PIC Preview: LEAN Principles Turn A Magic Act Into A Global Breakthrough

WEBVTT
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Hey, this week's episode of The Dead Pixels Society Podcast.
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We're doing something different this week.
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We're revisiting a past speaker named Stuart MacDonald, who is also the keynote speaker in the upcoming Photo Imaging Connect Conference, March First and Second at The Rio in Las Vegas.
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Here's your previous keynote presentation.
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And I think you'll find it very interesting.
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For more information on Photo Imaging Connect and to register today, go to www.photoimagingconnect.com.
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Welcome to the Dead Pixel Society Podcast, the photoimaging industry's leading news source.
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Here's your host, Gary Pageau.
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The Dead Pixels Society Podcast is brought to you by Media Clip, Advertek Printing, and IP Labs.
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Hello again, and welcome to the Dead Pixels Society Podcast.
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I'm your host, Gary Pageau.
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And today we're joined by Stuart McDonald, who is an old friend of mine going back, I don't even want to say how many years, but we'll say 40.
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And Stuart's going to be sharing to us a lot of information about lean principles.
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But first, Stu, let's first talk about your career because it's it's it's a multivaried and different one than most people.
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Yeah.
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Uh well, thank you.
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And first of all, thank you for inviting me to this prestigious podcast.
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It's very nice to be here.
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40 years?
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That it makes us look sound older than what we really are.
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Exactly.
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We're young at heart.
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Yeah.
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So my career is, yeah, it it's it's interesting.
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It started where, you know, in the college years, I had worked my way up as a magician and then put myself through college with it.
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And then I went on tour.
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We toured for like a dec uh 15 years and decided, uh, we want to get off the road.
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So we started this little haunted house, and it turned out to be one of the largest in the country, it was like 20,000 square feet.
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And this is before haunted houses were a big thing, right?
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Right, right.
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And we did that for 17 years, and then you know, the economy started bottoming out in 2008, and so I got out of that, went back to college, the Adrian College, where we both met, and went into the corporate world and started working at the television stations, and then ended up at large manufacturing headquarters on the west side of the state.
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They make appliances.
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I won't say who, but they're pretty pretty pretty pretty big deal.
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And you're also, I mean, you have you ran your own business, you did video, you had a video company, you did Oh, yeah, yeah.
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Forget about that.
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You used to do documentaries.
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You were doing a lot of different things.
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Yeah, I had a I also had a uh company called uh Boomerang Studios, and we did like 400 TV commercials, a lot of reach regional and local, but then the real breakout that we had was a documentary called I Wanna Look Like That Guy, and it got the attention of Arnold Schwarzenegger and his whole group of people, and it just went it skyrocketed.
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So I'm well known in the bodybuilding community still for something that I made in 2009.
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Yeah, and yeah, so you can look that up.
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It's it's it's some is you know, people put it on the internet for free now, so it's it's it's thousands of links to it.
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But I think I've got a copy of it here somewhere.
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I'm sure I bought the DVD at some point.
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And also, you kind of didn't do the magician thing for years, and then a few years ago you got back into it and you received some national and international acclaim.
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Yeah, and this is where the story gets interesting and and le latches on to the topic we're going to talk about.
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While I was working with this manufacturer, I was like, ah man, I really was depressed.
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I didn't feel whole.
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And I was like, Well, when did I feel really good about myself?
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And it was like, was when I was just getting started out in magic as a competitive magician.
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Because that's how you kind of go up through the ranks and get noticed by producers.
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But the only way to do that at an older age is to be in the world championships, and you have to qualify for that.
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And my first attempt, I basically face planted in front of everybody in the industry.
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And I I mean, laughing stock.
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I mean, this guy was terrible.
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Can you explain a little bit about competitive magic?
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I mean, because that's an that that's a very narrow niche that most people probably aren't even exposed to or or are even aware of.
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No, they're not, but it will be.
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There's a London, a very famous London documentary company that has contacted me and a bunch of other magicians who compete in the world championships.
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They're doing a documentary about it.
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Okay.
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So it will be mainstream in the near future.
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However, no a lot of people don't know what this competition competition is, and they held it every three years in a different country.
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And the Olympics of magic, essentially.
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Yeah, it's called Physm, the Federation of International Magician Society, and it's been around for like 85 years.
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And when when you say these it's competitive, I mean in Europe, it's how you make or break your career.
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It's very serious.
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And especially in Asia, it has gotten so big that government states will sponsor these magicians and they will come back as like Olympic heroes.
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And it is, it's really, it's really fascinating.
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I mean, this isn't like you know, the magic that you see a magician pulling out the quarter behind the ear.
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I mean, this is sophisticated stuff.
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Just to give you an idea how sophisticated there was a guy from Italy who uh did his act and with water, his that was his theme.
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He was controlling water, and at the end, he became a hologram of water and just the water stopped and he disappeared.
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Wow.
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And and and he didn't even come close to placing.
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Wow.
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Wow.
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And so so you so you decide you need a challenge in your life, and you get back into it, and you phase plan.
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You do not succeed.
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So what's your thought process then?
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Because you're thinking, maybe I don't have it anymore, right?
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Yeah, yeah.
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I'm I'm old school, right?
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So what ended up happening is I I remembered my training at this manufacturing company that they trained us in lean principles and continuous improvement.
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And I'm like, And what does lean mean for those who don't know?
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Well, lean isn't necessarily an anacronym, it's because I see it at as an acronym around, but you can it has a lot of meanings with different people, but basically what it is, it's a composite of principles that are designed to eliminate waste and create efficiency.
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Okay.
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And that's that's what lean is.
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And the continuous improvement part is that you have a closed loop system where you are constantly leaning out, putting new efficiencies in.
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So that's what we're so you decided that you were gonna from the training you had at this large company that you were gonna apply these principles to your magic act.
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Yeah, of all things, right?
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And I'm like, I I I didn't know how to really do it, but I the more I thought about it, lean principles have a lot of similarity to theatrical principles.
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And when I'm talking about the lean principles, I'm not talking about black belt, right?
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I'm talking about just the the very basics.
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So I would take like direct observation would be director and an and on pull would be the audience reaction, either they're booting falling asleep, not paying attention, that means there's something wrong.
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So I would I would take these principles and I would and I would match them with theater principles.
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Okay, and it made it really easy.
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And I started uh looking at my act a little differently.
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And I now now for those of you who have not seen your act, and I do recommend folks go on the tubes and you know, Google Stuart McDonald.
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You can find a lot of his material there.
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But just just briefly talk about the scenario that you were working on that you apply these principles to, the kind of the magician storyline.
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You had a story to it.
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Yeah, it at first there was no story, it was just a mirror, and I and this mirror duplicated things.
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And the accidental musician, magician, I think unintentional magician.
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Okay, yeah.
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So I ended up after I face planted this magician whose name is Gene Anderson, who is a retired and a very famous magician, and he he did magic throughout his entire career at Dow Chemical, but he's a PhD in chemical research.
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And he took me aside, he said, Stuart, I want a story because nobody else is telling a story.
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Give us a story.
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So I started thinking a lot about it, and I contacted a guy who came from Adrian High School.
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Adrian High School and went through the Croswell Opera House Theater that was in our hometown.
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And the dude ended up being one of the go-to uh production designers for Broadway.
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And he was nominated for a Tony for creating newsies, all the whole production design of newsies was his.
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So I looked at my audience in the same way.
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I need as few steps as possible to get my story to them without them trying to figure it all out in their head.
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And it's like, why is he doing that?
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Why am I?
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I don't want the audience to be thinking more questions.
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I want them to be lost in it.
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Right.
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So so you don't want to create a premise where they're starting to think about, well, that's a cool haunted house.
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Wonder where that is, and because they're not paying attention to your story.
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Yeah, you don't want them to think of who is this guy?
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Why is he here?
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You don't it it doesn't matter why I'm there.
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Right.
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It should, you know, that that question is answered differently in everybody's head.
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Right.
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And then you, you know, every once in a while you get a magician, it's like, it doesn't make any sense.
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You know, why do you come on stage with a candelabra?
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It doesn't make any sense to me.
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Who are you?
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Why are you there?
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And I'm like, well, I have nine minutes and I'm not speaking.
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I can speak anywhere, right?
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But obviously, I'm in a room that I can't see until I illuminate it.
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And every haunted, haunted house movie from the 50s and 40s always has that scenario, right?
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Yeah, so so as we started digging into the storyline, we started to have to go into waste management.
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Okay.
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Because I had a lot of, you know, when you're pouring a putting putting a story together, you have lots of plots, right?
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And you have to figure out which plot is gonna stick the best.
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Right.
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Because you had you had a hard stop on this.
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Yeah.
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I mean, you don't have a lot of time for this presentation for this competition.
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You had what, nine minutes to do your whole act, right?
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Yeah.
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And well, ten minutes was a cutoff, but you don't want to get there.
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Right.
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Because then you're gonna see a red light, nobody wants to see a red light, and five minutes is your mi minimum.
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And all these other competitors are hitting the five, six minute mark.
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But my story is a little bit more complex, and and so I had to add more.
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And more explanation.
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And by doing that, it added more complexity, and so we had to use the TIM Woods, which is the waste acronym.
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So time is the T part of it.
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The amount of time is that people are waiting for a trick to happen, right?
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How many?
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I don't want to call them illusions or tricks.
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I'm not sure what the actual nomenclature is, but how many were there at the in the final presentation?
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How many illusions did you have?
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Well, in the competition, I could I I I can't I can't even tell you how many.
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But but it's a lot, it's more than two or three.
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Oh my god, yeah.
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Yeah, it's it's it's a lot of small things to lead up to the mirror, yeah.
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And and now that it's not a competition act anymore, I've added even more elements and more skill that I wish I would have had time for uh before.
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So yeah, I mean you're probably looking at you know a hundred different, you know, visual effects and things.
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And it's so so so getting back to what you're saying, you had a a time element you had to work with, and you had to figure out what to keep and what to throw away, all continuously, all during this time.
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Yeah.
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Yes.
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And and that was that that part was difficult because you have to, you know, you don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but right, you know, you have to what do they call it, kill your darlings.
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Right.
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Yeah, exactly.
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Exactly.
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You know, just because you like it doesn't necessarily mean it's going to advance the the act or the or the or the show.
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Right.
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So, you know, when you when you think of the Tim Woods thing, like tea is transport, you know, it's like I'm transporting these my tricks from one part of the table to another.
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What am I bring bringing on stage?
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You know, I'm transporting a candelabra on stage, and we had different forms of candelabras.
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At first, it was a a chamberpot candle, and we found out that after watching it over and over and over again, it's like it should be a candelabra because you want to illuminate a room.
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And candelabras are used for people that in scenarios where you don't know where you're going.
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Right.
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Chamber pot candle is is just like you one candle, you know where you're going, you're gonna go to do your business and then go back to bed.
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Right.
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You don't wanna a candle is a lot is a lot different.
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So you're even thinking of things that maybe on an instinctive level would make sense, and you didn't have to explain it, it just made sense.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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Cause it's interesting.
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What ended up happening is that when I went from a single candle to a candlebra, it created a lot of problems because it was easy to duplicate a single candle, but it wasn't it, but it wasn't spectacular.
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Right.
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But when you duplicate a candlebra, it was like it turned into a miracle.
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There's like, what the where the heck did that come from?
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Right.
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And and it and it increased the complexity of the illusion.
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It it did and it didn't.
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It's it's amazing how you how you can think your way out of a problem.
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Okay, you when you are presented with with something that you're like, how am I gonna make this fit?
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And you just reverse engineer it.
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Right.
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And then the other the other uh part of the waste is the second one is the I, which is inventory.
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So inventory is for me, inventory is as a you could look at it as prop management, how many props am I bringing to the story?
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But it became more complex than that.
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Inventory became just how do I transport this table and this mirror and all the parts and pieces because it was becoming a pain to assemble and disassemble was a thousand parts because it had to be less than 50 pounds.
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And oh my gosh, it was it was nuts.
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So I came up with a system where the table doesn't have any screws, nuts, or bolts.
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It's all cottage together.
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And the mirror is all quarter-inch bolts.
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So if I lose a bolt or whatever, it's easy to find a quarter inch.
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You can do you can do that visually, right?
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So you even extended these principles into the into the construction of everything.
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100%, yeah.
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So it wasn't just the act, it was actually the construction of all the props and all of the various accoutrements you needed to even transport it.
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Because, like you said, you had to take this thing to South Korea, right?
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Uh yes, yeah.
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I mean, that was the goal was to get it to South Korea, right?
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And and the other part, too, is that you know, when you're in the competition this world competition, is that you can't do any magic that's off the shelf, you have to invent okay.
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And so you can't go to the two the magic castle place in Las Vegas and buy something off the shelf and get really good at it and try and compete.
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No, can't do it.
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You'll be locked, you'll be laughed off the stage.
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They will close the curtains on you.
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Okay, that happened.
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Yeah, that created its own challenge because it gets you into 5s.
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And 5s is when you're prop building, you amass massive amounts of just junk everywhere from servos to batteries to wire to coat hangers to you name it.
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There's tons of little things.
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Well, don't stand at the illusion for me.
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I'm still thinking this is all magical.
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Oh, it is, but it but it's but it it can become a nightmare because it's like you get an idea, right?
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And you need to find that tool to make that problem.
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And if you and if that tool is hidden underneath like some project that you did a while ago and you didn't put that tool back where it was, right, you're s you're s wasting precious time to find that one tool.
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Sometimes I'm like, I know I bought this prop.
00:22:13.039 --> 00:22:17.279
I know I know where I I'm just gonna have to buy a new one.
00:22:17.279 --> 00:22:20.480
And then you know, and then you find it.
00:22:20.480 --> 00:22:22.559
Yeah, then you find it, and then you got two of them.
00:22:22.559 --> 00:22:59.930
But it's like it's it's it would be uh you you get to the point of time management where it's like it's it'll cost me less money to buy a new one of these things, right, than to try to find it.
00:22:59.930 --> 00:23:00.490
Right.
00:23:00.490 --> 00:23:03.289
So 5s became very important to me.
00:23:03.849 --> 00:23:08.250
So explain it for the layman listening to this, what is 5s?
00:23:08.329 --> 00:23:14.250
What are the so 5s is is everything in its place and a place for everything.
00:23:14.250 --> 00:23:16.890
That's the simplest way to to put it.
00:23:16.890 --> 00:23:27.690
So yeah, if you imagine, and we've all seen this, a a very anal retentive person in their garage and they have an outline on the wall of every tool.
00:23:27.690 --> 00:23:31.769
So if if the tool isn't put back, there's an outline.
00:23:31.769 --> 00:23:36.970
So instantly they know a tool is not where it's supposed to be.
00:23:36.970 --> 00:23:37.450
It's missing.
00:23:37.849 --> 00:23:38.490
I'm that guy.
00:23:38.490 --> 00:23:39.450
I am that guy.
00:23:39.769 --> 00:23:40.490
Yeah, yeah.
00:23:40.490 --> 00:23:51.690
And and 5s can really be very effective when it's like you cannot close the door on your shop until that tool fills that spot.
00:23:51.690 --> 00:23:52.410
Right.
00:23:52.410 --> 00:23:55.210
Because you'll forget.
00:23:55.210 --> 00:23:55.529
Right.
00:23:55.529 --> 00:23:57.769
And so that's what 5S is.
00:23:57.769 --> 00:24:00.410
It's basic and you can do that with your desk.
00:24:00.410 --> 00:24:00.890
Right.
00:24:00.890 --> 00:24:08.970
I've seen guys at at work that they say, oh no, I said where's your where's your family photos?
00:24:08.970 --> 00:24:10.970
Where's your Christmas cards?
00:24:10.970 --> 00:24:12.569
He goes, Oh no.
00:24:12.569 --> 00:24:15.130
I ever I just have a laptop.
00:24:15.130 --> 00:24:17.930
I can sit sit down anywhere, and that's my office.
00:24:17.930 --> 00:24:18.569
Right.
00:24:18.569 --> 00:24:26.569
The the guys that really know how to do it can really make their their life a lot simpler if you 5S.
00:24:26.569 --> 00:24:33.849
Another way of 5S, right, is your when you open up your junk drawer at home, you know.
00:24:33.849 --> 00:24:36.650
It's what if your junk drawer looked like your silverware?
00:24:36.650 --> 00:24:37.769
Right.
00:24:37.769 --> 00:24:40.490
It's like, yeah, well, that would make sense.
00:24:41.289 --> 00:24:45.690
Unless you're unless your silverware drawer looks like your junk drawer, then then there's a problem there.
00:24:45.930 --> 00:24:46.170
Right.
00:24:46.170 --> 00:24:49.849
But it's called a junk drawer because it's not organized, it's just a repository.
00:24:50.170 --> 00:24:52.970
Because it's the stuff you can't you don't put in the other drawers, right?
00:24:52.970 --> 00:24:53.370
Right.
00:24:53.370 --> 00:24:58.329
So it's not so so you started this process in 2015.
00:24:58.329 --> 00:25:00.730
So when was the competition?
00:25:01.049 --> 00:25:04.890
So the qualifying competition was in 2018.
00:25:05.370 --> 00:25:10.170
So you had approximately three years to work this process.
00:25:10.329 --> 00:25:18.410
Did you do this the whole time, or was this I was I was doing minor competitions leading up to it and not getting anywhere?
00:25:18.410 --> 00:25:26.250
Then in March of 2018, I was on I I was accepted to be on Fool Us, the TV show.
00:25:26.490 --> 00:25:28.170
Which is which features who?
00:25:28.170 --> 00:25:29.210
Penn and Teller.
00:25:29.210 --> 00:25:33.690
There's a national TV show on I forgot it was ABC or somebody like that.
00:25:33.930 --> 00:25:36.089
It's on the CW and it's on YouTube.
00:25:36.089 --> 00:25:46.569
And so I was invited to be on the show, and and if you stump Penn and Teller, then you get to work with them in Las Vegas.
00:25:46.970 --> 00:25:48.569
And what does that mean, stumping them?
00:25:48.569 --> 00:25:50.650
They can't figure out what it is you did.
00:25:50.970 --> 00:25:51.210
Right.
00:25:51.210 --> 00:25:52.809
That's the whole idea.
00:25:52.809 --> 00:25:56.250
That's the whole idea of of being on their program.
00:25:56.250 --> 00:26:06.009
And if you don't stump them, that's like they compliment you, they say you did a really great job, and it's the best way I've ever seen that trick done, but we we know that trick well.
00:26:06.009 --> 00:26:22.009
And so I went in there and I was like, I know that I'm gonna I'm gonna fool these guys because I invented this trick with this mirror, and it's I'll just use the word it it's ballsy.
00:26:22.009 --> 00:26:27.690
What I do is very ballsy, and it's something that no magician has ever done before.
00:26:27.690 --> 00:26:31.529
And and I'm like, okay, so let's let's give it a shot.
00:26:31.529 --> 00:26:35.130
So I do it, and they had no idea, right?
00:26:35.130 --> 00:26:35.930
No idea.
00:26:36.170 --> 00:26:48.650
Yeah, I I've seen the segment because I guess that it's online, you can see it, and you could just the looks on their face was I wouldn't say it was stunned, but it was definitely you can see their gears are working, trying to figure it out.
00:26:48.890 --> 00:26:52.970
Yeah, and backstage I showed them how, and they were like, What?
00:26:52.970 --> 00:26:56.569
I you broke the code, you're not supposed to do that.
00:26:56.569 --> 00:26:59.289
Yeah, well, you know, they're your idols, right?
00:26:59.289 --> 00:27:01.849
You wanna give them a little love.
00:27:01.849 --> 00:27:05.450
So, yeah, so you haven't even shown me, man.
00:27:05.450 --> 00:27:09.289
Well, you gotta be a magician.
00:27:09.289 --> 00:27:16.009
So, anyway, so I win, and and there's these rumblings that are happening in the magic community.
00:27:16.009 --> 00:27:19.130
It's like Stuart Modell just fooled Penn and Teller, it's a pretty big deal.
00:27:19.130 --> 00:27:23.450
And now the competition is that summer.
00:27:23.450 --> 00:27:27.450
And and it had to be a big confidence boost for you, right?
00:27:27.450 --> 00:27:32.009
It's a big confidence boost, and and I thought, you know, I'm gonna win this thing.
00:27:32.329 --> 00:27:34.970
And did you you didn't sit on your laurels though?
00:27:34.970 --> 00:27:37.609
You still continue to refine the process, correct?
00:27:37.609 --> 00:27:38.170
Oh, yeah.
00:27:38.170 --> 00:27:40.650
I refined it, refined it, refined it even more.
00:27:40.970 --> 00:27:44.730
And so when the competition came around, it's in two phases.
00:27:44.730 --> 00:27:55.930
Phase one is you qualify for the Olympics of magic, and then phase two is the finals, who gets to be the winner.
00:27:55.930 --> 00:28:08.089
Now, this was the time where the Society of American Magicians, which is the SAM, and the International Brotherhood of Magicians came together and they called it the Combined Convention, and it was held in Louisville.
00:28:08.089 --> 00:28:12.809
And I was not a hopeful.
00:28:12.809 --> 00:28:20.809
The they had Asian performers that were there, and it was going to be a very, very tight competition.
00:28:21.049 --> 00:28:24.089
Now, now give us an idea of the scale of the composition.
00:28:24.089 --> 00:28:27.049
How many competitors and how many people like win?
00:28:27.690 --> 00:28:32.089
Well, in the in the qualifiers, I can't remember how many competitors there were.
00:28:32.089 --> 00:28:33.450
It was a fair number.
00:28:33.450 --> 00:28:50.009
You can the only only people from like the Asian people were able to compete in the International Brotherhood of Magicians, but to qualify for the Olympics of Magic, you have to be from North America.
00:28:50.009 --> 00:28:50.490
Okay.
00:28:50.490 --> 00:28:53.130
Because they're they're in different sections.
00:28:53.130 --> 00:29:00.890
I did my act, and I got a standing ovation, and I'm like, okay.
00:29:00.890 --> 00:29:07.370
But I made a ma there was a major problem though that nobody knew about but me, but I was really upset.
00:29:07.370 --> 00:29:20.809
Um my mirror wasn't set properly, and it was ahead of my table rather than behind the table, and some people couldn't see, and I'm like, so I actually had to pick it up and set it back in front of the audience, and I'm like, damn it.
00:29:20.809 --> 00:29:24.650
But the act was so strong that it didn't matter.
00:29:24.650 --> 00:29:33.450
So then the evening show happens, and I knew something was up because they said we want you to close the evening competition.
00:29:33.450 --> 00:29:39.849
They said you can put your tickets in the box for the per for the People's Choice Award.
00:29:39.849 --> 00:29:48.890
And there's 2,000 people in the audience, and everybody was telling me, Stu, your box, you can't get any more tickets in.
00:29:48.890 --> 00:29:51.529
Your boxes jammed.
00:29:51.529 --> 00:29:53.450
They didn't even have to count them.
00:29:53.450 --> 00:29:54.250
Right.
00:29:54.250 --> 00:30:00.410
And so when the award ceremony started, now just think about this.
00:30:00.410 --> 00:30:05.049
I had face planted just in the last competition.
00:30:05.370 --> 00:30:05.690
Right.
00:30:06.329 --> 00:30:10.089
And and so the expectation was he might be here.
00:30:10.089 --> 00:30:10.730
Yeah.
00:30:10.730 --> 00:30:12.250
I won everything.
00:30:12.250 --> 00:30:15.289
It blew the doors off of magic for me.
00:30:15.289 --> 00:30:19.769
I mean, I became an I was a nothing, and all of a sudden everybody wanted a taste of me.
00:30:19.769 --> 00:30:25.130
And so I then I had one more year to refine the act.
00:30:25.130 --> 00:30:36.250
You go to Korea, and the competition was solid, it was a lot of fun, and my only goal was just to qualify.
00:30:36.250 --> 00:30:37.370
It wasn't to win.
00:30:37.370 --> 00:30:42.569
Winning was not part of it because it's very subjective and and the competition is so crazy.
00:30:42.569 --> 00:30:42.890
Right.
00:30:42.890 --> 00:30:45.049
But I got in the top 10.
00:30:45.049 --> 00:30:58.089
And and when you think of face planting, and then you get in the top 10, and and nobody from the Western Hemisphere was close to me.
00:30:58.089 --> 00:30:58.730
Right.
00:30:58.730 --> 00:31:00.890
I I was like, okay.
00:31:00.890 --> 00:31:03.289
And I got a world tour out of it.
00:31:03.289 --> 00:31:05.609
So where did the world tour take you?
00:31:05.609 --> 00:31:07.930
Oh, where didn't it?
00:31:07.930 --> 00:31:11.930
I was I was getting I was getting so many offers I had to turn them down.
00:31:11.930 --> 00:31:18.890
I mean, I had offers to go to oh, it's a it's an island nation outside of Australia.
00:31:18.890 --> 00:31:22.250
But anyway, there to be on a TV show there.
00:31:22.250 --> 00:31:37.289
I was supposed to be on a TV show in Italy, but I ended up but I ended up going to the UK, Italy, Sweden, Spain, China, and the entire Caribbean.
00:31:37.289 --> 00:31:40.089
And then Oh, I'm so sorry about that.
00:31:40.250 --> 00:31:42.089
Yeah, and then it's been really a hardship.
00:31:42.329 --> 00:31:43.769
Right, it was it's terrible.
00:31:43.769 --> 00:31:45.529
And then COVID.
00:31:45.529 --> 00:31:46.250
Right.
00:31:46.490 --> 00:31:47.130
Yeah.
00:31:47.130 --> 00:31:48.569
There you go.
00:31:48.569 --> 00:31:50.569
And and there you go.
00:31:50.569 --> 00:32:10.650
So the reason why I went ahead of you on not only was to reconnect because we don't we don't see each other often enough, but to really kind of bring this back home towards the idea of using these relatively uh mechanical or rigid principles to a creative process, right?
00:32:10.650 --> 00:32:21.370
I think that's something that a lot of people in in the photo industry could benefit from, you know, if they're doing like a photo shoot or if they're doing even if they're printing pictures, right?
00:32:21.370 --> 00:32:23.130
Or you know, doing all kinds of things.
00:32:23.130 --> 00:32:31.370
What are the top three things you think somebody should keep in mind as they apply these principles to a creative endeavor?
00:32:31.849 --> 00:32:33.130
Yeah, creative endeavor.
00:32:33.130 --> 00:32:38.250
Well, first of all, is get to know the principles first, right?
00:32:38.250 --> 00:32:40.730
The and and just high level.
00:32:40.730 --> 00:32:45.130
I would say from a creative standpoint is waste elimination.
00:32:45.130 --> 00:32:48.569
Use the use the acronym Tim Woods.
00:32:48.569 --> 00:32:49.529
Just look it up.
00:32:49.529 --> 00:32:52.730
It's every you know, it's the definition is there for you.
00:32:52.730 --> 00:32:54.089
Tim Woods.
00:32:54.089 --> 00:32:56.490
I would apply that.
00:32:56.490 --> 00:33:00.650
The other thing I would apply is continuous improvement.
00:33:00.650 --> 00:33:07.769
I would find something that whenever you do a shoot, you ask yourself, what could I do?
00:33:07.769 --> 00:33:12.089
What one thing could I do differently that would make it better?
00:33:12.089 --> 00:33:12.809
Right.
00:33:12.809 --> 00:33:14.890
Just one tiny incremental thing.
00:33:14.890 --> 00:33:25.609
And what you what I did is whenever I would find something that I improve upon, I'd have a penny, uh, an empty jar, and then I'd have a full penny jar.
00:33:25.609 --> 00:33:30.569
And I would say improvement on the empty jar.
00:33:30.569 --> 00:33:36.410
So whenever you take an idea and you go, oh, okay, I had an improvement, you put it in the improvement jar.
00:33:36.410 --> 00:33:43.769
So now you can actually see progressively how many times you've improved something.
00:33:43.769 --> 00:33:51.049
So you're you're moving the needle, but you're watching it happen because you can see, you can see it and you can feel it.
00:33:51.289 --> 00:33:54.089
And it's a visual cue, it's almost like you're rewarding yourself.
00:33:54.410 --> 00:34:00.170
Yeah, like before you uh walk out of the office, you go, Oh, yeah, that was an idea, and then you put it in there.
00:34:00.170 --> 00:34:06.730
So, yeah, it's small incremental changes, and then they become big changes to me.
00:34:06.730 --> 00:34:07.049
Right.
00:34:07.049 --> 00:34:27.690
And what I did with my act to give you an idea of how powerful that is, is that I had gave myself a 30-day window before I went on a pen and teller foolis, and I videotaped my act 100 times in 30 days with the idea that if I improved one thing, that would be a percentage point.
00:34:27.690 --> 00:34:32.410
So at the end of 30 days, my act would be 100% better than what it was.
00:34:32.410 --> 00:34:32.970
Right.
00:34:32.970 --> 00:34:34.650
And it worked.
00:34:35.610 --> 00:34:45.690
Now, the thing there I think is important is you had to kind of let go of the preconception of you had to be willing to change your story, right?
00:34:45.690 --> 00:34:47.370
To to enhance the improvements.
00:34:47.370 --> 00:35:04.010
You had to be you had to be so wed to the story that you know of the uh of the magician in the haunted house, and you had a preconceived notion it was gonna do this, this, and this, because the improvements would change the story, or enhance it, right?
00:35:04.330 --> 00:35:06.970
Right, yeah, and make it more and clarify it.
00:35:07.610 --> 00:35:10.650
So I know it's with a lot of times with the creative people in particular, right?
00:35:10.650 --> 00:35:19.850
They have their vision and they're gonna lockstep, hold on to that vision like it's you know, gripping around, you know, a snake trying in in their garden, right?
00:35:19.850 --> 00:35:21.930
They're just not gonna let that thing go.
00:35:21.930 --> 00:35:25.690
And sometimes that can be very limiting.
00:35:26.010 --> 00:35:31.370
It it it can be, it can be because you could be holding on to the wrong idea when you think it's the right idea.
00:35:31.370 --> 00:35:38.410
So the third thing uh I would I would say is for photographers, 5S.
00:35:38.410 --> 00:36:00.730
You have so much gear, and and if you don't have the gear in the right place and you and you don't have a ritual for charging your batteries, have a ritual for your bag to make sure that you have the batteries, you have SD cards, you know, there are so many things that if you leave one thing behind, you're screwed, right?
00:36:00.730 --> 00:36:02.890
Or you're delayed, right?
00:36:02.890 --> 00:36:11.850
So, you know, that is something that I would say a photographer could really take to heart is to have that in your bag of tricks.
00:36:12.090 --> 00:36:12.730
Awesome.
00:36:12.730 --> 00:36:14.970
So Stuart has been great catching up.
00:36:14.970 --> 00:36:25.530
Where can people go to find more information about you, your magic, and your lean pro presentation presentations?
00:36:26.090 --> 00:36:37.210
You go to my website, and if if anything, just Google Stuart McDonald Magician, and that's S-T-U-A-R-T.
00:36:37.210 --> 00:36:40.570
And A C M-A-C.
00:36:40.570 --> 00:36:41.210
Yes.
00:36:41.210 --> 00:36:42.570
Mac.
00:36:42.570 --> 00:36:47.290
But my website is Stuart MacDonaldMagic.com.
00:36:47.290 --> 00:36:48.170
Pretty easy.
00:36:48.170 --> 00:36:52.410
And I'm easy to find if you type my name and then add the word magician.
00:36:52.410 --> 00:36:59.930
If you don't type my name, you'll get Stuart McDonald, the golfer, and Stuart McDonald, the the mountain, the mountaineering guide.
00:37:01.050 --> 00:37:01.210
Nice.
00:37:01.210 --> 00:37:01.930
Did not know.
00:37:01.930 --> 00:37:05.930
Listen, to me, there's only one Stuart McDonald, so you're it.
00:37:05.930 --> 00:37:06.890
So yeah.
00:37:06.890 --> 00:37:08.250
Well, thank you much.
00:37:08.250 --> 00:37:11.850
Great to see you again, and thanks again for being on the podcast.
00:37:11.850 --> 00:37:13.130
Oh, you're welcome.
00:37:13.130 --> 00:37:14.090
Anytime.
00:37:14.410 --> 00:37:17.690
Thank you for listening to the Dead Pixel Society podcast.
00:37:17.690 --> 00:37:25.130
Read more great stories and sign up for the newsletter at www.theadpixels society.com.