around fingers are used for moves like horizontal leviation or you can use your ring finger to open the loop wider from the thumb so you can transition to the other hand.

I'm thinking of trying to make a golw one using concentrate glow units from my staffs, I just need to get some tube short enough and get the hole right. if i do it i'll pop up a video

Ms Vanity - Search for "dancing cane" many nmagic shops will have cheap ones to learn with

well video's not perfect but was only a quick job.

Here's a bit of the tutorial I have for threading the cane

http://s41.photobucket.com/albums/e267/Mynci/Vids/?action=view&current=threads.flv

Please don't look at the other videos as they are years old I'm better than that now

if anyone wants any other videos I have the whole David mann tutorial so can chop it into managable peices if you ask REALLY nicely it's about 700Mb in total, but shhh it's a secret

edit

Maybe I should mention - File is .WMV because it was much smaller so will need windows media player compatible video player

Edit, Actually scrub that THink it's FLV oops

I'd love to get some more ideas on intermediate and advanced tricks. I feel like I'm plateauing a bit. Molly and I went out and ... umm... what's the verb? Spun? Floated? Sticked? Stuck? on Trancegiving Eve and had a great night. I know it's quite a bit of dance to make it look good, but I'm sure there are some learnable "tricks" as well. I've been looking at youtube vids but haven't seem much that's really inspired me.

Went to an outdoor psytrance party over the weekend and got some glow sticks that were about 2 inches shorter than the length of the flow wand. With a bit of tape and a couple of mins messing with the placement and you've got a levi glowstick to trip out the punters till the wee small hours. Good times

I've got a few tricks I'm working on with these but I just never seem to have enough time to dedicate to it. I'm working on some cross overs between levistick and double staff though video to follow when I get access to a decent camera.