Starting out in the world of magic can be difficult, especially without a teacher. I mean, sure you can learn hundreds of free tricks on youtube, but without guidance its just a smorgasbord of information and its hard to separate the good from the garbage.

Then, there are the magicians who've been around a while, they're advice is to read books. Typically, they're old books been around as long as the bible and probably read just as confusing.

Then, there are HOW TO BE A MAGICIAN kits at the store. But they are typically filled with plastic made in china junk and it doesn't seem like it would fool anyone.

What do you do?

It’s crucial when building anything, that you start with core essentials and building blocks. If you were learning to play an instrument, you'd start with scales and chords. Are there building blocks in magic? Of course!

You need a strong foundation. You need it to be all on one place. You need ease of access and you need room to grow.

You can get all of that in the HOW TO BE A MAGICIAN kit sold at ELLUSIONIST.

I was very impressed with this self-contained kit. Yes, it comes with made in china props (LOL) but they are the props that many of us have started off with and you get REAL VIDEO INSTRUCTION from people in the industry.

The kit is $69 and it gives you a custom deck of cards, box of magic props and you'll learn 40 classic tricks of sliding difficulty, and 13 sleights all taught by Chris Ramsay, Adam Wilber and Peter McKinnon.

The teachers are professional magicians, content creators and youtube celebrities.

Here is a video I made of what the contents of the box looks like and what the video teaching looks like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Bc2nUKHkCU

Here is a content break down of what you'll learn

1. Sponge Ball Routine
2. Paddle Move (jumping x) Coffee Stir
3. Jumping Dot with a cigarette
4. Vanishing Cigarette
5. Coin Bite – (no notes on care, transpo, coin in bottle)
6. Napkin Float – (IT) teaches make loops
7. Sharpie Reveal – – teaches a simple force with a signed card
8. Learn Thumb Tip
9. Out of This World – Paul Curray the trick that fooled Winston Churchill
10. Robbers Trick – does it as a cards from pocket
11. Black 6 and 9 trick
12. Win a Drink
13. Criss Cross Force
14. Card Toss
15. Tenkai Palm / Teijiro Ishida (over 50 years old) master class
16. Erdnase Color Change / Expert at the Card Table 1902 /
17. Paddle Move
18. Revolution / coin vanish
19. Peek / how to peek a card and reveal it
20. Coin Bend / signed quarter and nickel
21. Crazy Man’s Handcuffs / Created by Arthur Setterington and published by Peter Warlock in New Pentagram (May 1970) as "Getaway'
22. Cigg Vanish and Appearance / could use a golf pencil
23. Card to Mouth
24. Retention Coin Vanish / Nelson Downs and Dai Vernon
25. Two Card Transpo / Blaine made famous John Scarne switchcraft
26. Triumph / published in 1948 in Royal Road to Card Magic as A Tispy Trick
27. Ambitious Card - French magician Gustav Alberti, in the mid-19th century / (3x)
28. 2 Card Monte / "Be Honest, What Is It?" by Eddie Fechter
29. Pirouette (flourish twirl a card)
30. The Backup Plan / four of a kind turns over effect
31. One handed shuffle
32. Card to Pocket
33. Waving the Aces
34. Spin Change / flourishy reveal
35. Professor’s Nightmare
36. Stopping your pulse
37. 3 Pak Shakur
38. Cards from the Mouth
39. Angle Z
40. Haunted Deck

Sleights learned
1. double undercut,
2. hold a break,
3. dl,
4. overhand shuffle control
5. pinky count
6. top change
7. culling a card
8. cardini change
9. snap change
10. Bertram Change / Ross Bertram
11. LePaul Spread first published by Paul Le Paul
12. Hot Shot Cut invented by Daryl
13. How to do a ribbon spread

I bought this kit. Your description of it is spot-on. I love the custom deck of cards - mine was a second-edition ghost deck. In my opinion, the videos are good teaching tools, better than most of what's on YouTube. There are about 8 more tricks that are taught in "bonus material" that is not advertised on the site that are quite cool.

This will keep a beginning magician busy for months if not years.