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One of the more baffling illusions is when Dynamo froze the water in a
fountain and pond.
For those who haven't seen it, it goes like this:
The magician gets a bottle of water from a party
guest. He asks her to tip half the water out
and pass the bottle to him. "Here you are Mr D".
He then shakes the bottle and the water inside turns to ice.
He then goes over to a fountain and pond,
puts his hands in the pond where the water freezes.
Next you see the running water of the fountain
suddenly freeze as we watch it.
"Wow that's amazing".
"Did you see that...the water froze". How could it possibly be done..
Most people suspect camera trickery or CGI
or at the very least stooges and an audience in on it.
None of these are required but of course it's not a spontaneous
illusion, it required very special setup.
The illusion is actually in three parts. For the bottle part, the bottle
after half has been poured out, is switched through standard sleight-of-hand
for an already prepared one. You put salt in the water
which allows the water to freeze at a slightly lower temperature.
You put the water bottle in the freezer
until it's almost frozen. If you time it
just right, after you take it out of the freezer,
if you shake the bottle it will cause the water to crystallize and
freeze immediately. This part is important in the performance of the trick
as it makes the audience think that the rest of the
illusion must be done in the same way. In fact
this is not the case. Lets look
at the possibilities for the second part,
the freezing of the pond. Could it be done
in the same way as the first with chilled water ready to crystallize?
No!, because the pond water wasn't shaken enough.
The magician's hands barely affected the surface.
Also it works for small volumes
but for a pond size amount, the margin between
freezing & not freezing is just too fine to guarantee it working.
Another option is putting dry ice, which is
frozen carbon dioxide, a very cold material
that will instantly freeze water on contact.
Since the magician's hands are in the water,
this method would freeze his hands resulting
in his hands being amputated. This leaves this possibility
a pre-frozen layer of ice on a movable
platform below the water level. This is then raised
at the appropriate time. In the illusion,
the ice cracks to make it look like it's been freshly frozen.
A twisting of the ice will achieve this effect. It makes the hydraulics more
complicated
but it might have been considered necessary
to make the effect look good. The third part is the freezing
of the water fountain in mid-stream. This is achieved by having an ice-like
sculpture
(ice would probably melt too easy) already in place.
Water flows around it
hiding it and making it look like a normal fountain. When the water is turned off
the sculpture reveals himself. When you look at the official video,
take a look at the volume of water just before
it freezes. It suddenly gets a lot thinner. Ironically
this illusion is just so good
that people don't buy it. They think that it is
done by camera tricks or CGI
or Stooges and a knowing audience.
when in fact, this is not the case.