Are David Blaine's Card Tricks Real or Fake?

[Myriad209]

I was watching this little show last night on TLC of David Blane walking around the streets and doing his magic tricks. Some of it, I could believe was real, some of it, no way in hell. He actually levitated off the ground a few times, and it looked EXTREMELY real and all these little tricks he did were done outside, so there couldn't have been any secret strings attached. There was only a couple of times where it looked like the video had actually been edited, and looked sort of fake, but most of them looked 100%. I'd like to know how much of this is real (if any), and how much is fake (if any).

 

[matthyaouw]

The majority of it will be merely slight of hand, hidden cards etc.
I once watched a program showing what is probably the same levitation trick as you saw, but with an explanation. For starters, he gets together a group of people to show them the trick. If you stand at the right angle to people, you can make it appear that you are levitating an inch or so by supporting yourself with a part of the foot furthest from the observers. The reactions of the onlookers are captured on camera. After the onlookers have dispersed, in the same spot he is levitated by wires. For extra authenticity, extras, camera crew members etc wearing similar clothes to the original onlookers are positioned carefully, so that the cameraman can do an over the shoulder shot of him on the wires, so it looks like the same audience are present throughout. The clips are then pasted together.

 

[Myriad209]

There was another thing where he took a quarter and he said something like a quarter heats up when u squeeze it. So he does that, then he actualy bites part of the quarter off. Then he actually like spit the piece of quarter he bit off and madde it somehow latch onto the piece of quarter he was holding... what kind of camera trick is this?

 

[GOD__AM]

I saw that trick with the quarter too. It looked like he had the quarter rigged with a spring loaded hinge. It was cut to look like he took a bite out (thats when he bends the quarter at the hinge). Then you only see one half until he releases the spring, and seems to spit out the broken piece. The quarter pops back very fast and is convincing. Maybe I'm wrong but that's how it looked to me.

 

[Myriad209]

oh well, even if those are all fake, i could never stand on a giant pole suspended in the air like 100 feet high with a diameter of about 2 1/2 feet for 72 hours, or all those other things he's done

 

[Berislav]

Here are some of David Blaine's tricks explained:
http://www.free-card-tricks.net/blainemagic.html

 

[matthyaouw]

I saw that trick with the quarter too. It looked like he had the quarter rigged with a spring loaded hinge. It was cut to look like he took a bite out (thats when he bends the quarter at the hinge). Then you only see one half until he releases the spring, and seems to spit out the broken piece. The quarter pops back very fast and is convincing. Maybe I'm wrong but that's how it looked to me.

You're right. I saw this one explained too and that's exactly how its done.