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Criss Angel levitation explained


douglasdouglas

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I'm not one of those people who will either try to make you believe or to not believe (since I hate it when people try to change my thoughts on things), but my theory is that when Criss is standing near an object such as a chair, facing away from the audience and camera, and wearing stretchy black pants, that he is not magically levitating, but I do think that when he is facing the camera and audience and there is nothing around him that he can step on, that he is actually doing it. I don't think that he could have successfully hovered over the Luxor's light if he were faking especially with the light illumianting him, and anything around him, completely. Hanging on a rope or string from a helicopter or whatever would have made it completely obvious and he would have been swinging around unable to stay still with those winds. If he were standing on anything, it would have to have been thick and with a kind of platform which would have also been noticable. Again, just my opinons. No flames please, I'm a major Loyal to Criss Angel and I believe that magick is real. But I do have a question that has been nagging me lately. I've noticed that after most of his levitations where he is facing us and away from anything that could help him hover, when he comes back down, he does this dramatic thing where he lifts his legs, one after the other, as if stretching them or something.... Does anyone have an opinion as to why he does this? Edited by Alisha
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So what? Loyals can't be stalkers? I'd follow him around to every stunt if I could. The asian woman does kinda look the same but one's hair is shorter than the other, and i don't think that the wrist jewlery exactly means its the same person. That's just me though... ^_^

Edited by Alisha
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  • 2 weeks later...
Criss Angel is an illusion artist. He does not use magic. He pretends that he does, but he really does't. He's a hoax. I believe that you can use real magic to make yourself and anything else levitate. It is possible. But Criss Angel is not using magic. He's using talented actors, professional props and special effects. If he did use real magic, the TV show would not be concentrated on his feats, but rather how he does his feats. Magic just does't click that fast in people's minds. Its an illusion.

Chris Angel is not a hoax the way you make him sound. First off, magic is simply explained to be unexplained science. Second, magic in the sense you seem to accept simply isn't logical by any means. I would like to believe it exists, but don't see how it could. It would take the intervention of a higher power, and that wouldn't be magic, would it? Third, Chris never says he is using real magic. He almost always says he blends reality with illusion, so how does that make him a hoax? His "magic" could be considered to be a hoax, but not he himself. He is the a genuine article: an illusionist.

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Your check is in the post.

Ahh..my sexy MK,

Sadly a late post..but nice to see we have somefin' in common ...besides our love for zombies and kinky things..hehehhe

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Damn.. I need shades for that comment..could ya lower the size of your fonts.. it's like your yelling really LOUD... I was of course talking about Alishas' comment...

Edited by braptalk
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4) A cable from above, no other possibility, usually there are no bystanders so that is just a camera trick. The cases where he did this with crowds (which are always just a few people), but with the wall behind him, could only happen if the crowd was in on the trick.

What about the Levitation over the Luxor? That was a huge crowd. And when he levitated from the top of the hotel inside, to the floor?

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Chris Angel is not a hoax the way you make him sound. First off, magic is simply explained to be unexplained science. Second, magic in the sense you seem to accept simply isn't logical by any means. I would like to believe it exists, but don't see how it could. It would take the intervention of a higher power, and that wouldn't be magic, would it? Third, Chris never says he is using real magic. He almost always says he blends reality with illusion, so how does that make him a hoax? His "magic" could be considered to be a hoax, but not he himself. He is the a genuine article: an illusionist.

Criss Angel is a illusionist. That being said you can't believe most any of his gimmicky magic tricks he does. But when it comes to his levitation, I like to think he is probably doing it. Not the illusion ones, where he steps on the box. But when he levitates over a golf course out into a field of trees, or from one building onto another, in a parking lot he levitates up to the streetlight and back down, when he levitated at the luxor. Those seem pretty real to me. And I remember from the luxor episode that he said he was only using his mind, body, and spirit to perform his levitation. I believe he also claimed he began practicing his levitation as a child.

As far as magic? Magic is a story book term for what were dealing with here. Fact of the matter is, you only use 10% of your brain. Every human has the ability to levitate, bend spoons, telekinesis/psychokinesis, create energy balls, ect. All these things your are able to learn, just like you learned to walk, talk, breath, except for the fact you have completely ignored them from day 1. All you have to do is believe, and practice and you can do it. Meditation is key to any psychic ability because you must learn to clear your mind completely and focus on what you want to do. Meditation also helps you to re-program your sub-consciousness mind, because that is what really has control of your entire brain. I'm not religious but even Jesus said you could do anything he could do long as you believed. I mean come on guys, we have consciousness, explain that one? how come no other animal is consciousness like we are, not to mention that the human brain is still basically a mystery.

Anyway, all I wanted to do is make sure you people understand that Criss's levitation also has the option of being real.

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  • 10 months later...

Ok, I know I am going to get called crazy and loony and everything under the moon. But has it ever crossed your minds, that there is more possible in this world and in the human body and mind then ANYONE can imagine? The human mind is powerful, maybe, JUST MAYBE, he's gotten, well more so trained his mind to make things happen or to ignore what he was been raised in and do what is possible.

Ok, the leg slipping through the pants works (from the back), the wire works (if its dark). Now, please, watch this video, and try to come up with an explanation for this one. Notes: watch for the shadow (its his shower and shadows of buildings), no string, no board to stand on, no slipping the leg through the pants or whatever other kind of ridiculous reasoning you need to come up with to make yourselves understand it. Some things in this world, are NOT meant to be understood, some things will blow your mind, there is always a possibility, even at its smallest, that something could be true and real.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlIwcVAxZsU...um=1&ie=UTF

I am not looking for an argument or trying to say that it is in-explicitly real....I'm just saying, look at the smallest fragment of a possibility that it could be real. And learn to adjust to the unusual.... Myself, I try to have an open mind. I personally would love to meet him in person, I would love to learn from him, trick or not. I want to know the secret, and if it's real, I would hope that he could tell me how he does it. Not to make money, just to know.

Look at all the other "strange" things that have been proven as true and real....healing hands (the heat that comes from them, the energy that can be fallowed), how about Hindu priests, said to levitate while meditating through being so one with themselves and so at peace with the world around them, that they do it.

And about his going through glass, or whatever. What is glass? What is the human body? Nothing but molecule's and atoms, all jumbled around together to make something seem...or appear solid. What if...just what if, you didn't have the physics class, you weren't raised and taught "hey, thats solid, you can't go through that" and you just accepted that its nothing but molecule's and atoms, ALL of which can be separated. Would you, not knowing...or more so, the mind not knowing that a solid object cannot be passed through...be able to do it? Your only held back by what the mind accepts. The mind, the human mind, being brainwashed, OR taught since birth, solid things ARE solid...you can only do so much (example of bypassing that, life or death, break your back stopping a car to save your children or lifting a car to save a loved one even though you KNOW you can't do it, but you do it because you don't listen to your brain, you do what you have to). And air, and water, are all atoms and molecule's as well...why can you walk through them, or swim through them...there the same thing as a solid piece of wood or glass, just not as jumbled together as closely so they are not "solid". And while we're at it, maybe his brain or he himself, says hey, the air is solid under me, I can stand on it and it will raise me up and lower me down and move me around like an escalator (now, that I think is little out there, but you never know)...

Think about it...just for a second or two... what is really possible? what can the brain do and the human body? isn't everything atoms and molecule's, and can be separated?

EDIT: you forgot about another explanation...a power pack under his jacket that can make him fly, kinda like an airplane

Edited by Star Children
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More often than not, live audiences are able to catch things that illusionists do, while TV audiences can't. (For old timers, the "mentalist" Kreskin was a prime example. David Blaine, with his street magic, is another.) And there's no reason to think that it's not the same with Criss Angel.

Just enjoy the tricks, but know in the back of your mind that it's all just well-executed deception. You're expected to believe that what you're seeing is real.

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Don't get me wrong. I love magic and sometimes perform in front of my friends. I personally thinks that Chris Angel fake most of his tricks either by using actors and clever video editing. Some of them are too damn obvious to be fake such as this videos on Youtube.

Chris Angel Video

obviously fake

Chris Angel video

this one makes me laugh all the time because that actor screw up his act

I never like Chris Angel and i know that i never will. I don't understand why many people buy into his acts.

Edited by Dracunum3010
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You have hit it on the head. There are several different ways to do the trick, but you got the ways I have been told.

A lot of people assume that the tricks are much more complicated than they actually are. In some of the spontaneous leviatations in front of a real audience the postioning of the crowd is important so as not to see the toes on the ground.

What a lot of people know that a big part of the tricks is also the editing of the footage. You'll never see the takes that didn't go perfectly; when an audience member moves out of position and catches on(It happens often).

In all tricks, the planted crowd happens very often and is often overlooked. It is a big letdown to rack your mind to figure out a trick only to find out that the magician planted an audience and used camera positioning to make it look like it was much more than it was.

From the tricks that I know, they are often far simpler than anyone would ever imagine.

Yeah, they aren't that hard. Like, I can do the one David Blaine does alot. You have someone look at you from a 45 degree angle from the back, then, you use the opposite foot that the person is standing near, tol ift yourself up, standing on you're toes. While lifting the other foot, completely off the ground, if you do it right, then the person see's both feet come off the ground. It's an INSANELY easy trick. And it gets so many people to believe it's real, it's not even funny... :lol:

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i'll just say this, it's on the tv, everyone you see on that show Is part of the act... anything can easily be faked on tv (puts flame shield on)

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mmmmm... criss angel.

*passes by*..reads title .."oh, oh, that..everyone knowns that one"

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  • 1 month later...

everyone who thinks this is possible is forgetting one thing: gravity. it is the only pervasive force in the universe; meaning that it acts on all things. it is so powerful that light cannot escape it. therefore, criss angel cannot escape it either unless he were moving at tremendously high speeds and had wings. we all want to believe it's real, that is why we watch. it is amazing to see his demonstrations (as he calls them); but we all should be amazed at his creative ability as an illusionist and an artist instead of believing in something thing that is simply not possible. you may as well believe in santa.

peace

by the way; i haven't the slightest idea how he does it. it is simply mind-boggling to me. i am truly impressed with his ability to amaze; unless he's using audiences that are in on it and/or camera tricks. in which case he would be the biggest douche in the universe, behind john edward.

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every trick he does are just really good illusions thats why it seems magic almost. but hows he does he it, i really dont have a clue.

these 2 are really good. some might say magic. these seem to lack logical explaniation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yf4EaDtbBEk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8eD3AmxyAI

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Star Children -

I agree that Criss is very talented.

But review the video that you attached again. There is one issue that I found.

1:42 Criss is in the air, on the ground below him is a RV and a man walking backwards.

at about 3:39 they show the whole "flight" in a faster speed, The RV is there but there is no man.

That would indicate multiple tapings. And in between shots, Anything can happen.

edit 4 sp

Edited by ODIN-X
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  • 11 months later...

Exactly. I knew this wasn't a cable or wire, because if it was then he would be slightly swaying. So I was wondering how he did this, and now I know.

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  • 4 weeks later...

NICE I KNEW HE WAS A PHONY

Well not THE explanation, but after watching the levation tricks on video performed by Criss Angel I came up with a few theories:

First of all it is important to divide the levitation tricks into different categories, because they are quite different:

1) levitating a few feet in front of stairs or chairs, while turning his back to the audience.

2) levitating leaning backwards with one foot on the ground

3) levitating a bystander in midair

4) levitating 5 feet in the air with nothing around him.

5) levitating 5 feet in the air with an object behind him

Theories:

1) There is always an object in front of him to which he "levitates", he always has his back turned to the camera/audience. Sometimes one or two people seem to be next to him or in front of him which would have to be in on the trick. He is wearing a fake hollow, bendable leg on one leg which is attached to his shoe. The fake leg fits into the back half of his real leg. He then could just bend his knee, while putting his leg up and step up to the object in front of him. The view from behind would be two legs and two shoes next to eachother. When he has raised his other leg and the fake leg to the chair, the fake leg and shoe should fit into his real leg again. This way he can just turn around and show there are no other gimmicks present, the fake leg is reset and the trick can be performed again. His trousers would have to be cut or flexible to be able to put out a leg while his trousers at the back remain straight. In the video in the cafeteria you can actually see him make a stange move with his right leg slightly bending it, as if the fake leg didn't come of straight away and snaps back. This trick would require to lean slightly forward to keep balance, which is clearly visible when he does the trick on the escalator. When he perfoms this trick on the sidewalk -without an object in front of him- you can clearly see that it is suddenly necessary to lean sharply forward while balancing on one leg. The man passing by who has to see his leg in front of him, is clearly not impressed, from his standpoint, he propably doesn't even realize that someone is performing a trick, he just sees a man balancing on one leg.

With this trick you have to ask yourself two questions:

-Why not just levitate and land on the ground again? Because that would make it suspicous that an object in front of him is necessary. He cleverly has an excuse that a chair needs to be in front of him, because he is going to land on it, classical misdirecting of a magician.

-Why not perform the trick without an object in front of him? Well because it wouldn't be possible then, otherwise he would have shown it, because that would make the trick MUCH more impressive. When he does it on the sidewalk without an object, there is no audience behind him, just the camera from slightly above, because people standing directly behind would be able to see it.

2) In the video I saw he clearly stamps his right foot, and could insert a metal pole hidden in his right leg into the ground, the location seems to be selected by himself, so perhaps a prepared ground is needed with a hollow pipe. When he bends backwards while bending his knees, a metal mechanism hidden in his leg and back bends with him but locks at 90 degrees. He is then able to straighten out his other leg. Why not straighten out both legs at the same time? Or first one leg and then the other? This seems a giveaway to me. He also did this trick with a bystander which would have to be in on his trick. Only this time she has two legs on the ground when bend backwards and he shows that there is nothing under her back. Then he also straightens her legs but doesn't show again there still isn't anything under her back. So this would mean that she has the pole in one of her legs when he shows there is nothing under her back, but it is removed after another pole has risen from the ground (or is pulled down from her back) to support her back and connect with the metal plate she is wearing there. Conveniently he immediately lowers her which could be the pole in the ground simply descending. At this time the camera doesn't give a clear view of what's under her anymore. Again classical misdirection by a magician, first show that there isn't anything at a certain place, so that later when there is something there the audience is just tricked into thinking it can't be because it wasn't there before.

You have to ask yourself why the straightening of both legs isn't performed when he is levitating himself, surely the trick would be much more impressive if he would do that instead of just straightening just one leg? The answer is that it requires another person to make sure the pole from the ground connects with the back of the woman. In the video there are cuts and a shot where he may have touched the lower of her back may have been left out.

3) There is no other possiblity than that the whole crowd is in on the trick. The crowd looks unnaturally disciplined forming an ordered circle around him, no other people seem to walk by or join the crowd, this is in the middle of the streets of Las Vegas right? She simple hangs from a cable from above. He makes a point of having the camera looking up before the trick but neglects this when she is actually levitating. This trick is always performed outside, why not do this trick in the cafetaria? Because a crane would have a hard time fitting into there.

4) A cable from above, no other possibility, usually there are no bystanders so that is just a camera trick. The cases where he did this with crowds (which are always just a few people), but with the wall behind him, could only happen if the crowd was in on the trick.

5) This is the video with the plants behind him performed for just 1 bystander. The plants could conceal a contraption which connects with a metal plate in his back. It is suspicous that he always walks up to the camera immedtaily after landing on the ground, perhaps allowing something behind him to quickly hide itself. This trick could also be with just a cable and a bystander who is in on the trick, it is suspicous that there isn't a crowd.

Well just theories, but it's not impossible to reach the same results with it.

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I just want to know the trick behind the luxor levitation! maybe helicopters but IDK? also the one in the lobby.

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Some of you might have wondered why I haven't posted in this discussion until now. I happen to be a professional magician and while many magicians can work me under the table in many things such as card magic and so forth. Levitation's are my specialty. It's one of the things I'm most known for among magicians in both levitation's of objects and self levitation's.

If you want you can see some of my youtube videos (Just search for "Ron Jaxon Magicjax" and you'll find them). Here's a link to a video of me that was made in 2003 of one of my self levitations.

http://www.magicvideodepot.com/main/viewVideo.php?video_id=167&title=Jaxon_Magic&timer=1

Anyway. I find this discussion very interesting in that some seem to put "Magicians" in the same category as "psychics" or other paranormal claimers. This isn't real news for even when I'm performing a comedy magic act where my goal is to get laughs more then gasps. I still receive questions from my spectators like, "Can you read my mind" or "Are you using real magic?"

But one thing I noticed about this discussion is it's the only time I've ever seen a magician called a "Fraud". This is rare because magic as a performing art isn't something that is "Claiming" anything to be real magic.

While most words have variations of definitions. The definition of the word "Fraud" as it seems to be used in this discussion would be:

fraud (frôd)

n.

1. A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain.

This does not fit when it comes to a magician who uses the art of magic for entertainment purposes. While it's true that a certain amount of deception is always present in magic for what appears to be "real magic" is accomplished with "real methods" that appear to be magic. The goal is not to "Fool" anyone in any negative way. Magicians do not "secure unfair or unlawful gain".

I always view magic as a form of story telling. Even when there's no story involved in the act it's kind of like a movie that allows you to experience things that do not seem possible. To go on a little adventure of "What if this was possible" or "This is what it would look like if this was possible". In order to do this the magician sometimes has to play the part of a true magician. This is part of what's known as "presentation". It's what sells the illusion in most cases. The magician must act like what is happening is "real magic" for the it to seem like magic. Otherwise it just seems like a "Trick".

Trick:

Something designed to fool or swindle.

This is not the intent of a good magician.

Let me share an examples of a good magician. Here's a video of a great magician named Tommy Wonder (Who unfortunately passed away not long ago). What his act. He's an entertainer. As you watch do you think he could care less if they think it's "Real magic"? Of course not. He's doing magic as a form of entertainment. He's has no intention of getting anyone to "Believe he's real". He has no intention of securing unfair or unlawful gain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ6qT8JvaMY

He can't be called a "Fraud" because he's making no claims.

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i couldnt help myself, i really lik criss angel, magic is what he does, he never ever claims to be spiritualy gifted, he just claims to be 1 with his mind body and soul. But i just thought i'd post up the clips i thought were his best and see what people think

Orange juice to a lil chicken

found this one pretty ****en amusing too

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBKbW3DEcq0

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