2014 Sheffield Street Magic Festival Slide Show

A few of the photographs I took during the Sheffield Street Magic Festival on 1-2 November 2014.

I’m pleased to say that we’ve now had payment for this and are able to pay participants. Shop regulars should have received their pittance fee; if you’ve not had yours, call in or give me a ring. This should be a complete list. If your name isn’t on, contact me immediately.

Peter Antoniou, Russ Appleby, John Archer, Ian Baker, Adam Bell, Steve Brownley, Ashton Carter, Chris Clarke, Nathan Clarke, Connor, Roger Curzon, Darren Dudley, David, Steve Faulkner, Craig Frith, Julie Gascoyne, Ian Hallworth, Peter Hammond, Ian Henshaw, Toby Hudson, Tom Hudson, Ryan Jackson, Ben Jones, Dominic Lawrenson, Nathan Lindley, Looch, Tom Magick, Jared Manley, John Martin, Jordan Maycock, Callum Morris, Gareth Neale, Vincent O’Brien, Gordon Pemberton, June Savory, Ben Smithies, Jake Smithies, Tim Smithies, Wiz Spencer, Andy Taylor, Peter Wall, Tony Wilkinson.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to say a big thank you to everyone who performed or helped in any way. I hope you enjoyed your involvement and feel that the Festival helped raise the profile of magic in Sheffield.

The 2014 event was much bigger than 2013, spread over two days and with two evening shows and two ‘junior magician workshops’ (despite the organisation  fee being the same!). I’d love to get your feedback and hear your ideas for improvement if we go for a 2016 Festival. Don’t hesitate to comment below, or email me. Thanks.

 

Explaindio Cheesy Testing

I had a call earlier from someone who’d seen my previous post about Explaindio, asking if it was really as easy as I said it was, and what could you do with it. So I took a little time out this evening to make a short test video.

Please note that this is not intended as a serious promotional offering. I knocked it out in about 20 minutes as a way of getting to know the program and seeing what it can do. So I’ve mixed static and hand-written text, video, cartoon characters, still images, etc.

The result won’t win any prizes. (If I was going to do it properly I’d keep some of the text on the screen longer so even kids’ entertainers would have time to read it, for example.) But it does show what you can do using the standard ‘slides’ and animations that come with the pack.

It is a very simple, menu-led program. You add ‘slides’ to the simple timeline and just add your own text and pics. There are a couple of teaching videos on the Explaindio website, but you don’t really need then to start using the program. Just pitch in and click a few buttons like I did…

But keep it simpler; don’t use all the facilities in one video!

Confession: Although the program does come with some royalty-free music I added my own instead. But you probably guessed that.

 

It’s going to be magic in Sheffield!

Preparations for the Sheffield Street Magic Festival on 31 August continue. 5000 flyers are due to be delivered later today (Friday). And here’s our promotional video. Be sure to spread the word!

Many thanks to our magical performers: Mike Baker, Adam Bell, Craig’s Magic, Roger Curzon, Steve Faulkner, Tom Hudson (AfroMagic), Tim Smithies, Damian Surr (Gingermagic), and the people of Sheffield.

More news soon.

 

First kiss

A little follow-up to my last post. Quoting Tom:

“The close up magic is going great and everyday I can feel my performance building and building. I am also in the middle of putting a stage piece together with a presentation about my first kiss and it has the most beautiful finish ever!”

Look forward to hearing about that. I believe Adam has been inspired to work on something similar. Gather he’s having a problem remembering his first, er, kiss. He’s such a romantic, though; I understand he’s still got the receipt…

 

If you knew sushi…

Glad to hear Lounger Tom Hudson is doing well and enjoying life and magic in Spain. Happy to say he left the phone number of the fish and chip delivery service before flying off to entertain the sun-cream-slicked denizens of the Costas. And sushi too! Not all English fish n’ chips and tea like mother makes, then? Check out his blog listed on the panel to the right.