Criss Angel born Christopher N. Sarantakos is an American musician, magician, illusionist, escapologist, stunt performer, and the creator and director of the Criss Angel Mindfreak television series on A&E Network. Now he is trying to simulate and replay what Jesus Christ did more than 2000 years ago, by walking on water, in a magic and illusion performance that’s stunning.

What’s the secret of Criss Angel walks on water magic trick? How he does it? The secret will most likely points to illusion and camera video editing. The most convincing explaination to the trick is that Criss Angel was walking on some kind of floating device, or plexiglass, or perspex platform, or transparent plastic bridge, or glass path, or vertical poles, which may have some gaps for swimmers to occasionally swin across it. Some also suggested that wires support was been used to hang him, which may be positioned under his arm, especially on the first 25 seconds or so. For all these tricks and optical illusion to happen, so all the ‘audiences’ and ‘swimmers’ in the vidoe are actually the actors in the magic that were hired to add realistic and believable feel. The video may be edited by using CGI to hide the think platform in the water.

Some even suggested that the shots were taken on different times that is edited together to give you that illusion of reality. The theory is that because at some times he demonstrated no weight hitting the surface, while on the far away shots, his weight is visible as he hits a surface. Another theory is that the toes on his back foot bend as walking on a flat surface, while on another sequence of the video which supposedly shot from Criss Angel’s camera as he looks down while walking, his toes no longer bend. This magic theory summarily said that during normal angles of video shooting, Criss was walking on plexiglass under the water surface, but for the video angles above him and shoot from Criss’s point-of-view angles were done when he was hanging above the water.

Some interesting points highlighted from the video on the magic are:

  1. Criss Angel walked on his heels and his pant hung down and covered the heels.
  2. His walking style looks unreal and unnatural on the front part of the magic.
  3. The girl in red bikini swam underneath the water instead of crossing the path.
  4. Water line on his pants changed, if you believe that the magic sequence was shot in multiple times.
  5. A girl crossed between his legs after he took down his shoes, so the area may be without any platform.
  6. In some shots, Criss Angel didn’t show weight hitting or weight shifting when stepped down, which made suspension possible.
  7. His feet seemed like not stay in a position when stepping.

This article is re-published from My Digital Life article about Criss Angel walks on water magic trick.

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 6th, 2006 at 9:46 am and is filed under Magic and Illusion. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.