Hi folks,

I was chating with a good friend and we are trying to think of the best come outs when spectators see what is not there. I will explain..

Lets suposse you are about to do something and you will use Mind Power Deck as a tool.. then... tadaaaaaa.. your spectator 'saw' one card but when you are 'doing your job' you realise your spectator didn't think of one of the cards she/he could see...

Ok, we know that a very good presentation maybe would change this, you can phrase that "you must see one card and blablabla" or something like that, but sometimes they can just think of one card (that is not there) and that´s it.

What can we use as 'outs'?

See Christaian Chelman's Capricornian Tales for an effect you could use as an out. It is the one where someone sketches the card they are thinking of. Otherwise there is always Ultra-mental deck out.

Cheers,
Al

I think you could use an invisible deck as an out... or Kolossal Killer (Kenton Knepper).

Yeah, we can think of many deck switches or outs, but why would you try to fish if you had this before. remember you just know the spectator blowed everything up AFTER trying (and failling) to discover the card.

Original KK for sure is a good out for most of the cases...

I'm emailing you now.

Best,
Neil

Look up derren browns smoke effect, there are some great details in there that will answer your question

This is a real problem.

I open the deck on the table.

Mentalist - Please, look one this cards.
John - ok.

(I close the deck.)

Mentalist- Now, think your card... the card not is red, is it?
John - no
Mentalist - Yes, I saw this... but your card is number, correct?
John - Yes
Mentalist - and is "clubs"
John - Yes
Mentalist - Is a small number...
John - Yes...
Mentalist - Yes, I saw the card in your mind. Is a "Two of clubs".
John - No, is a "Four of clubs". (?????)

Really is a problem. The spectator can be look a "irreal card", can forget the card or the spectador maybe is "bad".
Somethimes I have this problems...

Move on. Either get them to repeat the experiment (if you're sure they won't spot the deck's secret), or move onto another effect.

You can blame your own lack of energy for the failure, or the specatator's lack of commitment. But I don't think you have to be right in Mentalism all of the time.

Occasionally, customers come up with their own reasons for failure that are quite convincing. As an example, I had a lady mis-read the required word when I was performing Marc Paul's AAA Book Test, and then mis-read it again when I attempted it on her a second time. I then moved to the next victim, and it worked. The troublesome lady then wondered out loud whether my inability to read her mind was linked to her invulnerability to hypnosis. As the customers around her were nodding sagely, I left it at that (and got a huge round of applause at the end).

Finally, while doing your next effect you could set up a prediction of the card chosen by the troublesome customer. Done in the right way, this can be quite impressive.

Just some ideas.

Ian

Communicating with people is so difficult.

In some situations, all that you can do is look at your personality, see if you are setting up an adversarial situation. A challenge act does not work with MPD, TOH, PK touches, Hellstromism/muscle reading, pulse stopping, etc. And many more.

But, figuring this out can completely save your career. I was leaving comedy clubs with huge laughter and applause, but people seemed to leave feeling that the show was incredible, but he was kind of an a.h. or a jerk. At that point, you've lost the more important thing. The people didn't have an emotional connection to you, and you might not be hired back again, or they just might not feel as good as they could have if you were not challenging their sensitivities and intelligence. You may have to drop some one liners in your show. Maybe you should have long ago. That's what I began to realize when I became less self focused about my act.

Good luck!

It's all in the presentation. If you set it up properly with your introductory remarks, the participant will know what to do, how to do it, and is very unlikely to mess things up.

With the Mind Power deck, it is essential that you get through to them at the very beginning that they must LOOk and SEE a card, and NOT merely imagine one. You can say that this is a test of visual retention, or retinal telepathy, or whatever presentational ploy you might choose, but get it through to them that if they were to just imagine a card, it might lead them to think of a favorite card, or perhaps one that you had tried to mentally "force" them to think of. You want their choice to be completely random and spontaneous, and so they must LOOK at a card they see in the spread and remember it.

While it may seem mundane and elementary, it is usually the performance that is at fault, and not the audience participant.

- entity

Just accept it will sometimes happen. There are a number of different possible reasons for it. My only advice is this : get two spectators involved. If you find one of the two cards, that's not bad. You can then use that success person for future demonstrations, just like an hypnotist will test some people first. Make sure that you spread the cards widely. At least I believe this has occasionally been the source of my problems. Finally if it happens, it happens. Just say that you are having problems tapping into his/her mind and move on. Many things could cause this to happen. For examle, someone might see clearly the four of spades and then see another black four and then conclude it is the four of clubs. Who knows? The correct hits far outweigh the occasional failures.

"Move on"

Great advise.
This is a 1 in 52 for a laymen and is not as good as you telling them their friends name via a centre tear etc.
If they lie or forget or whatever...it is a mistake to challenge them.

Look at the overall effect--it is minor.
The spec is not worth the hassle of a challenge.
Move on and do something else and try to hone your spectator selecetion skills such that you have less and less scenarios where you pick the wrong person.

The overall effect does not justify pulling out 2nd or 3rd packs of playing cards and getting into a prove-it mentality, IMO.

Tom

One day I spread the deck the wrong way. but I was lucky and could get 2 cards right!
kiki

Really is the best option in this case.

Thank you all for the kind words and for the time!
really liked to read your ideias and thoughts.
Rick

Yeah, move on is a good idea.

But, how do you move on? It's like a relationship, everyone needs a different way to get over it.

Sense of humor, backpeddling, excuses, outs, denial, blame... How about total acceptance, use it to get the audience 'on your side'. Wow, that is actually pretty powerful, and can make the other two even more powerful. Remember, this is an impossible trick, and tell them that.

Figure out what works best with your personality.

Maek suere that the spec never reveals the identity of the card until you have said it, then if (or when for some of us) you fail, over do it. Show how bloody hard this is, really continue to sturggle and perform!!

Then, in order for it to be a bit easier ask them to write their card down in order to illustrate the thoughts in their head far more clearly for you and then get them to project this image on a large screnn blah blah --

Then, center tear, peek, or just bloody look at it when the other spec doesn't notice (will get a huge laugh from the audience if you saw, ok I really want you to concentrate on your image now so close your eyes and really try hard, then you just open up the billet and say ahh yes, I'm getting it now, the 4 of clubs!)

But best yet - fail.

And be humble, to do what you say you are going to do is good if the claim is outlandish. But to fail to do it, then try again and really get it spot on is so much better - youve just demonstrated how hard it is to do, even for a person of a higher state like yourself.

Remember your creating mystery - mystery is somethign that if FOUND through observation, this mean people find it themselves. Anything learnt independantley is mroe likely to be believed. So don't tell someone what your going to do and do it, because you have taught them, illustrate how hard something is, even use comedy to portray the message of this (works best when you employ a wee bit of tragedy.)

Jon Hackett

As the only man on the planet who can regularly mess up the Gilbreath Principle, I agree - move on, or just dump the routine, altogether if it fails for you regularly.

I know that the mathematicians in the group will state, clearly, that my claim about the Principle is impossible, but I have witnesses. Many, many witnesses. Too many witnesses...!

In fact, it's one of the ways in which I learned how to move on and USE a "failure" to my advantage on stage.

Lee Darrow, C.H.

Failure in mentalism on one effect actually seems to add credibility to the rest of the effects in a set.

Multiple failures seem to exponentially decrease credibility. If you use routines that require audience participation and following directions/guidelines, then you are already using up your one failure.

The only way that you could take advantage of a failure in a self-working, surefire mentalism show would be to purposely mess up a very simple self-working trick on purpose. You would not want to introduce a more difficult, impossible effect for failure. That would only call attention to all of the contrivances and conditions that your show has for accomplishing the effects.

Maybe the only failure is being scared of going out on a limb and not being on your toes enough to recover.