Hey everyone,

A friend of mine shared an effect with me and asked if I had ever seen it. I had not, but that doesn't mean it isn't out there. It reminded me a bit of Thunderstruck by Ken Krenzel, but it doesn't WORK the same way if you catch my drift. So I thought I would toss it out to the Café to see what you guys thought.

Without revealing methods, here is a vid of me doing the effect. Let me know if you have seen it before and please provide references.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5SGwJELprU

Cheers,
Aaron DeLong

#1. I hope you don't use that patter when you actually perform the trick for laypeople. "Make sure there are no breaks." "I'll just outjog it."

#2. To answer your question: "Yes, I've seen it many times before. When I teach beginners about key cards, it's one of the effects I use as an example."

I wonder why a key card can produce this effect.

I have read Red/Black Menetekel Deck somewhere. The gimmick is same, but the effects are different.

Hideo Kato

The method is not a key card. This is a trick that beginners and experienced magi can do. It is quite simple, but very strong when presented well.


Cheers,
Aaron

OK, let me start again. Yes, I have seen it before. It is the first trick I teach to beginners when I begin my lesson about the use of key cards so I have seen myself and my students perform this many hundreds of times. The key card is used, not to locate other cards, but as the force card itself. Once the beginners understand the concept of the key card, the lessons then progress to other uses and types of key cards. The particular key card type that I use for this is a shaved corner blue card.

This is the way I learned about key cards in the 1950's when I took lessons from Ted Collins (of Mecca Magic) who used the same effect. I don't know if the effect itself has a special name, but it was old to Ted, too. It was not considered much more than an effect to introduce beginning magicians to the concept of key cards. In our presentations of it, we never mention "card breaks" or "outjogging." Those are magician's terms reserved for later lessons that employ pure sleight of hand.

If you have learned to perform the effect without using a key card, congratulations, but it's not much of an effect then, is it?

Again, the effect does not use a key card. They can stop me anywhere as I dribble, near the top, bottom or middle and the card they select will be the only blue card in the deck. That means that the blue card that goes in is obviously not the same one they choose. Which means it is not a key card.

I use the line of "no breaks" for magicians. This video was clearly made for magicians as well as the patter or lack of it. Again, let me be clear here. The vid was made to get crediting done for fellow magi. Nothing else. It is not going on a dvd, a vhs, a website or anywhere for sale. It is being used for crediting and source sighting.

Aaron DeLong

Maybe Spellbinder-san meant "Locator Card", not "Key Card".
Anyway the trick was done not by a Key Card or Locator Card, but by red/blue Menetekel Deck if my guess was correct. Menetekel Deck was invented by Burling Hull in 1900 if my memory is correct.

If Aaron-san had spectator insert his finger while riffling the cards in stead of having spectator call stop while dribbling, Spellbinder-san did not misunderstood.

Hideo Kato

P.S.
Sorry it is not Menetekel Deck, but is red/blue variant of more famous deck by the same inventor.

P.P.S.
I now recollected I independently invented that variant of SD and Haines House of Cards manufactured it. In that trick, I did not show the blue backed card as the prediction, but the selected card turn to different color.

Do you know the name of the more famous deck by the same inventor?

Thanks.

Svengali.

Aaron:

The deck you are describing is R.W. Hull's "Magnetic Mental Control," which was first published in Greater Magic. It has been knocked off by a number of people over the years. The most recent knockoff of it is by Magic Apple. They have "improved" it by having several cards of the odd color in their shirt pocket, "which eliminates the need for the second deck."

It's an excellent trick.

I checked Hull's MMC and found it uses R/S, not End Stripper which the OP uses.

Instead of End Stripper, I recommend normal End Shorts because you can riffle the cards more naturally. (Not at near corners). Besides, you can Riffle Shuffle more naturally.

Hideo Kato

Thanks guys. I will pass on the information to my friend.

Is it the method or the effect that is important? You can add short cards to the RS and have everything you need. But in the MMC, although you don't riffle the cards to show them, you can ribbon spread them face up. Max uses this same deck in his shows.

Although I don' t know why Mr.Palmer quoted my post, I would like to make my point clear. My main point was I thought "End Shorts is better than Stripper".

Of course the effect is more important than method. But without using the best method, the best effect is not possible.

I agree R/S make the effect better. As R/S is a method, it is an example of what I mentioned.

Hideo Kato

P.S.
My quoted post was not to point Mr.Palmer's no mention about R/S, I wished to add the information. Sorry if it was uncomfortable.

No problem. I didn't mean to pick on you.