MINDvention 2012 Pictures from Days 1&2

Danny and Robert really know how to arrange a convention schedule. The first event of the day didn't begin until 10:00 a.m. which left plenty of time to sleep in after a late night to early morning session. I finally retired to my room around 2:00 to work on an upload the podcast (which, BTW, I hope you enjoyed) and as I left the bar, there sat about 15 of the top mentalists in the world huddled around a table talking about the next best thing that I know I must soon have in my show...and probably yours, too.

But to go back in time a bit (which we mentalists are wont to do), Danny Archer hosted a fascinating interview with Eric Dittleman, finalist on America's Got Talent. I hope to grab him for a few words here on The Magic Word, too. Then followed a panel discussion on TV mentalism featuring a variety of international performers. From left to right in the picture below: Eric Dittleman (U.S.), Sartori (Germany), Haim Goldberg (Canada), and Lior Suchard (Israel).

Paul Draper hosted the Attendee Show which essentially is anyone who wants to perform before their peers. Although it is a scheduled show, the performers are gathered from the registrants who tell Danny that they want to perform. There is a wide variety of performers and performances and personalities from this international group.

Due to a technical error while trying to video record a first day lecture, Allison Campbell repeated her lecture on the "Do's and Don'ts of Corporate Mentalism". Essentially it was a short marketing course on getting work and doing work on the exhibitor floor. It was a fascinating presentation from a professional trade show worker. Not just another viewpoint from the distaff side, but an introspective look at what and how those interested in getting the work can get it.

One fascinating point of view tip was to look at other trade show performers as friends and business associates and not as competition. Look at the pie being larger...not someone else trying to get a piece of your pie. The picture below is a phone number prediction taken direct from her act and sold after her lecture.

075: Day 1 - MINDvention 2012 in Las Vegas, NV

After a little bit of a travel difficulty due to a layover in San Diego, I finally arrived in Las Vegas for the first day of the annual MINDvention at the Palace Stations Hotel & Casino. I missed the first couple of lectures but Gregg Lancaster and Bob Patilla filled me in on the details that you will hear in this podcast. I then chatted with Roy Zaltsman from Israel who will lecture for us tomorrow plus he will be one of the featured performers in the final night gala show. Roy talked a bit about the MARS convention (Magic At the Red Sea) he produces in Israel. One of the things he offers is a webcast of unpublished videos that is more of a sampling of some of the tricks extracted from the lectures featured at MARS. You can learn a lot from these free videos by subscribing to his newsletter at: http://telepathy.co.il/unpublished

We wrapped up the day with an interview with Paul Draper who talked about his upcoming lecture tour and his long association with MINDvention as one of the emcees.

2012 MINDvention
Scott Wells

Download a MP3 file of this podcast by Clicking Here then right click to save the file. You can also download the MP3 media file directly from the RSS feed by Clicking Here.