 | | |
| | |
|
Spaces home  Cool Old Otis DealsPhotosProfileFriendsMore |  Tools   |
Cool Old Otis Deals...where the cool meet the Otis
|
||||||||
|
May 13 I'm easy.....Looks like the Magic Cafe has let the thread on UWC remain....with 2000 hits and 55 posts. Thomas Wayne was finally banned. Bob Kohler is allowed to look totally rediculous in his new avatar...clearly no one is helping him there. Can all this be coincidence??
Well, we'll see...but if this is the new direction for MC...I just wanna say....I bet Brooks feels all fresh. Born again...away from all the seedy sponsors and soulless suck-asses. Take a deep breath Steve, feel the brisk new air, smell the flowers and allow your senses to reel in your new world of common sense and dignity.
If you need anything Steve, you can come here anytime. Together we can keep you on the right track. And could you grant me just 2 fake memberships with over 50 posts please? So I can help you with the house cleaning and be like the resident psychologist over there? Ask Otis. Yeah, that's the ticket. I'll straighten them all out. Anyone with over 500 posts could be immediately elligible for rehab. 5000 posts and I can legally prescribe meds.
The MC banner can fly proudly here to let you know you have Otis' support in your transition. Here is your metaphor. When you are in the elevator, you are going up, up, up...you look up and see the word OTIS. When your are in the head, getting rid of your wastes, you look down and see the word....KOHLER. That will help you keep it in perspective. May 12 UWC Explanation
I finally got around to a making a cheap-ass (of course) explanation video for my UWC routine. I had sent the first batch out sans routine, so those customers should have the routine in their email today.
It is about a 9 minute vid, so to make it it easy on yours truly, I just posted the explanation on YouTube...but hopefully it is hidden there where you won't find it unless I want you to.
I thought that I would make the explanation video available to anyone that wanted to check it out. So, I'm going to weigh in here somewhere between Kranzo and Troy....
Send me 10 bucks by paypal to todd@toddlassen.com ... along with YOUR email addy where you want it sent, and I will email you the link. The video pretty much sucks as far as quality goes....but the full explanation is there and should be easy to follow. (I just sit in a swivel chair so I can show both sides...ha) Also, if you are on the list for the 2nd or 3rd batch and you want to see the workings now, send me an email and I will send to you.
I may, sometime in the future, make this explanation public...so if you spend 10 bucks now because you are like most magicians and want to see it post-hastily, please don't whine if I make it public in the future. I'm not saying I will do this for sure, but the thought crossed my mind, and I'd like to have that option at a later date without ruffling any feathers.
One more thing I thought of...if you decide you want to buy a UWC from me after watching the work, I will deduct the 10 bucks from your order. Troy Buddy
Here's Troy's new DVD. Just got together with Troy at the Central Illinois Magic Get-Together...which was a blast for us mid-westerners. Tight bunch of hayseeds. Troy is selling this for $20. I was pleasantly surprised that Troy hasn't started slouching yet. Exactly what you'd expect from Troy. Solid, practical, well thought out, original material from Mr. Mellow himself. I love this picture of Troy too. It's definetely a classic. Well worth the ticket price alone. I highly recommend you spend 20 bucks right away and buy this from Troy. There'll be something for everyone, he even has a couple unexplained teasers in the mix that will have you hitting the replay. Troy's got moxie and he's a smooth operator baby. TLH8788@AOL.COM JUST SPOKE TO TROY, HE WAS SWINGING A HAMMER. LOVE TO HEAR THAT. ANYWAY, HIS WIFE HAS ALERTED HIM TO HIS PILE OF EMAILS AND HE WILL ACTUALLY LOOK AT HIS COMPUTER TONIGHT. May 10 Geez..it's the sunnymooners againThat's a pretty classic hoodie there Kranzo. Never saw one like that. What is that actually?
I got a call from the Natester today and he sent me this link http://kranzomagic.myshopify.com/collections/products/products/stand-up-progressive-wild-coin to his wildcoin routine. This is NOT the routine I am WAITING for ..for the UWC coin set. (HINT HINT). But it does use a reverse sun/moon coin which would be half of the UWC gimmick....and the demo video does seem to go right hand in hand with the other cheap video productions of powerful coin effects on this site. However, I watched the download, and that is of much higher quality than the demo.
Nate taught this routine to me way back in the day. The second version that he teaches on the download is a bit of a knucklebuster, but well worth the time invested. Kranzo has always been a great thinker and I love his unorthodox use of a sun/moon coin in this routine...it's a real fooler. $5.97....that's rediculous. That's what I paid for a pack of gum in NYC.
 May 06 Well I Figured that........if I didn't post a couple of these...maybe one or two people would be dissappointed....but I think I also assured several that they could be confident that no pics would end up here....so it' kinda a no brainer. I thought this was interesting.....
At this end of the table, things seem rather normal....old pals out for a bit of socializing.
a little past the halfway mark you sense a bit of a darker air....
but nothing can prepare you for what is at the other end.......it's more coins than a laundromat...and 5 or...errr...6 seriously troubled individuals...... May 01 Need a little more to recover.......Ok, I ate 4 Xanax and still feeling the effects of the Norwegian Kryptonite. Tim Biskup was the only man able to bring me back from the depths....and errr....a smiling girl in a bathing suit.....in COLOR...with sunshine, a swimming pool, flowers, and a pool cue! Noobinski strikes againGaffs aren't for everyone. And neither is happiness, I guess. Here are a few of the cheery images on Noobinski's photography site. There's more...... http://www.stormhalvorsen.com/faces/faces_thumbs.htm
I don't much care for stereotyping cultures or countries...but....I've always heard those stories about the suicide and depression rates being so high in Noobinski territory. Granted, Bush & Co. have been making their best effort to afford us Americans a similarily dismal mood/outlook on everything. Still, Noobinski is certainly doing his share. It's getting dark in here......very dark....there will be no joy from my okito boxes.....or anything else I spend my money on after midnight.... Here's an image that may snap you out of it. April 29 Jack Nicholson CoinThis is the standard set, not the deluxe version with bang ring. This is made with a 5/8 inch diameter cavity behind the hole, you just have to tuck the material under the lip when you change it...not too difficult. I include a little tool to aid the procedure.
Anyway, this is a nice set. The ungaffed coins match very well and I'm still crazy about these copper chinese coins. $200. There is only this one. I made a set as part of an order and carried this one extra. 1893 Columbian Exposition Half DollarsHere is an American Half Dollar that many may not be familiar with. You can find one or two here and there, but again, finding ones with nice patina in matching conditions and sizes will require mucho patience.
There was this exposition in Chicago 1893 honoring dear old slave trading Christopher Columbus. I think I remember reading that Columbus would cut off the hands of slaves who could not work fast enough.....and 'sleight of hand' kept crossing my mind when I was making these.
Anyway, Chris got a nice looking coin made for himself...about 400 years after he was dead. This is a great set. The shells are the 2 middle coins in the left picture. So it's 4 coins and 2 expanded shells. These old coins have near mint edges on them...very strong milling. I'd say comparable to a new Kennedy. These are exactly half dollar size....because they are actually half dollars. $350 for this set also.
April 28 Norwegian WouldThe amazing noobinski is quite ill informed. He also seems to have a problem focusing his camera.
The average international package WITH INSURANCE normally costs MORE than $30. I will not send orders without full insurance coverage unless the customer accepts full responsibility. Been there, done that. And postage rates are going up faster than gas prices right now, with another increase just around the corner. http://www.usps.com/prices/welcome.htm?from=bannercommunications&page=prices Anyway, Noober, I don't make a dime on the postage end of things, and insurance costs a little over a dollar extra for each 100 hundred dollars worth. Did you hear about the fire at the circus? Yeah, the heat was in tents.....and so is this guy.
And speaking of intense glares....Doug Brewer sent me one of his new business cards. It has a cool caricature of him on the front. On the back it says Comedy Magic Mindreading...and there are 2 Pictures of Doug. In one, Doug is looking like his normal mellow kinda-guy ..self, in the other...he has spiked hair, is holding an esp card, and looks totally intense. You have to do a double take to be sure it is him, he has the same suit on in both pictures, otherwise you might think it is some punker he hired to do his mentalism for him. It's great. Doug is great. We love his material. It's real well thought out and practical and I'm sure alot of magicians use some of his material in their pet routines.
Update: AHHAHAHAHA. Just got an email from Doug. He said I'm a goddammafool. The other Doug is actually his partner, John George. So I apologize to John for calling him a punker, and I take back the accolades to Doug for his brilliant concept of showing 2 different Dougs representing 2 different types of entertainment venues. Silver Victorian Half Crowns
These are called the "Jubilee Head" Queen Victoria half crowns. I love these coins, they are a great size, elegant and ultra smooth and quiet handling. These coins are about 120 years old...dated around the 1890s. A while back Kainoa sent me a stack of these to make his coins for him. He had aquired them one at a time on ebay. I was immediately jealous. I have a set of dollar size crowns with the same head on them, made from coins that were a gift from Lee Asher years ago. Anyway, the only way that I can find to aquire these coins is the same way Kainoa did, so I set out to get my own little stockpile. I managed to get about 25 of them over a few months. I bought each one individually and paid postage from Great Britain on every one of them...which you might know, alot of these ebay guys really want to rupe you on postage...especially from UK. I made myself a nice set of these and I use them alot. Anytime I want to use coins a bit smaller than a dollar, I usually reach for these. I had a few of these left over. I was talked out of a few of them also. Finding 4 of these coins the same size is not an easy task, they vary extremely from one coin to another in diameter. I had to keep buying until I could aquire enough coins that would match up in size. I'm setting the price fairly high on these. $350. I don't plan to try and aquire or make any more of these, they were expensive, and I spent a considerable time ebaying them and matching them up. If no one feels they are worth that much, I will keep them for a backup. This is a nicely matched set with shell fitting all the coins very well. The shell is excellent...nice and rigid, and shows no distortion. The coins are obviously nice and soft, but they have very good edges with milling fully intact...much better than Barbers. The coins do have some very small dings and nicks, but you can't escape that on coins this old and worn. I've carefully doctored all the little high spots so there are no hangups in handling. I think you will be able to saftely say that Lassen only made a couple sets like this....this one, Kainoa's set, and my own.
April 24 Magic Bob Kohlers Ultimate 3 Fly DVD....check it out..A Customer just showed me this. http://www.magicvideolibrary.com/magicstore.htm Scroll down to where the products run out. It is the last item.
Haha. Damn...Magic Makers got nothing on these guys. I don't suppose this was approved by the big BK himself...since there is a link to MY website. Ha. Wonder if I could get a deal on 100 of them. I hope they edited out the stupid parts where Kohler tries to explain how to repair the gaff.
Hey, this is cool.....click the link above, scroll down and read about bobby's rip off, then click the link to my website, scroll down and click the link to my blog. And here you are. April 22 Last of the Half Dollar Expanded Sets for a While3 really top notch Barber expanded sets. These are nice soft coins but most of them have near full rims on the face at least. Sturdy flat shell with excellent cover. Shells are on the right of each fan. $170 each.
And yes, all you that ordered these and have been waiting...I didn't forget you. April 20 Kite flying weatherI have these 3 very nice softish Ben Franklin expanded sets. Shell is always at right of fan in my photos. $155 each. April 19 Walking Libs BabyI just bought a boatload of walkers, so these sets of coins all fit the shell like a glove and are very nicely matched. I have these 10 sets of soft walkers. Rigid expanded shell (not bubblicious) and 4 coins. Inside of shell polished to mirror-like finish and hallmarked. $155 each.
I'll get back to everyone tomorrow on these. I think there are about 3 sets left as of 9pm Iowa time. April 15 UWC weevealed at wast...HISTORY
Where to start? Well, I had a pet wildcoin routine that Latta did. It was a production of 3 silver coins, they each change one at a time to copper, then back again one at a time. The handling was fantastic. Latta used all his little passes, etc. to show both sides of the coins and to show his hands empty each time. This also was a really fun routine to do because of all the sleights that were going on in a single routine. I don't think the routine was ever published, I saw it on an old video. Fortunate as I am to be in this position, he called me one day and this was the first thing I asked him about. And luckily again I don't think he left out much in the way of details, because I had figured my own way of doing a few things that I couldn't tell what he was doing, but his were better or more natural of course.
Anyway, cutting to the chase....this routine used 4 coins. 2 c/s coins, one silver, and one copper. That way you could show three sides of each. So in silver dollar size, you are holding out a pretty big slug of coins.
Well, I play around with sun and moon routines alot too. That is also some of my pet material, which is why I really liked Rob Thompson's routine. Anyway, one day it comes to me that if you have 2 opposite sun and moon coins, then you have 3 sides of each coin built cleanly into 2 coins...great for a wildcoin routine, but if you make the inserts and shells exactly the same size so they are interchangeable, you can open a whole 'nother can of worms...the possibilities become endless.
THE GAFF
The gaff is made as described....2 sun and moon coins that are the exact opposites of one another. Both the inserts are exactly the same size to allow for a near vacuum fit on both the shells and everything is precisely interchangeable. I've imbedded steel cores in the both the insert coins to aide with ditching on magnets and to open up even more possibilities. The shells have teflon inside because I found that this really does make some of the moves in my routine absolutely silent....mainly the move were you revolve the coin in spellbound and let the insert fall out. There was a small scraping sound as the coin falls out...this was eliminated. Under the teflon, the shells have been polished and hallmarked.
AVAILABILITY
I just completed 11 of these sets. They are fairly labor intensive. For instance, I had to make all the steel cores out of round bar stock. I cut each little slice on a saw, then machine it on both sides to attain the proper thickness, etc. Somewhere there is probably a box of these that are just the right size, but by the time I found them it might be too late.
Anyway, I am running out of these dollar size copper coins in a hurry now. I think I only have about 4 rolls total left. There are no more of these coins to be found if you ask me. I've exhausted most of the avenues a couple years ago.
These 11 sets are spoken for, plus a few more already. I'm going to start another batch of 12 that will also be made of copper coins. Shortly after that, there will be a batch made with brass crowns..probably in the range of about 15 or 20 also. And that will be that for these coins. No mas.
I will be making some sets in Kennedy half dollars along with the South African penny. That is what I made for Neighbors and I liked the way it turned out. The half dollar set will not have the steel cores.
I have my mint guy sculpting a new copper crown for me, but that will be a ways down the road, so I'm guessing there will only be these sets of the copper and brass dollar size for a while. I'm trying to be fair and limit one per customer at first. I will compile lists and let the customer know which batch they will be in.
THE PRICE
These dollar size sets are $425 and include only the 2 gaffed coins. Extra matching copper coins of these will not be available....except in one form....
I thought of ways to increase the versatality of this gaff to include all sun and moon routines. As many of you know, in order to do routines like Klause's ..and Rob Thompson's routine for instance....you need the solid silver coin to fit in the copper shell or vice versa. You use this to switch out the insert coin for real coin under the shell. Since the 2 coins in this UWC set have to be exactly the same size, you will need a shrunken coin to fit one of the shells to be able to perform these sun and moon routines. So I thought of this.... I'm going to offer the companion coins to fit the shells if you want or need. You do not need them for the ultimate wildcoin routine. You can use either coin with one of the UWC shells. A shaved and remilled uncirculated dollar to fit the copper shell is $50, and a shaved copper coin to fit the silver shell is $35...limit one on the copper.
I will not accept paypal on these sets, only credit card or check. I will not charge your card or cash your check until I am ready to ship. I'm trying to get unburied here, so I don't want to owe any work at this time.
April 14 I rate right up there with Bull Terriers and Soccer.....A customer bought one of these and sent it to me. And it's for real...
Wouldn't it be cool if I brought the fam to a magic convention, you know...like the Maga conveniton where like, you know, no one got paid...and you pull in the lot...and every dang soccer mom van has a got lassen? sign in the back window...and you know, there is like a dealer room whale pulling up in a Bentley or something with the "gl?" in the window. Now THEN I would be hot stuff. April 12 Recovered....from blog fever.
Here is an expanded tail side Morgan shell with steel shim. The head side showed some small stress marks after expansion, but tail seemed fine...so I was hoping there was an ass-man out there somewhere. If so you can have it for $90. Next are 2 slippery sam gimmicks made with old pennies. These were part of an order that was cancelled. $70 each on those.
AND COMING SOON......U3F3.....ERRRRRR........UWC!!!!!!
And finally...
These are taking up precious space on my granite surface plate. This is a whole passle of Phillipine shells and shell sets in these 2 varieties of coins. A guy by the name of Bit Santos ordered these from me last year but didn't pay in advance. This is why I make people pay in advance....but I still use my intuition sometimes..it's usually reliable...but sometimes not. :) Anyway, if there were a fillipino magician out there anywhere...he could probably get a helluva deal. I think there are like 9 shells of the larger and maybe 5 of the smaller.
The expanded shell and slippery sams are spoken for as of 11:15 last night. No bites on the Phillipine coin sets and shells.  The UWC are going to be limited to one per customer for now. Thanks to all. April 04 Dang, alot of Cafe action for Miller
I recommended this a while back and NOW look.....23,000 hits on mc. Otis is a powerful tool.
Tony is one of the good guys....when he is not telling his version of "The Aristocrats" at 9 million decibels amongst a crowd of children and Amish. You go girl. April 03 Alrightee then..Top left is a nice sun/moon set. It is set up with expanded english penny shell that fits the insert and matching date coin both perfectly. $130. Bottom left is a c/s coin and matching copper. $125. At right we have one silver eagle flipper coin. $200. One original U3F set with pristine coins. $230. And on far right we have Josh's walker flipper coin. $150.
This are 3 pictures of the same 4 coin sets....one taken with flash and one without. These are the digital dissolve type slippery sam gimmicks. They have a steel shim installed. Each shell is made to fit it's particular half dollar. I've painstakingly played around alot to make the gaff as deceptive as possible. The shells have very flat
And here are 4 Kennedy sets. Same deal. SORRY, THESE SETS ARE ALL SPOKEN FOR. THANKS ALOT. April 01 I wanted to mention.....Pete McCabe sent me his new book along with an inscription that read something like..."hope you enjoy the book, but don't read it until you finish my coins!"
Well, I haven't gotten his coins quite finished yet, but I have cheated and read small portions of his book. I can't imagine any magician that wouldn't enjoy reading this. Highly recommend and many thanks to Mr. McCabe. March 30 WHICH ONE IS THE SHELL?Here is a sneak preview of the new Schoolcraft shell line. His promo video ain't bad either.....
I have the background music for the new 3CM video.
| ||||||||
Posted: May 1, 2008 9:37am 
