A mix of Time Travelers, Time Capsules, and BOF Bonuses
Gregg teaches animation and invents and writes about magic and illustrates about magic. He also paints and plays keyboards.
3 April 2012
Greetings, from the future. I’ve always been interested in time travel, and now I ARE ONE!
Years ago I did a painting I thought would make me rich, of a clock built as a spiral, trying to show time as a cyclical, not linear, or maybe better said, as a combination of the 2 ideas.
Lately, especially after reading Stephan Hawking’s recent stuff, when I realized he was insane, I stopped believing in the possibility of time travel … and one day I awoke and … it was the future!
WOW!
So I named the newsletter TIME TRAVELER, but there is also a card trick I came up with which I’ll run first … then … back to rehashing my old newsletters. So ……..
Time Traveler The Card Trick
By Gregg Webb
For quite a while this was the card trick I would always do on laymen. You get familiar with a pet trick. After a long time, it suddenly hit me that I could improve the trick. My commentaries are not so much about the people as they are about DETAILS OF HOW TO IMPROVE A TRICK BIT-BY-BIT UNTIL THEY APPROACH MAGIC. YAY!
And then, a new handling presented itself on the ending “SHOW” and I realized I never wrote this trick up but now could include the new work.
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Effect: Similar but shorter than Bro. Hamman’s trick “card on the table” where a selection disappears amongst “4” Aces then reappears as the card on the table from the start. In mine it is not the 4 Aces but 2 Jokers that make it go, but the structure is different – in mine the selection is lost in the deck, and before the Jokers are taken out … but a card (an unknown card) was placed on the table at start. It ends up “being” the selection! (Between 2 Jokers used to scoop it up)
Mine was inspired by Trevor Lewis move but that changed to the Gregg Webb Move. Required: A deck and 2 Matching Jokers.
Setup: 2 matching jokers on top.
The trick: False cuts or shuffles if desired. Then – take top card and put on table and say “Please note that I won’t go near this card until the end of the trick.” (or “experiment”). Also note that you don’t show this card. It is unknown! It is the mystery.
There is another matching Joker on top. Have a card selected from the middle of deck. After they show it around, for the replacement, do a swivel cut (or swing cut) taking top half of deck into left hand. With your right hand (holding bottom half of deck) gesture that they replace card on left hand group.
After they do, drop right hand’s group – the original bottom half … on top but keep a break. After a pause, double-undercut to the break. Selection will be on top, above the other Joker from the 1 on table. (There are many controls possible. This is fine. For laymen. Say, “I can’t find your card …it is lost … but I can get a Joker to appear on top. By magic”. Tap the top of the deck and then do a double turnover to show the Joker (a double, backed by their selection). Turn the double and deal the top card (the selection) to the table well away from the mystery card (a Joker) placed down at the start of the trick.
Saying, “I also need the other Joker” you tap the deck and turn up the same Joker they just saw but it seems like another joker and you turn it down and put it face down on the face down selection they think is the other Joker. Say “The reason I need the two Jokers is so I can scoop up the card from the table without touching it!
Here, after scooping up the mystery card, is where I used to do the Trevor Lewis move but now do the Gregg Webb Move! I’ll go into exquisite detail.
The 2 card pile you just made is a joker on top of the Selection! The Mystery Card is actually the other joker. The audience thinks the 2 card pile is 2 jokers. They saw 1 joker twice.
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Gregg Webb Move: Pick up the top card of the pile of 2 with right hand (It is a joker) Pick up the other card of the pile of 2 with the left hand. Use these to scoop up the mystery card (it’ll end up between them) Note: Follow these details! The right hand scoops under the mystery card and the left hand’s card goes above the mystery card … sandwiching it.
Here comes “the Move”. Note that mine derives from Bro. Hamman’s but is completely different. I like mine better … but not just because it’s mine. I tested the three methods … including the Bro. Hamman ending to “Card On Table!”
Your right hand draws the Bottom card out to your right and flips it sideways to your left into a face up condition. Drop this on top of the packet. (A Joker shows) Next your left hand shows the lower card the same way. But draw card out to your left, then turn it face up and put it under all. Another Joker shows.
Next you have someone look at the spread deck! This is the new idea!
Yes, indeed-y-deed! Short of having a card signed, spreading the deck so they can see there is no duplicate … or whatever it is “they” think.
People used to sometimes say “Oh, I see, it is the same as my card”. [When really it was their card] But spreading the deck first so they see their card is not there helps them
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realize the card to be revealed in the sandwich IS in fact their card …not just “the same as” their card.
Without a signature! Of course, if you want to have it signed, by all means have them sign it.
And finally, have spectator pull the face down card … the mystery card supposedly, from between the 2 Jokers.
The patter is something like “you didn’t see me go, but I traveled back in time – switched the card – and came back to the then “NOW” and finished the trick!”
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Nate Leipzig – What a Guy!
Nate Leipzig did a trick with 5 spectators who all got a 5 card hand of draw poker. Each upjogged 1 and concentrated. Then they pushed the cards flush and the hands were collected. I'm not sure if there was a false shuffle (whether you do or don't false shuffle makes 2 different effects - since the trick uses second-dealing, if you don't false shuffle the trick seems to be about dealing. If you do false shuffle, the trick may seem to be about trick shuffles and help hide the use of seconds.)
His way used a key number for each hand. You'd deal regular up to your number per 'round' and then begin holding back to get the card to your (5th) hand. You'd then show you dealt yourself all the selections.
Marlo had a version in Marlo In Spades. I forget the details. I came up with a version with a punch deal (bump, blister) for feeling the card for the second deal and there was a special feature that Meir Yedid told me was original. What I did was have the 'punched' bump card be the highest card in each hand (via a setup) so that each spectator was to look at their hand and remember and concentrate on the highest card in the hand.
Pretty clever (ahem). Then they could mix their hand - didn't matter. The punch card in each 'round' of dealing would be held back for me.
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Today's offering retains that gaff being the highest card in the hand, each hand, of 5 hands, but with a different gaff. Here I went to a short card being the highest card in each of 5 hands. My thinking is this, lately, I'm giving up on my trick deals for other methods. Quite simply, I'm getting away from the 'real work' and trying more for magic than for what a gambler would do.
Here's how it would work, then the details. After each person has memorized the highest card in their hand, each hand would be shuffled and upon getting it back, each hand would be cut at the short card. This puts the short card at the top of packet. Next you need to run it to the bottom. The first card peeled in an overhand shuffle must be a single...the rest are less important. Now the Short card arrives at the bottom of the hand and hand is dropped on the deck. One interesting detail is that if when you get the hand after the spectator's shuffle, the short force card (highest in the hand) may be at the top or bottom of hand and if this is the case, harder to detect and also hard to find and cut to. When this happens, give the packet a casual cut in the middle and begin again to feel for the short card to cut to - then run it to bottom.
Do the same with each packet, and when done with all 5 hands, you will have stacked the selections to arrive at the 5th hand when dealing out poker.
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I've substituted casual cut(s) and toying with the cards (the run) which should look almost absent minded while you patter about how each person merely thought of a card from their hand. Blah blah blah.
* * * Ain’t time travel wonderful?!
9 May 2012
Hey! I was sitting in a pizzeria in Queens, NY. A guy with a FDNY shirt (fire fighters) was in a corner booth (by his self) talking on a cell phone loud about how the world would end May 21, at 6:00! See, he even had the time…6:00 at the International Date Line…then it (the end) would follow around the world as the world turns. And he kept yelling (I think he was talking to an accountant or relative in that field) that this was all in the bible!
I kept wanting to tell him it wasn’t in the bible…or perhaps, offer to bet him that the world wouldn’t end…but then my pizza was ready and I could leave and was thus saved!
Coins, Coins, Coins
2 Copper and 1 Silver (or Copper Silver Brass) with no gaffs!! By Greggo Webbo
Gary Kurtz has a great move in his book called Take Two which is a switch of 2 coins for 2 other coins, based on a Marlo vanish with 1 coin.
First I'll teach the Marlo, then skim over the Kurtz switch and go into my variation of the Kurtz which will be a 1 for 2 switch, not much originality there I guess, but then I'll teach my use for it which you'll like.
Holding a coin between right thumb and 1st finger, insert this into the left thumbhole of a loose left fist. It goes all the way into a left Classic Palm. Then you can pretend to hand the coin to someone but when they open their hand to accept, you can open your hand and by wiggling the fingers, 'prove' the coin has gone. (Me, I like dodges...I just had the thought that I might use this if I added a dupe coin in right Classic Palm from the start, so just when they notice the 'vanish' by the left hand, that you can produce a coin from
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their left elbow with your right hand (to get their attention off the left hand) and then to take this visible coin with the left fingertips to take the curse off the left claw.
That also introduced the idea of a dodge I'll use in the routine I'll suggest for my Take 2 for 1 variant (or is it Take 1 for 2??).
The history lesson is that the Kurtz move involved having 2 coins in left fingerpalm. Let's say those are coppers. Now, in view are 2 silver coins squared at the tips of the right first finger and thumb and these are inserted in the left thumbhole of loose left fist and all the way into left Classic palm. Now, as you open your left hand over a table, or over someone's open hand, perhaps after blowing on the left fist for magic or luck, the coppers drop out. This is such an elegant move, I love it.
All that I did was change the two squared silvers into just 1 silver because it fits the 2 Copper 1 Silver theme, or you could have a copper and a Chinese coin in left fingerpalm and when the silver is inserted it changes into a Copper and a Brass!
All I added next for a dodge end is to have a dupe silver in right classic palm from the start. After the 2 coppers or 1 copper and 1 brass fall from the left hand, you can produce the silver with your right hand.
A more complex routine is to have dupes of everything. Let's use the 2 copper, 1 silver format for explanation purposes. Hidden in left fingerpalm is one set of 2 coppers. The other set of 2 coppers is distributed with one at the left fingertips, in view, and 1 at the right fingertips, in view. A dupe silver is hidden in right classic palm.
A separate silver is on the table in view or on a spectator's palm.
The routine here would be to show the coppers that are in view, and this pose helps hide the face that both hands are dirty. Now pass the left's copper to the right hand so now the right hand has 2 coppers at the fingertips. Now go to a right side pocket and ditch the 2 coppers.
When your right hand comes out of pocket, silver still hidden in its palm, go straight to the visible silver on table or on spectator's hand, and pick it up.
This silver goes into the loose left fist and into left classic palm. After a magic gesture or word, 2 coppers drop out of left hand and onto table or their hand. To 'dodge' and pull attention away from the left hand, produce the silver from right classic palm... perhaps from a spectator's elbow.
Put it at left fingertips to give the dirty left hand something to do. Eventually take all visible coins to pockets, both hands working at once, ditch the dupe at the same time.
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One hears that the danger of Time Travel is that if anything should change or be changed that that will alter the future. I say … “Bring it off.” Seriously … I didn’t make it clear that during the performance to come that the person with the dog whistle is an assistant or stooge hidden in the wings (or the cloak room) is the one who blows the dog whistle, not you the magician. I didn’t mean that of course but in my writing I didn’t make it clear enough. Now I can!
Dog Whistle and Dog of Psychic Dog I
If you have a dog, great! If not, get one, and preferably a Jack Russel Terrier.
This trick takes some training - the good news is, being magicians, we are pretty smart. All animals respond to food rewards or ’treats'. What you have to do is train your dog to bark when he hears the whistle. Hint: Tease the dog by waving the treat around but not giving it until the dog barks. Then give the treat and blow the whistle and say GOOD DOG! After a while, change the procedure until the whistle is blown first, and then wave the treat around.
What you are really doing is training the dog to bark to get the treat.
In performance we will be using ESP symbols or playing cards. Either using a stack, rosary stack, or whatever method, even a force, the person with the whistle must know what card it is. Giant cards would help. When the selected (?) card is shown, and the whistle is blown...the dog barks. Whistle is blown secretly by assistant!! What is required to get this trick to work is that the person who selected must be convinced the card is really lost. One pro way would be a force deck and a regular deck that is missing the card forced. A very easy deck switch is done while the spectator shows the selected one to the mob. Just turn away, and the old poacher's pocket (Topit to you magicians) does the trick. The selection is replaced in the new deck which is regular and with the replacement is now perfect and the helper shuffles.
No for everybody – especially not those with no dog or desire to get one … but a fun thing to think about.
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PS. I am writing a short story about a ghost dog that comes when the dog whistle is blown … it’s a spooky story! It may get animated.
* * * One thing I try to do is put in less cards unless good.
Sometimes I come up with an idea for a gimmick and actually bother to make it up and test it.
This went over well with magicians and magiciennes. I never tested it on laymen. I should. Maybe it isn't just a magician fooler.
What this is, is an attempt to make a rubber band like a rope gimmick. The magnetic kind.
Imagine really linking two big fat rubber bands. True.
At Staples Office Supplies, and I'm sure elsewhere, you can find thin rubberized magnets in sheet form to stick to the back of a business card so someone can stick it on their refrigerator. Peel and stick. This stuff is thin enough to cut easily with a scissors and the adhesive is sticky enough to stick onto a wide rubber band.
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Cut two small squares of the rubberized magnet less than the width of your big rubber band. Cut the band, and affix the magnets after peeling. You'll also need a regular ungimmicked band and I've found that this one is best being the same color and not a different color. So, now we're ready. Like Linking Ropes. You can do the Vernon move of supposedly rotating the gimmick band in your hands but it is really mime and an illusion and the gimmick stays hidden behind the fingers. Also, with a switch the same one can be shown clean, supposedly exchanged for the other, but really the same one is shown again. Casual and bold, this will fool.
Pot Holder for Close Up Mat
Especially H.P.C!
Those that know me know I like HPC. One trouble is that you need a table and also a soft surface...a mat or I've folded a scarf to get some thickness or even a jacket, mouse pad. The reason is that after you slap down — there are 2 times you slap down, and then you want to pick up the coins again without fumbling. You need to get a rhythm going and a fumble destroys that.
And so today I offer the idea of something found in any home you may visit. Now you don't have to work on the rug (which isn't bad) and the idea is the lowly pot holder for lifting something hot off the stove. See my drawing; should tell the whole story. The size is definitely big enough for the left hand to do its slapdown and pickup (and now those coins are protruding from heel of fist...and then slap down and do the move with the right hand with the assist from the left hand letting go and moving aside. Then pick up the coins on the pot holder which are added to the ones concealed in the right hand...and you are on your way.
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A New L’Homme Masque Load Variation
I've been having fun with this. I think you'll like the feel. Let’s say we have just 2 coins - a silver and a Chinese, or whatever you have that are different colors. Just the 2 coins is the beauty of this one.
Have 1 (let’s say silver) on the table or spectator's open hand. Put the other (let’s say Chinese) into the left hand, supposedly, but really only pretend to do that and really keep it right fingerpalm. I've been using the Old English Drop vanish which keeps the coin in right fingerpalm. If you like, you can use a vanish that leaves the coin in right CLASSIC palm, but not many have a great classic so I have lately been creating around fingerpalm.
Whichever, I'll explain for both, reach for the silver with the right hand. Spectators think the coin is in the left fist (nothing but air really there). We are about to do a Palm Change. You can cover a small move with a bigger move by saying IF I SQUEEZE REAL HARD to cover any 'tells' of your change...you can go classic-to-classic or if you have used fingerpalm, you can pick up the silver and push it into the right hand classic palm in spite of the fingerpalmed Chinese.
In any case, drop the Chinese to fingertip rest and then move it to between the right 1st and 2nd fingertips as shown.
Now, with the Chinese coin held pinched between the right 1st and 2nd fingers, do your L'Homme Masque Load of the Silver into the left fist.
To end reveal the silver by opening the left fist smartly and display the transposed coins in opposing hands.
And there you have it!
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Copper-Silver with 2 C/S Coins
When you have 2 C/S coins in play it allows you to use some interesting moves are possible. There's the Jules DeBarros move from Coins of Ishtar where you hold two coins (both c/s) fanned between 1st and thumb and you see 1 is copper and 1 silver! Turning the hand over to show the other sides, and they see 1 copper, and 1 silver! I came up with one, with 2 coins overlapping on the hand, 1 copper and 1 silver (both c/s coins) and doing like a one-handed ribbonspread turnover (with coins instead of cards) to show the other sides - guess what they see? 1 copper and 1 silver! Right! And if we add the Addendum Move we are SET with plenty of deceptions. If we do the Addendum Move with both hands at once, just remember to look at the hand with the Copper coin showing ...that'll be our little rule.
Effect: A copper coin and a silver coin are shown. They are shown on both sides, over and over, in a myriad of ways (!). Then one is placed on the palm of each hand..., and then they just change places and are shown both sides each, (in a myriad of ways). (!) I like this approach to magic...very clean looking magic with a lot of subtlety and not having to switchout at end...but I'll give a method even so (for those fastidious souls; plus I like the switchout (from my dice routine).
Method with details: You need two Copper/Silver gaffs. If you want to do the switchout, you need a real copper and silver too. You also need a drawstring bag.
To begin have a gaff on each hand, just on your side of the line where the fingers join the palm. One shows silver and one shows copper. Now you'll do the Addendum Move with both hands at once, and as you do, look at the hand with the copper side showing. Also, if at all possible, have 'tails' showing on the silver side of gaffs. Anyway, do the Addendum Move, as taught here many times before. Close hands, turn fists palm down, get thumbs in there and pin gaffs to insides of fingers then straighten fists and wrists and straighten fingers and push gaffs foreward as you set down on table. (Note: In certain cases with this move you don't have to put the gaff or gaffs on table, but can just pause for the viewers with the coins pushed foreward protruding enough to see. In this case you could do that then place one on the other fanned out, and do the Jules DeBarros move (the paddle move thing). End by doing my 2-coin ribbonspread turnover style 'show'. If you are casual and look at the hand with the supposed copper, you will have convinced all that you have 1 of each kind without a switch needed.
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Announce that the coins will change places and here we do an Addendum Move to prove while they are looking, that there is 1 silver and 1 copper. Pick them up so that this time the coins are on the fingers not the palm. This time when you close your fist the coins turn over. Then to make it seem mysterious, turn each fist palm down and then palm up again then open each hand one at a time and here you could open each finger in order starting with the pinkie...when done smoothly this adds class. Now end with another Addendum Move with both coins at once...to kill any possible thought that the coins might be c/S coins not that laymen would call them that.
Repeat the DeBarros move and the Webb ribbonspread turnover with coins and then...if you must... Webb's Switchout.
In your right pocket is the open drawstring bag with the regulation coins inside. Pretend to put the gaffs into your left fist. Really you fingerpalm them in your right hand. Occasionally jiggle your left hand a tiny bit (keeping that hand alive) and as your right hand goes to the right pocket, you ditch the gaffs outside the bag as quietly as you can but if there is any coin talk, the little jiggles of your left hand is meant to cover and explain that. Come out with the bag which is open and pretend to just dump the supposed left hand coins into it.
Actually this is just acting, but as soon as you act that out, do a brisk shake of the bag (as if making sure the coins go all the way in, which jingles the real coins inside, and pull the drawstring if you want and set the bag down off to the side. Don't offer it to anyone to examine...so just act like you are done and go into a card trick or something. Someone may ask to see the coins and if they do, you are safe and clean. While they look just say "An American silver half-dollar and an English copper penny" as if they were only curious as to what those odd coins were...play dumb about even the existence of gaff coins.
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Return to Poor Man’s Raven “The Ghost of Ramsay”
By El Webbo
Perchance you remember poor man's raven? I ran that in an older newsletter. It used a palm magnet made from a bottlecap with a magnet and some felt glued on, and a silk, and a shim coin or a shell coin with some shim material glued inside, or a small magnet just as good. You also needed a real coin.
The trick, which is now famous since Jeff McBride and David Regal both like it, was to put the real coin on your left hand, then the silk and then on top of all the shell with shim or magnet inside. Well, a wave of the flat right hand with palm magnet inside caused the top coin to poof vanish into thin air, because the coin would jump onto the palm magnet in the right classic palm. Then the right hand would whisk away the silk to reveal that the coin penetrated the silk just like that!
So I was wondering - How can one improve on such wonderfulness?
And then it hit me! Wow! John Ramsay never did a trick like this! But! Hmmm.
I guess his Coins and Cylinder is his most famous thang. (I never really worked on that there ting...yet I can give an homage to John Ramsay just the same...in this raven trick. Wow!
First off, let's agree that the shimmed shell coin or small magnet (tiny in fact) glued under the shell be what we use and not a shimmed coin that is not a shell, or a magnetic coin that is not a shell, but solid with the shim hidden inside. This is because we want a hollow space on the under side. This is because we will hide something there.
What we are doing is an idea from Ramsay's Coins and Cylinder and in that trick there is a cork (really 2 corks). In our trick we are adding a penny (really 2 pennies) to the trick done with a silverish Half Dollar or Quarter that seems to penetrate a hand in the most amazing way except that now there will be a penny placed on the Quarter (let's say) and when the Quarter disappears, the penny remains (adding a level of mystery...if you picked up the quarter someway, wouldn't the penny go with it? Therefore... since the penny is there well then the magician must have done something else.) You'd pick up the penny and whisk away the silk and there is the missing Quarter under the silk. The Props: As stated, the palm magnet is best made so you can palm the rough mouth of a bottlecap, and there is a magnet and felt glued to the bottom. The shell quarter with small magnet or shim glued inside (think 5-minute Epoxy) can have a magnetic penny that attaches to the upper side of the gaff quarter...but even more practical and easy is just a regular penny glued with Epoxy to the quarter, a little off- center. (Just before doing the trick, you can mime moving the penny around, adjusting it etc. Just as good.)
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But...under this gaff is a single dupe regular penny. Then (all this on your flat left hand) the silk, and under the silk on the left hand is the regular dupe quarter - ungaffed.
Perform: With palm magnet in place, use your right fingers to supposedly move the penny around on top of the quarter. This is justy mime. Next, pass your right hand over the gaff and it jumps on and clings to, the palm magnet. It looks like the quarter disappears, but really what they see is the penny that was under the entire gaff. This is like the cork in the Ramsay trick.
Use your right first finger and thumb to pinch the penny and pick it up. Use the right middle and ring fingers to clip a corner of the hank and whisk it away. There on the left palm is the real quarter with, hopefully, a date that matches the one on the gaff - and the dates on the pennies should match as well...as well as the amount of shine.
I hope you like this variation on Poor Man's Raven.
On time travel: “Going forward in time isn’t hard … but it is slow! Going back in time is the challenge. Time capsules require consideration. This newsletter is more like a time capsule. Maybe my next newsletter will be called “Time Capsule.” Wow!
Gregg Webb 2012
19 June 2012
To me … one of the most interesting things about time is that before the big bang, there was no time!! Think about that. Then, think about it again. What would it be like with no time … or anything else either?
My question is … has time stayed constant from the beginning or is it slowing down? Or, is it speeding up? Einstein would say it changes. The rate of expansion of the universe is said to be speeding up! Is that the same as time speeding up? There will be a quiz next month!
Back to rehashing old magic.
Wait! Wait! Wait! Stop the presses. I just heard that Hermetic Press helmed by Steve Minch will be releasing in June 2011 two new books … essays by Jamie Ian Swiss, who, although ‘knowledgeable’ … when he himself does magic … it is awful, so you think “If he knows so much, why not apply it???”
And yet … there are people who know a lot about many things yet can’t apply it. “Those that can’t do, teach!” So I guess he’s a teacher of magic.
(Meanwhile, there are many people who are great at something but can’t teach. This is very common.)
I favor the situation of someone who CAN DO and CAN ALSO TEACH. * * *
But I’m willing to believe Steve Minch when he says “He knows his stuff” yet I probably won’t read essays.
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Next is something I would read and may get … Barry Richardson’s Curtain Calls. Barry’s brand of mentalism is just swell … So I’m sure Steve Minch is right on his call of this one being very good, too. Steve is modest and I’m sure it is even better than that.
* * *
And so on into the vaults of the Time Capsule that is my collection of old newsletters in search of the rare worthwhile item. Wait … there’s one … and it’s not cards.! Yay! Cards are cool but there is so much written about them already … plus as we speak new card ideas are coming out by the “card tricks crowd.”
Not to say I don’t like cards, and I admit trying to come up with the next new thing with them … from time to time … but I also like to invent non-card items … and at least some of the card specialists .. read only do cards … don’t (or can’t … even if “can’t” is only because there is no time since all their time is taken up with cards.)
* * *
This next move could also be done with that Renee Levand move I explained lately. Check it in!
More Coins – Addendum Move with a Shell
Those that know me know about the Addendum Move, which is a false turnover I invented for 'proving' that gaff coins aren't. Good in C/S tricks with C/S coins to show as if the same color on both sides. I'll review this but let me just say that today's article is about using this move with a shell!
A little theory on this move. A) You must use this with misdirection. The best way is to have a gaff in one hand and a regular coin in the other hand, and as you work both hands at once, you look at the hand with the regular coin! Furthermore, you do the Addendum Move with the hand with the gaff (the hand you are NOT looking at) and with the other hand and its regular coin...YOU DO A REAL TURNOVER THAT YOU'VE PRACTICED TO LOOK LIKE THE ADDENDUM MOVE! This is like when you study your second deal and then make your real deal look like your second deal.
Another aspect to this all is that the eye goes to the silver coin when you have copper and silver in evidence. Take this into consideration when deciding what coin to use where in a routine. Finally, the tail side is less suspicious (especially if you are looking at your other hand,) than seeing two heads. Consider this. When choosing a shell, I would say in all cases a shell that shows tails is more useful than a head that is what does show on your shell, but they seem to make them more often with heads, oh well.
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Let's review the move and show it with a shell on your left palm, not on your fingers. The right hand has a regular coin in the same position. Here is where you look at your right hand which will do a real turnover. As I said before, if you can find a shell that shows a tail it is a tiny bit more deceptive than them seeing 2 heads, or if it were a Copper English Penny shell showing tails...this would be the best of all worlds. But, looking at the other coin does wonders. You'd be pattering about something else anyway, not about heads or tails or the color of the coins.
The fake turnover: Close both fists palm up, but loosely. You don't have to squeeze. Now as you turn both fists palm down, the coin and shell drop to the pads of the fingers in what Roth calls Fingertip Rest. Now, since the fist isn't tight, you can now get your thumbs in their respective hands and the thumbs press the shell and coin against their fingers that they rest on. Now straighten the left wrist and open the hand out almost flat and deposit the shell on the mat or table.
Simultaneously the right thumb instead of pinning its coin to the fingers, instead contacts the edge of coin which keeps the coin from doing a half-turn as the hand and wrist straighten. As the right deposits its coin on the table, you'll see it has only done a half-turn total and therefore is showing the other side from when we started.
Let's say you are going to make a vanish or whatever, and step the shell over the coin. As you go to pick up the top coin, which is really the shell, in fact the shell slips over the coin as you pretend to lift it and take it away. This is standard, and my point is just that by virtue of the Addendum Move and casualness and bluff acting you have implied very strongly (when you get the knack and the casualness... it will be proof that you don't have a shell therefore that can't be the method. (Many kids have visited magic shops and understand shells as in Scotch and Soda or the like...what they haven't seen is someone do - in essence, a paddle move with a shell. Neither have magicians.
So work on it. Have fun. * * *
Coins again. A Webb original idea from long ago that I forgot to write up (I think) but David Roth liked it! It is merely a variation on a standard Roth Shuttle Pass … but one never knows where some odd thing might fit … does one?
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Note: Right hand has a 3rd coin in right fingertips rest position.
The Move: It is a regular “shuttle pass” and the coin between left 1st finger and thumb just goes along for the ride. After the pass, the coin between the left first finger and thumb is still in view (of course) and the one supposedly “passed” to the right hand is in left fingerpalm.
The right hand holds in view the coin it had in “fingertips rest” as if it were the coin “passed” to it.
Context: Let’s say the left hand shows two coins on flat left hand. Let’s also say that you only want to do a shuttle-pass with 1 of them instead of doing a utility move (Bobo) which allows the seeming dump of all into right hand.
So … follow along … you take 1 coin, (the one not near left fingerplam position), into the left thumb and first finger position as already explained.
Now you can do the new shuttle, and then turn left hand palm up but necktied slightly to keep fingerpalmed coin hidden. Now put the single from right hand into left palm …
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then take the visible coin from left 1st finger and thumb and drop it into left cupped hand.
When you close the left hand, the fingerpalmed coin joins the others and now there are 3 coins in the left hand.
* * *
A Newish Ending to Coins Across
By Gregg Webb
I made a special trip into NYC to see the David (David Roth) to ask him if this was new. He said it is newish! What does that mean?
So … I am going ahead with my description of this … and with two methods.
Effect: As you near the end of a “coins across”… and let’s assume we’re using 4 coins and a Chinese coin! Let’s say the coins are travelling from the left hand to the right! OK. And let’s say the audience thinks 3 (silver) coins have magically traveled to the right hand to join the magic odd coin – the Chinese. But, in reality we are 1 ahead and therefore have the 4th coin in right classic palm. So… the viewers see 3 coins plus the odd Chinese coin on the table. The right hand seems empty to them because your palm is so good!
They think the 4h coin is in the left fist… yet to go. Actually the left fist is empty. Fine!
Newish magic!: Ok. Here goes! Pick up the Chinese coin with the (palming) right hand [without flashing the coin you are palming] and do a Palm Change (palm to palm change) and drop the silver coin to the mat. Or table.
They just saw the odd magic Chinese coin “change into” the 4th coin.
To give this all some closure… we can now do a L’Homme masque load into the Left Fist of the Chinese Coin and then dramatically reveal it by opening the left hand and dropping the Chinese coin to the table.
2nd M.O.: Modus Operandi 2 – Here we use an English Penny for the odd coin, not a Chinese!
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The left hand could have another C/S gaff coin… so you could even flash silver right up till the end and then show copper there at the end.
* * *
P.S. For this 2nd M.O., think of using all the known methods for doing fake turnovers and paddle-moves and such that you can casually do to imply that they are seeing both sides of coins.
Note: tails showing on both copper and silver sides of both gaffs is a plus if you can. For some reason… seeing 2 tail sides… especially on the copper coin doesn’t seem odd at all - You realize that no one knows what this kind of coin looks like anyway. All that helps is if they just don’t notice 2 heads. That would jump out.
And you realize that you don’t say much, except “copper coin” or “silver coin” and you never look at your hands or the gaff while you do the move anyway.
Supposedly Michael Rubenstein is working on compiling fake turnovers + paddle-type moves with C/S gaffs. So if you know how to contact him on-line, do so. I met him once… seems very nice. I run every new idea of mine past David Roth who is interested in history of moves and really keeps up.
He seems to respect that I strive for my own ways of doing things rather than just doing his way on everything. His way is better for him!
I still wonder what he meant by “it is newish” when I asked about this effect. -Fast Foreward-
25 July 2012
Thank Odin (or somebody?) I made it back in time!
Hey … I saw an item in Tannen’s circa 1971 and years later I came up with a way to do it with sleight-of-hand! The original turned a balloon into a plastic half bottle which if kept “dead on” to the viewers … was a good trick!
The fake bottle was handled like a flip stick and it had a pin sticking out of it which would break the balloon and the bottle would take its place!
Well … I just decided, why not just substitute a real beer bottle (or could be a Norm Nielson rubber bottle) and have a push-pin in the other hand. (?)
Balloon to Bottle
My favorite thing is Standup Manipulation. I originally only wanted a closeup Ace trick because after my card manipulation act people would often say “I wouldn’t want to play cards with you” and they meant it as a compliment.
They also always thought they were being terribly original, with that line. Almost as bad as "Make my wife disappear". And so, I learned Twisting the Aces but then I got interested in Ace Tricks and finally Closeup Magic.
Now I'm actually cutting back on closeup and really interested again in standup manipulation. I keep forgetting to work on mentalism so must not really care about it. I will be running 1 mental thingee soon.
Here we are. I'm thinking about an old dealer item that was half- a bottle, plastic, and there was a sharp pin coming out of it. It was only the front half and this was to keep it thin. It was decorated to look like a real liquor bottle, Cognac or such. You held it by the
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top or can we say the 'cap' and it was tucked back behind the arm as in a Flip Stick vanish. You held a balloon between the hands, mainly controlled by the left.
The balloon was lofted a few inches into the air. As it fell back down, the bottle was levered out as in producing a Flip Stick and the pin caused the balloon to break and it looked like the balloon changed into a bottle! A good trick. The only drawback was that the bottle was only half-a-bottle and didn't look too great at that.
So I set to thinking. Pretty soon I realized that it was a good trick (the timing has to be learned...there is a knack to it, but I also realized that it could be done with a real bottle - a beer bottle.
Webb variation Teach In: Get an empty beer bottle. I'll wait. Only have the one so you can remember these instructions. Let's imagine you are going to hide the bottle behind your right forearm - a la a Flip Stick. (Turn slightly stage left) Insert your right middle finger into the neck-hole of bottle. When your middle finger and ring finger and pinkie are curled, leaving the right thumb and 1st finger free, the bottle is hidden behind right forearm. When the fingers are straightened out, and you turn to the front or even slightly stage right, the bottle appears between the left hand, which now holds the foot or bottom of bottle and the neck is seemingly held by the right hand but is really on the right middle finger. Getting the finger out of there in a subtle way is the hardest part of the trick.
Details - adding a PushPin and a Balloon: In this version, the left fingers will hold a pushpin. The right 1st finger and thumb will hold the tied nozzle (neck) of the balloon. Standing slightly stage left, the bottle is hidden along right forearm. The right first finger and thumb also hold a balloon by its tied neck. The balloon is in view, projecting above the right hand.
The left hand holds a push pin between the left 1st finger and thumb. The hands are maybe 8 inches apart.
The production/change: What will happen is this! The left hand will break the balloon with the push pin. Immediately, the right fingers straighten swinging the bottle out from behind the forearm and the left hand catches the base of the bottle with its palm and free fingers.
As you face slightly stage right now, the finger is withdrawn out of the bottle to adopt a Ta-Daaah pose.
In closing, this is a platform or stage trick. I notice that a lot of closeup guys don't realize this without telling them - they just think it is a mistake or bad trick - whatever! I suppose you could use a smaller bottle but you'd have to use a more secretive PIN than a pushpin.
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For stage or platform work, the pushpin is practical because it is easier to find. For the fastidious, you could paint the push-pin flesh color, (the real work) black if your coat is black.
have - fun -
Selection Monte
Yipee! I love it when I get a new idea! Just when I think it is safe to come out of the water, boom, a new idea! Wow!
I sometimes worry that I'm done. That I'm bled! Finished! Washed up! Spent!
But no. Playing with Monte I remembered a Doug Edwards idea to have the Q or whatever 4th and 3 Jokers on top. His method was to do a quadruple Turnover and then turn it down and deal the top card (a joker - first of the 3) to the mat. Then show a Joker next and deal it to one side of the supposed Q, really another Joker, either face up or face down. Then the same with a 3rd card, another Joker. The supposed Q is face down, but is really another Joker. Upon turning the Jokers down, and mixing, they hunt for the Q! They'll get a Joker no matter what! After two more tries, they eventually realize all are Jokers. Right! 3 Jokers! Then you palm the top card of deck - Q, and 'pull' it out of a pocket!
I've made some changes, and I have an alternate routine to use in formal shows.
You are going to like this, I guarantee it! You need 3 matching Jokers. I save jokers - you will too after this.
Have the 3 Jokers on top of deck. Do your favorite falsies. Spread deck for selection - don't let top 3 cards be picked. As they memorize the card etc. you are closing spread and while you do, get pinkie separation or break under Jokers.
For the return we can use a modified Tilt, or a modified Bluff shift. In the first you tilt all 3 Jokers as a unit, you have to take back card with your right hand and insert it from the back - let them see the depth illusion etcetera. Eventually lose the break and the tilt. For the other way, with your break under 3 jokers, lift the 3 of the cards above the break as one, and keep your right hand and cards angled down in front so they see the back of top joker, and not the edges, because you want them to think you lifted a bigger group than you really did. Also keep the left hand and its majority of deck angled so that the back of top card is seen, not the side. Just draw an imaginary line from a viewer's eye to the top card...this line (which you should always have in mind - maybe I don't stress this enough...I am checking this type of thing all the time in my manipulation act...this should be second-nature to a magician) and it should hit at a 90% angle or perpendicular. In art we have something called perspective and I learned it very young
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so it is automatic to me yet I see my students struggle with it and rarely get it right. It is a similar thing about keeping imaginary lines in mind and in a second-nature way. Anyway, whichever control you use, after replacing the Jokers (as if half the deck) or losing the tilt (secretly during patter and gesticulating but watching those angles)...the selection is under 3 Jokers.
Here we go. My differences are that we're going to do Monte with a selected card (not a Queen) and that we'll end up with the selection turning into a third Joker after suitable build-up and then we'll palm it to a pocket from the top of the deck to end.
So turn over the top card after a magic gesture such as tapping the deck. Always get as much magic out of your situation as possible. Do not just turn up the top card and say "Here's a Joker". No. Instead (since you already false shuffled or cut at the beginning) to find a Joker on top means you had to magic it there! See? Say "I can't find your card very easily - it's lost in the deck!" "But to warm up I can tap the deck like this and cause a Joker to rise up through the deck."
"Watch, again, (tap the deck)". Turn up the next Joker. I forgot to tell you to deal the first Face up to table, and do so with the second. Leave a space between them.
Say "Your card is still lost in the deck." Using that patter, spread the deck a little, then as you square, get a break under 2 cards - the 3rd joker then the selection.
Saying "Let's see if I can 'get' your card to rise up" tap the deck and do a double turnover - easier that way than a Quad turnover earlier hey what? Ask "Did I get it?" They'll say yes and then turn the double face down and casually put the top (Joker) face down between the face up jokers on the table. (they'll think this is the selection) Now turn the 2 jokers on table face down, one at a time and mix them a bit.
Use just your right hand for all that. You want to keep the deck in your left hand and do everything, the turning and the mixing, with the right hand; soon you will do a palming move while they are turning a card up (and they find a joker)
The slight mixing helps all this in a certain way. It puts a tiny bit of doubt in their mind as to where the selection is. Say "Point to a card" and when they do, say "Turn it over". It has to be a joker. Do this again. Finally - when you do it the third time... it is only then that they are certain that their card is gone and that there are 3 Jokers on the table. This is the high point of the trick. At first they think they just pointed to the wrong card. Then they try again. Wrong again and here you want them to think the 3rd card must be their card - so when they turn that one up and it is a joker and there are 3 jokers...this is a different ending from what they expected...a Whoah! moment.
As for the timing of the palm. By this time you want to have done a top palm in your right hand and taken the deck in an overhand grip with card palmed. This should look like you took the deck from the left hand with your right hand.
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After a pause, you set deck down on table with palming hand then go to your pocket and remove their selection!
I'm very happy with this but came up with a different way for a formal show. For a formal show.
Some things are more forgiving in a formal show. In card tricks you don't have to deal with someone just grabbing some prop because they feel like it. For that reason I came up with this version with a force deck that is every bit as strong in a formal show, but you may not want to end with this, or have this be your only trick.
When I also say Formal Show, I mean not for magicians! Roger that!
Your setup is 3 Jokers on top of a 1-way force deck and let's say they're all 2-C cards. At the face put a red-spot card and we're almost set. Take 1 of the 2-C cards and put it in your pocket. What we are playing with is the notion that laymen don't care as much about a signature as we think. The trick is that their selection turns into a joker. The card from pocket is a kicker only...not the central stunt.
To perform, do an imperfect faro and just make sure the jokers stay on top and the bottom odd red-spot stays on the bottom. You can do a pretty safe cascade (waterfall) to end. Next have a card selected from anywhere but the bottom or the top 3 cards.
They can put it back anywhere except too near the top. Get the most that the return is fair (seemingly fair) and that you don't do any kind of control.
You can go right into the Ambitious Jokers to get 2 Jokers on the table. The rest is the same except you don't have to palm to get the card to your pocket. It already (a dupe) is there! Enjoy!
Appearing and Dancing and Vanishing Streamer
Platform or Stage Magic by Gregg WEBB
This is by far the best stage magic piece for a manipulation type act that I've come up with in a long time!
It is based on the Thumb Tip production of a small 6" silk. I connect this trick with Chris Capehart as I always used to see him doing the trick catty-corner from Tannen's when they were on Broadway up from Loew's Theater. He'd do this and the miser's dream and 3-ring Linking Rings. Can't remember what else.
Then, years later Jeff McBride gave me long narrow Rainbow streamers which are only 1" wide but pretty long because they are so narrow but still fit the thumb tip!
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That's what I'm using here although you could cut a strip from a bigger silk and get your wife or girlfriend to hem the rough edges.
Did I mention a Thumbtip. Pretty big. The Vernet ones are great.
Preparation and setup: You'll need a magic table and a hat or bucket or box on it. Next we have to sew or tie black silk thread onto each corner of the end that will go into the thumb tip last. This isn't invisible thread, doesn't have to be for stage. What you don't want to do is use monofilament (clear nylon) because it shines under the lights and looks like a silver thread that is anything but invisible. Repeat - black silk thread. You need one piece that reaches from the center of the stage to one wing, and another length that runs from the center stage to the other wing. Like I said, they attach to the corners of the end of the streamer. The loaded tip is put in a box on your table. The ends in the wings could have tassles or thingees on them to make them easy to find.
You could have 2 empty spools of thread to wind the long lengths onto.
Finally, you need two assistants. This is the big drawback for some, but this is what makes this work. This must be rehearsed so it becomes artistic!
I am attempting to get Jeff McBride himself to try this out for real.
To perform: The best way to get set for this would be to be putting your prop or props away from the last trick. Let's say we just did a rope trick and after the bowing and scraping, you put the scissors away in the box on the table. While there, don the loaded thumbtip and try not to tangle the threads running to each wing where your assistants are holding the tassle ends of the long threads.
Another big point here is that, you are better off with short sleeves or sleeves rolled or pushed way up because it is the type of thing that audiences will say (if you have sleeves) Oh, it just came out of his sleeve! Big deal! Only when not wearing sleeves will they not say that!
Your assistants who will have to practice as hard as a puppeteers to make this artistic, should keep a mild tension on the threads at all times to prevent tangling.
You show both hands to be empty in the time honored way for thumb tip and silk work. Next, load the thumbtip with its cargo into the left hand. Now the right hand kind of makes mystic passes over and around the left hand.
FINALLY: The Assistants and their threads rise up, causing the streamer to rise out of fist as shown. There should be a swaying back and forth to the movement of the 'head' of the streamer to make it seem alive.
31 Hoochie Koochie music would be great!
When it is all the way out of your hand, it is best to hold the 'tail' with the left fingers, so that as it continues to 'dance' that the lower part is stationary.
Another good idea is to sew a lead sinker or a few B-B's into the tail so there is some weight there. This allows you to have the tail resting on your flat palm, yet the upper part can dance. With this feature, the streamer can dance on the floor, dance on your table or on your shoulder.
To end you get a hold of the thing and begin poking it into the fist and thumbtip in time-honored fashion and eventually it is gone and you can show your hands empty (!).
I'm real glad this idea flew through my mind and that I wrote it down before it ran away. For the lucky few who have 2 assistants and who feature mid-size magic or at least have a set of that, this is more magical than the Dancing Handkerchief in that with bare hands and arms this streamer appears then it Dances and then it disappears with pretty clean moves. Very clean, in fact!
Standup manipulation is my favorite branch and this piece would fit right in.
Alternate method: For those with only 1 assistant, I came up with an alternate method. In one wing is a reel strapped to a cinder block or some kind of weight (a box that you carry props in may do) and this is on a table or up on another packing box. This takes the place of one assistant. The thread runs across the stage, the streamer is attached to the middle (and is hidden in thumbtip in a decorative box on your show table and continues on to the other wing where the assistant holds the end. The reel takes up any slack allowed by the assistant so when she moves her hand towards the performer, the reel pulls by the same amount. The dancing undulation (side to side) is perhaps even better with this method. Try both ways if you have two assistants.
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-So you think you can dance?- Fast Foreward till next time in time.
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And the world didn’t end on May 21, 2011. And it didn’t end yet in 2012 so …maybe the crackpots can take a break!
And so back to magic. Less cards as promised. But some cards. Yay!
An Alternate Handling for KARATE COIN
I’ve gotten so that when I play with a prop, that I don't want to do it the way it was designed, or even some new handling 'going around' (like a virus). No! I want to find out what Gregg Webb would do with the prop.
You should do the same sorts of things...find out what works for you! And so, what I found while toying with the standard ways - and the early versions I saw had a coin with a smooth hole, not the ragged hole we have today, which I like better (it looks like an object, bullet or finger went through it, was mainly that I missed a lot, not having the skill of Roth or Latta at the real work in those days -or now even - but now I don't care if the version I do is the hardest one around. Or if mine isn’t the hardest around. In short – less worry about what other magicians might think. Many magicians worry way too much about this. I say don’t worry about this at all!
Needed are… Karate Quarter Real Quarter
Setup: The Karate Quarter is in left hand finger palm. The real quarter is in the right hand, in view as you patter about the low quality of the metal they use in coins nowadays.
Pretend to put the coin in your left hand, which is cupped and necktied towards your own self. The real quarter goes into the right finger palm…and you pretend to put it into the left hand (!) Now close your left hand as it holds something (supposedly the real quarter) which it does…but not what they think. And…you have to act like nothing is in your right hand. In other words…look at the tense left fist and don’t look at the relaxed
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right hand…which is relaxed even though finger palming. You want it to seem as if nothing is in the right hand… (Catch on?). OK!
Next:
The Penetration: Open your left fist a tiny bit. Poke your right first finger into the left pinkie hole of left fist. When you find the opening of the Karate coin, some ‘knack’ required here that you’ll acquire over time – then act out a hard push as if you are poking the finger through a coin. Open the left hand so everyone can see the coin on the right first finger.
There are many ways to clean up. The best is still the one shown to me by Geof Latta, who probably learned it from David Roth. In my mind it was Geof who was copying David, not as Jamie Swiss tries to make it sound as if Geof was an original. I was there…and I think Geof was copying David Roth.
Anyway, …as the left hand takes the Gaff Karate Quarter off the right first finger, the regular quarter falls from the right finger palm into the cupped left fingers (And Hidden there by a palm up but neck tied Ramsay subtlety while the gaff is displayed by the left thumb and 1st finger.
Next . . . a card trick!
Putting in the Fix! …or changes on the Jimmy
Grippo
Note: A Jimmy Grippo trick van in an earlier Gregg Webb newsletter. It used a double-faced card.
Charles Reynolds and myself both thought the Grippo trick in the earlier issue was good ... but...
We wondered if the double/facer could be switched out via a Top Change or such. We had a good session and attacked the problem (how to end supposedly clean) from all the angles we could think of. What became apparent early on was the thought that the double/facer was probably not the best way to go. We were pretty soon back to a well-known ploy of having a dupe card, not a double faced card, and you can make your own D/F card by putting two cards back-to-back and holding them like a double-lift of some kind and turning that to make a change and you would then unload the card underneath, which is face down, on the face down deck itself by briefly putting the back to back double on the deck and then after a pause taking the face up card which is now clean.
The idea of using a dupe goes way back (Erdnase) even though I like to think of it as the Scarne beer commercial trick.
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The exact details vary based on which wav to "change" the back-to- back double.
There is the Sleeve Change or Snap Change who's inventor is lost in time. This is perhaps my favorite.
Then there is a Swivel Change by Bob Hummer which could look good. Then, the next one brings us to another installment of settingtherecord (straight) wherein I have to tell you that a popular move called Shapeshifter - supposedly by Mark DeSousa is mis-credited and was actually "The Pirouette Change" by Oscar Munoz. It is a way of adding snap to the Hummer swivel move.
I've seen the move done well a few times and I've even hit it my-self a few times but most times I've seen it has been an OOPS move not hitting in the first try so having to try again to get it after exclaiming OOPS. That leaves me with the sleeve change (snap change) or the Hummer and I hit the snap/sleeve change almost every time but not so the Hummer so you can see where I'm going.
(And it gives you a tiny lesson on how to cull a move to use from a group of moves that can accomplish the same thing. Most magicians think they have to pick the one that is "going around" (like a cold) but I don't think that way. If everyone is doing "Shapeshifter" say, I will go out of my way to dig up something similar just on general principal, but I also base my choice on which one I do well rather than devote hours of my future towards learning (or not) a move that doesn't fit me. Some may say 'How can you know if you don't try?". Well, I do try a new move 'going around' a few times. If it feels right to me I may keep it but if not - I throw it back, like a fish too small!
Details: Let's assume that the dupe card is the 2-C! Let's assume the other card we'll use is the Q-D! O.K. ! Have 1 of the Dupe 2-C's on the face of deck (face down). On top (face down) of deck is the other 2-C then the Q-D. To perform the trick do a double turnover and show the Q-D. Say "Remember this card", as you turn the double face down and deal the top card (Really the 2-C) onto their hand and have them put their other hand on top of face down card.
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Reach under deck and pull out the other 2-C and put it face up on top of deck as you patter about them noticing the 2-C which will do some magic!
Pick up a double card as shown. Held between the R. thumb and 2nd finger ready for Sleeve or Snap Change. Note first finger slightly in a curved position.
As you rub the double on your left sleeve, supposedly to build up static electricity, after a few back and forth rubs, the double is allowed to slip off the right 2nd finger and the right 1st finger takes over the job of holding. A loud 'snap' happens, and the card (double) turns over showing the Q-D that was back-to-back under the 2-C. What is nice is that the card turns over (while the right hand is moving) but the right hand doesn't have to turn over, but it does rotate a few degrees so the face of double is correctly ’to' the viewers. This is the key - the right doesn't have to turn over because the grip change causes the double to turn.
To end drop the back-to-backer on the deck and after a piece of patter wherein you get them to look in their hand for the missing you take a single Q-D off the deck so that when they look back the card you hold in the right hand is clean.
I hope I pass the audition!
Note: I was listening to a Beatles CD at the time. * * * On to the Muscle Pass.
Daniel Garcia came up with a use for the muscle pass that is a real magical use, not just jock magic like see how high I can make this coin jump. It ran in Genii magazine and also used a flipper coin. If you recall, you placed a flipper coin showing 2 coins (open) on the right palm of a spectator facing you. You held the right wrist of the spectator with
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your left hand and your right hand held the spectator's left wrist. I have to mention that there is a coin palmed in your right palm.
The trick itself and a good one at that was to move the viewer's right wrist with your left hand, up and down, and this would cause the flipper coin to flip closed! After some suitable milliseconds, your right palm muscles shot the palmed coin into their left hand with the muscle pass. Yay!
Trouble is; I don't have a flipper coin, and never hope to have one. Don't get me started about gaffs. (I use a C/S gaff, and Copper- Silver-Brass and that's it!) Which is a good thing for me. Good in that it forced me to figure out how to do the same trick au naturale.
Feel My Pulse
It was probably Bob MacAllister who taught me to turn a negative into part of the trick! Thank Yoda he didn’t say 'turn lemons into lemonade'. Same idea, though.
So how can I make not having a flipper coin "Part Of The Trick"? I thought and thought and here is what I found kicking around in the cobwebs of my mind (sung to the tune Windmills of My Mind).
I pretend to put a regular coin into my left hand, but Really I keep it in my right hand...then I have a spectator Hold my wrist instead of me holding their wrist when doing the flipper-coin version. Wow! I'm so glad this idea came out and bit me! (Note: You can't really control these things but when they hit, write them down or they go away again and you forget you ever had the thought.)
This solves everything, and you patter about her holding your wrist so she can feel your pulse quicken when the coin vanishes. Bruce Elliott suggested (for a different pulse trick) that to speed up your pulse, just imagine that you are having sex with Sofia Loren the way she looked back then although she did age well! I suggest that if you pick a sexy assistant from the audience that this may happen naturally just by her holding your wrist. If not, just remember most people don't know how to take a pulse correctly so use the power of suggestion and bluff acting - twitch your arm, scream "Did you feel it speed up? I sure did! Thank you!"
Open your left hand - Yell, "See, its gone!" Now use your muscle pass to launch the coin out of your right classic palm area and into the spectator's palm up left hand. Note: This hand should be OPEN and palm up when you hold HER wrist.
There you have it. I'm pretty happy with this variation and the elimination of the Flipper Coin.
- fin -
HAPPY
38 Happy Thanksgiving!
First I'm going to review a trick I already ran because of some recent developments. Then I'll run an original new trick using the same prop. I tested out the simplest version of silk and coin with palm magnet (a penetration) on laymen for years and it always went well for walk-around and mingle. But, recently I showed a group of magicians including some of the heaviest hitters in coindom, and even the (the) highest ranking guy in coindom...and I got the best compliment I think possible. "It looks like magic." "It looks like magic." "It looks like magic."
What this is is my answer to Raven. I simply hate pulls and hookups. I decided I needed to just classic palm a magnet - maybe attach it to a coin for better palming. This evolved into a bottle cap as the easiest thing to classic palm if you palm the rough mouth of the cap. Felt over the magnet to kill the noise. Of course you need a magnetic or shimmed coin. I took the shell from a gaff coin trick I don't use and glued a magnet inside it. A small one. Finally I decided I needed a wand or something like a wand to pick up after the vanish to give my palming hand something to do to seem "busy" and holding something, which makes a palming hand look better. This evolved into the silk (grab an end) and the silk suggested a penetration. Adding a dupe coin, does not have to be magnetic or shimmed or anything but normal, - gave me my ending and turned the effect from a vanish into a penetration. The reappearance of "the" coin under the silk immediately gives closure to the trick. A vanish leaves a person wondering where it went. A reappearance breaks that line of thought! A vanish of a coin on top of a silk, silk whisked away to reveal "the" coin under the silk, and perceived as a penetration.
Effect: As a perfect icebreaker, you show your left hand to have a silk draped over it with a coin on it. Wave your (almost) flat right hand over the coin, not even touching it, and the coin vanishes!
Whisking away the silk, the coin is seen to have reappeared instantly on the other side of the silk. Looks like magic.
One interesting thing to me is that I still consider it a sleight-of-hand trick since I classic palm the bottlecap and magnet and not some tape or stickum or pull!
39
Required: Silk. Shimmed coin. Dupe coin. Palm magnet.
Set-up: Regular coin on left palm. Silk over this. Shim coin on top of silk. Palm magnet in right classic palm.
Performance: Icebreak! Say, "Watch the coin", and wave your right hand over the shim coin and of course it jumps to the palm magnet and vanishes. This part is every bit as good as Raven. Grab a hanging corner of the silk with your right, and whisk silk away to reveal dupe coin on left hand. Pocket silk and magnet and shim coin in a right pocket. Next “time” we’ll start here with more palm magnet effects.
40 September 2012, Number 6
Based on a trick Doug Edwards showed me that he did not invent but he change (improved?) the ending.
I changed the ending ... and in fact the whole trick … a different way except for the basic concept. I don’t know the inventor.
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Those who follow my newsletters will remember a 4 Ace cutting trick (I really used 4 Queens … no matter) and this trick (which I now do instead of the other [!]) but it only needs 3 of the 4 false cuts I taught for the 4 Ace/(4 Queens) thing.
Effect: A group pf cards is shown to a viewer and the request made to memorize 1 of the “group”. Note: the “group” is always 3 cards but you don’t say that. You refer to the group as a group. “Please memorize 1 card of this group”. “Thank you “
(Sort of act like the number of cards doesn’t matter – get it?)
2) Put these on the deck and give the deck your best false cut! Take off 3 cards as if 3 other cards (really the same 3) and show to someone not real close to the first viewer (who should be on your left, and now use a spectator near the middle.
Same thing … “Memorize one card of this group!” “Thank you”. After, put the “group” on the deck and give another false cut as you move to the right.
3) Now take seemingly another 3, but really the same 3, off the deck and show to a 3rd viewer near your right side of the room.