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epsilon97
Regular user
105 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 1:06pm
I am just starting to learn some card tricks, but I am having a hard time conceptualizing how to move from trick to trick. I am currently reading the Royal Road and watching Michael Ammar's Easy to Master Card Miracles. But, most of the tricks (more like all) require a pre-arranged deck. How do you move from one trick to the next? I would love to hear some strategy discussion here for how to build out a routine progression.
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cirrus
Inner circle
his minions made
1487 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 1:18pm
Proper routining could solve the trick (pun intended). Never do more then 1 pre-arranged deck trick after another, it's not professional in my opinion. Although an act complete of card tricks is boring (believe me, although a lot of people on this forum will say otherwise).
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Poof-Daddy
Inner circle
1066 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 1:19pm
A couple of "suggestions" have your multiple pre set decks readyfor a quick swich, go to put the deck awy switch and say, Let me show you another. you can also alternate between coins cards spongeballs paddles whatever as an excuse to lose that deck and bring out the fresh one next.
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Steven Youell
V.I.P.
3866 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 1:54pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:18, cirrus wrote:
Never do more then 1 prearranged deck trick after another, it's not professional in my opinion. |
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Yow! In that case, I know at least 12 top name Cardguys who are apparently unprofessional!
Here's the truth: the audience should not be able to detect the fact that a setup deck is used IN ANY TRICK!
And if they can't detect it, then it doesn't matter.
SEY
The Best Close Up Mats In The World
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Steven Youell
V.I.P.
3866 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 2:02pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:19, Poof-Daddy wrote:
A couple of "suggestions" have your multiple preset decks ready for a quick switch, go to put the deck away switch and say, Let me show you another. |
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Very bad advice. If you can't maintain the stack during the routine or set it up another one on the fly, then you need to rethink what you're doing.
SEY
The Best Close Up Mats In The World
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Steven Youell
V.I.P.
3866 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 2:06pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:06, epsilon97 wrote:
I would love to hear some strategy discussion here for how to build out a routine progression. |
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What effects do you already know? How long do you want the routine to be? What sleights do you know well? Who do you perform for?
Be skeptical of advice from anyone who doesn't ask these and about 20 other questions.
You're asking for advice that has answers unique to you and your situation.
General advice off the top of someone's head usually does more harm than good.
SEY
The Best Close Up Mats In The World
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Harry Lorayne
V.I.P.
New York City
5744 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 3:13pm
Obvious. Stop doing set-up-deck tricks! What a simple solution. Learn tricks that can be done with any shuffled deck, any time, etc.
harrylorayne@earthlink.net
http://www.harrylorayne.com
http://www.harryloraynemagic.com
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edh
Inner circle
4702 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 4:31pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 15:13, Harry Lorayne wrote:
Obvious. Stop doing set-up-deck tricks! What a simple solution. Learn tricks that can be done with any shuffled deck, any time, etc.
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Such tricks can be found in Harry's books.
Magic is a vanishing art.
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helder
Special user
538 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 4:49pm
Follow Harry advice or learn to set up on the fly. If you want follow the second option, study Juan Tamariz, Darwin Ortiz, Tommy Wonder and Michael Vincent work. Meanwhile take a look at Card College, it will help you to become a better card man.
ps: First option, buy Harry Lorayne books and you have card magic for several lives, with any deck. He forget more than most of us know.
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motown
Inner circle
Atlanta by way of Detroit
4776 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 5:31pm
Like Harry said. There are plenty of card effects you can do that don't require a set-up. Not knowing all of the books and DVDs you have, you may need to expand your library. There's plenty you can buy that doesn't involve difficult sleight of hand.
"If you ever write anything about me after I'm gone, I will come back and haunt you."
– Karl Germain
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Harry Lorayne
V.I.P.
New York City
5744 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 6:06pm
I sure as h*ll haven't done the math, but I'd imagine that in all my card magic I've included in my books, 99% of the effects and routines are impromptu, done from a shuffled deck - or are easy enough to "set" from a shuffled deck - because that's the kind of stuff I do and have been doing all my life. I'm talking about muy own stuff, not necessarily stuff in books I've done of other peoples' material (David Regal, Ken Krenzel, etc.) although most of that stuff is also impromptu. HL.
harrylorayne@earthlink.net
http://www.harrylorayne.com
http://www.harryloraynemagic.com
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panlives
Inner circle
2088 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 6:59pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:06, epsilon97 wrote:
I am just starting to learn some card tricks, but I am having a hard time conceptualizing how to move from trick to trick. I am currently reading the Royal Road and watching Michael Ammar's Easy to Master Card Miracles. But, most of the tricks (more like all) require a pre-arranged deck. How do you move from one trick to the next? I would love to hear some strategy discussion here for how to build out a routine progression.
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Great question and a vexing problem many of us have faced.
As mentioned many times in previous threads, the 5-volume Roberto Giobbi Card College books, along with his 3-volume Light, Lighter and Lightest books have end-chapter primers with specific examples, many of them wonderful set-pieces on how to think about and actually perform fluid, logical and thematically interesting transitions.
Nick Trost's books are also gold-mines and I must throw in my vote for Harry Lorayne's magnificent body of work, which will make you giddy with possibilities! Lorayne is a treasure.
The organic transformation from individual, granular tricks into multiphase card routines is delicious work; a lifetime of study. Fortunately, we have the greats mentioned above to help us.
There are many other card greats, of course, that deserve your attention...seek and ye shall find.
Good luck, fun journey!
"Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
"The dog did nothing in the night-time."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.
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Mick Ayres
Special user
Hilton Head Island
981 Posts
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Posted: May 5, 2012 7:40pm
Heads up on the actual question, guys. Whether the effects in a show are impromptu or require a pre-stack is not really the issue. The OP is asking for advice on making the TRANSITIONS from one effect to the next. Transitions depend on (and are scripted for) the overall plot or theme of the entire show, the effects selected and the order in which they are presented.
All four books in my Act-Series offer entire mentalism shows involving playing cards. Each of these acts were successfully presented hundreds and hundreds of times to guests from around the world before being offered to the conjuring community as an example of how a parlor act is created, scripted and theatrically assembled...including the transitions.
I'm not suggesting you should perform these particular acts or effects...but the examples provided may be of specific value here.
Mick
The 5 Obligations of Conjuring: STUDY. PRACTICE. SCRIPT. REHEARSE. PERFORM.
Visit Mick Ayres' Wares! Click here
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jmvives
New user
72 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 8:38am
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 15:13, Harry Lorayne wrote:
Obvious. Stop doing set-up-deck tricks! What a simple solution. Learn tricks that can be done with any shuffled deck, any time, etc.
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+1
If there is no conviction, there is no illusion. -Hofzinser.
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1tepa1
Veteran user
354 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 9:21am
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:18, cirrus wrote:
Proper routining could solve the trick (pun intended). Never do more then 1 pre-arranged deck trick after another, it's not professional in my opinion. Although an act complete of card tricks is boring (believe me, although a lot of people on this forum will say otherwise).
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I would have to disagree. There are many performers who use only cards with good success. For example would you say that Darwin Ortiz is boring?
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Erdnase27
Inner circle
2360 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 10:16am
Why would you care when a magician finds an act entirely based on cardmagic is boring while there are many cardmen alive proving the exact opposite?
"He must be content to rank with the common herd." - S.W. Erdnase
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Mb217
Inner circle
V.I.P. ;)
5754 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 11:39am
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 15:13, Harry Lorayne wrote:
Obvious. Stop doing set-up-deck tricks! What a simple solution. Learn tricks that can be done with any shuffled deck, any time, etc.
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Hiya eps, welcome to the Café. 
Well, Harry gives the best answer here...Simple is good!
Setup deck tricks are nice but much better to be able to take a regular deck of cards and do tricks, right from your pocket or from the specs themselves. Always more disarming to let specs even shuffle a deck, give it to you and then you perform miracles. That way you don't have to be "set-up." Heck many times you don't even have to know the card selected to produce magic. If you just have to do set-up tricks, then maybe do packet effects that don't involve a deck, or if you must use a deck, do one trick like that and done with it, like the Invisible Deck - killer!
As to the routining of going from one effect to another, first figure out what you want to do. Don't bore people with 10 card tricks, especially back to back, not even 5 really. Pick like 2-3 and call it a day (unless you're giving a show or something or if people just keep calling for them, which I would doubt in most cases). And it's good to mix that up with other things, like coins and closeup. But if you're bent on just doing a few card tricks, here's what I do and it seems to work pretty good.
Open with a great packet trick like NFW, where 4 jokers turn down 1 at a time and then cleanly into 4 aces. It absolutely get's people's attention and blows them away. When you finish, put the aces away in your pocket and pull out a deck. We'll be coming back to the aces soon. 
Now pull out a deck trick, like ACAAN, it's not hard to do, people love it and it let's you do your deck thing with a regular deck of cards.
Then say something like "Hey, remember those 4 aces?" Quickly run through the deck and pull out what will look like the 4 aces you used earlier in the greater scheme of things...Now do Dr. Daley's Last Trick (I like the Bill Malone version) and you're done with a nice continuity to the set. And that's a simple way of moving from trick to trick.
There are other ways and other tricks but hopefully this is a bit more helpful than someone just pointing and saying "Go that way!" on all this.
*Check out my latest Crimp Change - REDUX! and other fine magic at www.vinnymarini.com 
"Not much new under the sun I hear but under the moon, well who knows, that just might be a horse of a different color." -Mb
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Jaz
Inner circle
NJ, U.S.
6113 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 12:55pm
One way is to use the same cards for different effects.
Example:
The 4 Aces are ideal.
You can do Slow Motion Aces Across, Twisting The Aces, sandwich effects with 2 of the Aces and a selection, Carney's 'Sanverted', J.C. Wagner's 'The Fab Four Revisited' and more.
Lately I've been working on routines using Ace thru 4. One is one of Derek Dingle's 'Elevator' tricks followed by his "Too Many Cards' with an added 5 spot. Also working on a twisting effect where the Ace thru 4 turn in sequence.
Good luck on your journey.
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MagicMason
Regular user
168 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 1:52pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 15:13, Harry Lorayne wrote:
Obvious. Stop doing set-up-deck tricks! What a simple solution. Learn tricks that can be done with any shuffled deck, any time, etc.
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I totally agree with Harry. And Harry's books can show you. So can material by Aldo Colombini and Cameron Francis. Great stuff all!
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Bill Hegbli
Eternal Order
Bill and Bill in Fort Wayne Indiana
12917 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 3:14pm
I have found the more tricks you learn and learn well, you will realize, all of a sudden, that one trick could follow another trick, if you do this simple thing of moving a card or cards. Also, it helps if you can talk and arrange the deck at the same time, like Harry Loryane. Although, I did go to a lecture in Chicago in 1982, I think it was, and Harry, put out 4 or 5 decks on the table, and worked from them.
So be interested in your spectators, and converse with them and know your material. It should all fall into place.
Also, you are jumping the gun, if you get to the back of Royal Road to Card Magic, they do explain presenting card acts. The book is meant to be read from the front to the back, if you skip around, you will get confused and not know what they are teaching you.
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Mick Ayres
Special user
Hilton Head Island
981 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 6:33pm
Sigh. Have fun, guys.
The 5 Obligations of Conjuring: STUDY. PRACTICE. SCRIPT. REHEARSE. PERFORM.
Visit Mick Ayres' Wares! Click here
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BarryFernelius
Inner circle
Still learning, even though I've made
2102 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 7:11pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:06, epsilon97 wrote:
I am just starting to learn some card tricks, but I am having a hard time conceptualizing how to move from trick to trick. I am currently reading the Royal Road and watching Michael Ammar's Easy to Master Card Miracles. But, most of the tricks (more like all) require a pre-arranged deck. How do you move from one trick to the next? I would love to hear some strategy discussion here for how to build out a routine progression.
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This is quite a good question. At the risk of repeating what others have written, I'll offer the following:
1. Some have offered that you should learn some tricks that don't rely on a pre-arranged deck. This is good advice.
2. Note that not all pre-arrangements require the whole deck to be pre-arranged. So, learn some tricks that use a subset of the deck and don't disturb the pre-arranged portion of the pack.
3. Keeping with the idea of tricks that use a smaller number of cards, you could arrange an entire pack consisting of one pre-arranged group of cards after another. Brother John Hamman used to mix gimmicked and non-gimmicked packet trick in this manner.
4. As you learn additional tricks, you'll start to observe that the ending configuration for some tricks can be used as the pre-arrangement for another trick. For example, after you've performed Juan Tamariz's Neither Blind Nor Silly (called TNT in one of Giobbi's books), you're automatically in the perfect position to do Out of This World or Out of This Universe.
"I don't teach people stories about the coyote for them to tell. I AM the coyote. They tell stories about me."
-Pop Haydn
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Zombie Magic
Inner circle
I went out for a beer and now have
6562 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 7:25pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:06, epsilon97 wrote:
I am just starting to learn some card tricks, but I am having a hard time conceptualizing how to move from trick to trick. I am currently reading the Royal Road and watching Michael Ammar's Easy to Master Card Miracles. But, most of the tricks (more like all) require a pre-arranged deck. How do you move from one trick to the next? I would love to hear some strategy discussion here for how to build out a routine progression.
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Harry Lorayne, through his entire career, worked with borrowed decks ( I believe he'd arrive and one of his performing stipulations was that they had two brand new decks, one red back one blue back, for him to use ).
Get all his L&L DVD's and he'll teach you all you need to work miracles going from trick to trick. And...he gives/shows priceless advice on how to set up a deck for the next trick(s) without them never knowing.
You'll think about your card magic differently after watching Harry!
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epsilon97
Regular user
105 Posts
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Posted: May 6, 2012 9:41pm
Wow, this thread has been an awesome read! I hope others have enjoyed it as much as I have.
Right now, I have learned 8 Card Brainwave, the Chicago Opener, Jackrobatics, and Twisting the Aces. I think that I can move through these 4 tricks right now as only the first packet trick requires major pre-arrangement. It is so much fun to view tricks as a set as compared to just individual tricks. I also look forward to the day when I can do many impromptu tricks without having any pre-arrangements.
Thank you all for your great advice.
-Fred
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pepka
Inner circle
Uh, I'm the one on the right.
3797 Posts
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Posted: May 7, 2012 12:43am
Nothing wrong with using a stack. In my professional every day work, 99% of everything is FASDIU. Currently there is only one exception and it's easily reset when going to another table. You want to really fry people? Use a combination of the 2 and occasionally let them shuffle or handle the cards. Just like the age old question, What is better, gaffs or no gaffs....the answer is both and the specators should always have the feeling that they are just witnessing a miracle.
www.forentertainmentonly.com
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MagicJuggler
Special user
Anchorage, AK
918 Posts
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Posted: May 7, 2012 4:56am
After finishing one trick announce,"And now for my next trick..." Turn your back on the audience for a second while saying,"Just a second, almost ready." While arranging your next trick. Next turn around and say,"Ok, I'm going to do a trick with a normal deck of cards that hasn't been pre-arranged at all."
Matthew Olsen
www.mattolsenmagic.com
I heard from a friend that anecdotal evidence is actually quite reliable.
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MagicJuggler
Special user
Anchorage, AK
918 Posts
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Posted: May 7, 2012 5:00am
Actually this can be really funny if you're doing a trick that doesn't require any set-up and is blatantly obvious during the course of the routine (having spectators shuffle the deck before and after selection, etc.) Of course you have to have the right kind of personality to pull it off well without spoiling the rest of your magic.
Matthew Olsen
www.mattolsenmagic.com
I heard from a friend that anecdotal evidence is actually quite reliable.
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magicfish
Inner circle
2836 Posts
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Posted: May 8, 2012 9:24pm
Quote:
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On 2012-05-05 13:18, cirrus wrote:
Proper routining could solve the trick (pun intended). Never do more then 1 pre-arranged deck trick after another, it's not professional in my opinion. Although an act complete of card tricks is boring (believe me, although a lot of people on this forum will say otherwise).
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....you cant be serious.
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BenGGie
New user
61 Posts
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Posted: May 8, 2012 10:23pm
There are some interesting ways to set up one trick under the guise of doing an effect, Darwin Ortiz has couple on his Scam's and Fantasies set.
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S2000magician
Inner circle
Yorba Linda, CA
3597 Posts
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Posted: May 8, 2012 11:49pm
Quote:
| On 2012-05-08 22:23, BenGGie wrote:
There are some interesting ways to set up one trick under the guise of doing an effect, Darwin Ortiz has couple on his Scam's and Fantasies set. |
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Here's the late Glenn Falkenstein doing just that. Note Glenn's comment at 1:38.
Now, back to your original question. I disagree with the suggestion that doing more than one effect with a prearranged deck is unprofessional; I've seen many professionals who do just that. However, as you've already determined, it may be difficult if you have limited performing experience. Glenn's performance above shows you one way to insert into the middle of your routine an effect that requires a stack, but to do it smoothly requires a lot of practice. (Not that the technique is difficult, but doing it smoothly whilst chatting amiably with the audience as if you are ignoring what you're doing with the cards is difficult unless practiced.)
As for moving from one effect to another in general, that depends a lot on your personality and the performing persona you adopt, and a lot on the effects in your repertoire. Some effects, such as Twisting the Aces and The Last Trick of Dr. Jacob Daley fit together quite naturally; you remove four cards (usually the aces) from the deck for the former, and use only those four cards for the latter as well. As your knowledge of card magic grows, I encourage you to study the effects you know. What do you need to begin each effect? How does each effect end (i.e., how are the cards arranged at the end?)? If you're diligent in your studies, you'll find other sequences of effects that naturally blend together.
If you can find a copy of John Bannon's (book) Dear Mr. Fantasy, I'd encourage you to get it. He has a sequence much like Glenn's above where in the course of doing one effect with a deck that has been shuffled multiple times by a spectator he openly sets it up for a spectacular follow-up effect. Alas, I have never been able to do it as written (I cannot do a pressure fan to save my life), but the approach will get you thinking about ways you can do much the same thing.
On top of that, you'll need to consider what you say in the segues, which will depend again on your performing persona. Some of us need nothing more than, "Here's something else interesting." Others are more elaborate. Some are casual on one occasion and Shakespearean on another. You'll have to find out for yourself what works for you.
Best of luck!
BCIII
The Polite Side of Magic
Risk Mitigation Associates
Bottom Line Gurus
I took the Pledge
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