So what false shuffles do people like to do with their stacked decks?

Bill Wisch's "In the Hands Zarrow" is great. It's natural without looking too slick. This summer I hope to spend some time learning the Heinstein shuffle, because to me that looks REALLY great.

--Chris

Heinstein for me whenever I'm standing. Zarrow for table work with some "up the ladder" work.

What's fine with the Osterlind Stack is that either you or your audience can do regular cut, so there is not much need for false shuffle.

Agreed. It's more for the benefit of my magician friends who already know I'm partial to stacks...

Anyway, I bought the Osterlind stack ebook based on what I read here, and think it's the best in cyclical stacks.

Getting back to the original question , here's the first thing I came up with when I first learned Si Stebbins. It's obviously usable with any stack...


You've probably heard people say the hand is quicker than the eye. You might have even said it yourself. But if you think about it, you know that's nonsense. The eye perceives changes in light and nothing is faster than light. Trust me. I went to MIT. I know how to lie about science...

So the eye sees everything the hand does. The problem is that some things happen too fast to register. At least without training. I've been trying to train my eyes to catch things faster. Would you help me with a demonstration?

Take these cards and cut them. Now take the top card, look at it, and put it in your pocket while my back is turned. Have you done that? Great. Now if I were to go through the deck one at a time, it's pretty obvious I should be able to figure out which card you have in your pocket. But if my theory is correct, all I have to do is slowly riffle the corners like this. Now I've seen all 51 cards, and I know I've only seen three of the 7s. I remember both black ones, so you have to have a red 7. I'm pretty sure... yes, you have the 7 of hearts!

Where can the " Bill Wisch's "In the Hands Zarrow " false shuffle be located ?

Anyone... please ?

False shuffling seems to risky to me. Granted Im not the best at false overhands and riffles really look too fake (IMO). Going with Osterlind's method and counting on the spectator doing the cuts as sufficient.

Wayne

...And yet, at a lecture, Osterlind did a simple false riffle shuffle with his stack and fooled us all. When asked which shuffle it was he said, (all toghther now) "It's in Tarbell".

Victor

Imho you absolutely have to shuffle the deck. Why wouldn't you?

Whwn laymen play cards the card are shuffled as soon as they come out of the box. It's the natural thing to do. If you can't do a false shuffle..... learn one it's not that difficult and enhances the illusion a great deal.


Jesper

As Richard said, "It's in Tarbell"...and it is.
I just do a simple, sloppy overhand shuffle and a riffle.
Don't do anything fancy..spectactors just get suspicious if they see that you can handle the deck better than the average layman can.

Sven

I received Osterlind's BCS DVD and it is very good......

I heartily recommend Ken Krenzel's "Chopper" false shuffle. It can be found in the book "Ken Krenzel's Close-Up Impact". It is very easy to do and cannot be distinguished from a regular overhand shuffle.

Ulf

Ive been just doing repeated cuts and the slip shuffle, so far no problem. Just got to trust spec to do the cuts correctly before the effect or let them do the cuts in front of me.

I found I get challenged pretty often at the outset. After displaying the cards and a couple of false shuffles, that is enough for 99%. Every once in a blue moon I get people who accuse me of stacking the deck or memorizing it outright, but I have found that people assume if they can't reverse engineer it, then everything is ok. I think the willingness to let them see that the deck is not a brand-new in order deck is enough, especially before false shuffling.

Krenzel shuffle suggested above is pretty good, the riffle shuffle done by Richard Osterlind is pretty convincing too.

Me, I alternate between false riffle shuffle and some sloppy shuffle depending on the situation.

Basic thing IMO is not trying to overprove that the deck is in a random order, but let spectator assume that is the situation.

And if they tell you you could have memorized the deck when you apparently don't look for any card to give you a clue, that it's just plain nonsense.

I think that's the name of the game... Convincing everyone that you don't look at any card, not even one, thus making difficult for them accusing you of using a memorized deck.

Unless they accuse you of flash estimation + memorization but in that case they would be better magicians than you are!

Osterlind's system is the one I use. Nobody has even questioned it yet, whether false shuffled or not - as long as you let the spectator do the last cut or two before choosing their card. It just doesn't occur to most people that you make the force with the cards in their hands.

Merlin

Ehr... Merlin, if we are talking about Osterlind's Breakthrough, I'm sure you wanted to say "guess" or "divine" the card while the deck is in their hands and not "force" since you don't need to force a card with that deck (unless you want to).

The Osterlind Stack is incredibly powerful. The Mind Mysteries series demonstrates it thoroughly and effectively.
--GF

After using the BCS by Osterlind, I cant find any stronger mentalism effect.

In the first video, mind mysteries - the act, he performs the radar deck.

But once he's finished, he gives the deck to the loud guy at the front to examine.

Won't he see the way the stack is setup?