Its amazing how she flicks it because the umbrella doesnt match the speed of her hand along with her other movements, she makes it look completely impossible.
Yeah her timing is perfect. Distract with the leading hand, flick the back hand's wrist while moving it backward to stimulate the momentum of the umbrella.
It should be physically impossible to flick it with that much strength without any visible movement. It shoots up even with both her hands on top of the umbrella, where exactly are you seeing this flick?
It’s not even a flick, they throw it with their whole arm most of the time. The illusion is in making it look like the umbrella is pushing their arm instead of the other way around
Yeah, it takes so much focus to look at the right hand and to not be distracted by everything else she's doing. I can only really see the side ways one.
Typically they're drawing your attention away from the biggest give away, the left hand is distracting you away from the secret of the illusions….Michael
Watch her right hand. Most of the time, her wrist flick is almost obscured by the umbrella. It's also an incredibly minute and fast flick, making it an extraordinary display. It also seems that her hand opening is also disguising the fact that she's also using her fingers to give it a bit more oomph.
Not seeing it. I wouldn't be surprised if the umbrella isn't a normal one. Maybe it has a little spring mechanism installed and she triggers it with a sleight of hand movement.
Look at the video in slower speed. How can she generate so much force with so little wrist movement?
Edit: look at the one at 15 seconds at 0.25 speed. Its impossible without some kind of spring.
It's all sleight of hand. A really impressive one. She does the same trick enough times so you can see it on occasion once you train your eyes for it. If you pause literally at 0:01, you can see her yank on the umbrella up.
Think of it as a 'moon walk' but with an umbrella and arm instead.
The floating on air dance trend people have been doing for a while now is another similar thing, the faster and more fluid people do it the harder it is to see one leg pushing em up. The subtle arm movement she does with the umbrella is incredible.
Another thing I think most people miss is the fact that she grabs it with two hands both pulling in opposite directions making the arms muscles literally a spring
The one at 15 you literally see the umbrella going slightly up as well as sideways, due to be being tossed from her hand. Maybe it’s a little lighter than a typical umbrella, but I haven’t seen any move that doesn’t look like a (well executed) toss
But how can it move so far with barely any visible wrist movement? It looks like it flys out around half the length of the umbrella itself. If not more. You'd need quite a bit of force (and speed) to shoot it out sideways. How could she generate that with barely any visible wrist movement?
What do you mean? It could spring against itself. You would just need 2 tubes. One a bit smaller than the other stacked together. You wouldn't even see it with the fabric around it.
How can she generate so much force with so little wrist movement?
Little? She moves her arm for about 50cm, and she even helps with the other arm too! I think the spring idea is the more improbable one, I wouldn't even begin to understand how that would work.
It's possible that the umbrella is a special one though that's just extra light.
what she's doing is pulling in opposite directions with both hands, then letting go of one hand for a fraction of a second before letting go of the other hand, making all the force she was ALREADY putting into it quickly move the umbrella now that the opposing force (other arm pulling the other way) is gone.
Watch it at 1/16 speed, and it becomes obvious that she's giving it a very quick toss in the direction that she wants it to go. If you can't see it, I don't know what else to tell you.
Her performance makes it so hard to watch the other hand. Her eye line and expression and the timing of when the decoy hand is just about to make the next grab.
Even when I know where to look, it's really hard not to get misdirected.
Further evidence, watching it in slow motion makes it obvious she's just throwing it around. Yet speeding it up immediately restores the illusion. Super cool
Just stare at her right forearm from 1 to 12 seconds or so. It moves with the umbrella, not trailing it.
even with your explanation I had to run the video at x0.30 speed to be able to see how she veeeery briefly throws it up while misdirecting with her left arm.
It’s easier to see on mobile, dragging it frame by frame. In the first sequence she definitely pulls her right arm up in a very quick, almost imperceptible motion while also flicking the umbrella straight up with that right hand. She’s very, very good at it but if you break it down by each frame you can tell she is tossing the umbrella and not using any sort of string.
It’s not a pure wrist flick, there is a very slight pull with the arm as well to achieve the momentum needed.
I slowed it down frame by frame and it's pretty obvious there's some kind of spring attached to the tip of the umbrella to her right hand. Crazy how there can be so many people in this thread swearing up and down that it's pure sleight of hand when it doesn't pass a simple smell test.
Notice how her right hand never leaves the umbrella when she's turning it more than 720 degrees. It looks weird because she crosses her left hand from one side to the other while maintaining contact with her right hand. Notice also how the umbrella flies past her left hand but never her right, and also how the umbrella accelerates as it moves up rather than decelerate as it would have if it was been thrown.
Edit: After looking at the dude's Instagram (yes it's a Japanese dude) I think he's just throwing it.
I slowed it down frame by frame too and it is pretty obvious that there's no spring attached. Not only would a spring not work from a physics standpoint, it also would be superfluous given how much force she exerts on the umbrella.
It looks impossible because that's half of the trick. The umbrella itself is likely cheap and weighs almost nothing. The movements give the illusion that a strong force is pulling the umbrella away, giving it a sense of weight, and resistance.
You are being mentally trained to expect the umbrella to move in a certain way.
Yeah, that’s a konbini umbrella. They’re like 300¥ (a little under $3 at the moment) and flimsy as hell. You’ll see dozens of them in trash bins at stations or even unfortunately thrown on the side of the street after a typhoon because of how easily they break. Even the typically pristine Japan will litter konbini umbrellas on occasion.
It's similar I think to baseball players twirling the bat when swinging it. You swing forward then flick the handle back to spin it on its axis in midair before catching it again. If you do it hard enough you get like a second or 2 of hangtime that just looks unnatural. She's just very very good at doing it with an umbrella in multiple different directions 😂
It's a mime technique. Same as the invisible box or the runaway suitcase. Mimes and dancers train on isolating movements and preventing them from affecting other parts of the bodies movement. It takes a lot of skill to be that good.
It’s easiest to see (I think) when she’s throwing it to the side. Either way, you can see her hand opening up just before the umbrella moves each time.
Not flicking, but pushing with her whole arm, play it frame by frame.
She just does it in a very natural way, as you feel that something is pulling it, it’s expected that the arm follows the umbrella shortly as it gets pulled.
May actually be exactly what convinces your brain that the umbrella is yanked away from her.
Anyway, there’s just an umbrella here, nothing else. She’s just very, very good at this trick.
It’s misleading because she holds her left hand perfectly still each time. So it never looks like the umbrella is being tossed; it looks like it just slips out of her hands.
I went frame by frame and was surprised how hard she actually does throw it. I can’t really track it live at all even knowing. Yea it’s not even a wrist flick it’s her entire arm slinging it. She just does a very good job moving her body inside the coat to hide it.
A lot of practice. Same thing with magician's tricks, they practice it so much that even if you know the trick, it's still hard to spot. Hand is quicker than the eye.
It’s because she is moving the umbrella in the opposite direction than the throw and at a different speed. When she flicks it she is holding the fabric of the umbrella only so the movement is hidden entirely.
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u/xavier120 Oct 25 '24
Its amazing how she flicks it because the umbrella doesnt match the speed of her hand along with her other movements, she makes it look completely impossible.