I have had NFW for many, many years. I have done it a lot and have put it away time and again, but always to come back to it. Why, I ask myself every time I pick it back up. Because it is simply just the perfect little packet trick. Of course there are hordes of other gems out there and to each his own as to what they like but this little trick was an absolutely stroke of genius by Gary Freed, IMHO.

The effect is compact and so easy to do but always amazing to specs. You can do it a couple of different ways but any way you do it will make people's eyes POP! It doesn't take much to do it but a few basic enough moves in card magic. It all allows you to presents it in the most interesting of all ways, as an absolutely impossible slo-mo change of 4 face-up Jokers to all face-down and then a most miraculous finale in a change to 4 Aces. This is so simplistically beautiful. And if it was the only card trick you ever did, people would surely remember you always for it.

Time after time, I have come to realize again and again that this is just an amazing card trick. I have tried many, with gaffs and with regular cards and there are many that are quite good and worth the effort to know and present, but NFW is just so clean IMHO and so instantly amazing that I find it hard to beat. And I'm a guy that also loves beauties like Double Back, B'wave and Dr. Daley's Last Trick. All monsters as packet tricks go and there are admittedly other noteworthies but having come back to NFW yet again in my life (And I'm more of a coin guy really), I totally get it now. It's just the best. So cleverly done with not all that confusing twisting and turning going on. It's clear and direct, the perfect follow-along for the specs. It's not too long and or over-engaging but just enough to lure you in, take you to the top of the the tallest building and drop you off like a rollercoaster as to such sudden amazement.

Just love this trick, still after all these years. What do you guys think?

I have to admit my ignorance here, but I am not familiar with this effect.
Would someone help me, please?

Thanks

mlippo

Mlippo, this should help:

http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewt......orum=109

I agree that NFW is fantastic, especially if you learn a convincing show of the four face up Jokers. I do not like the easier "we have three face up and one face down" start. BWave, with how simple it is, is amazing if you do the eliminations in such a way as it looks like free choice.

NFW created a BIG buzz in the magic world when it cam out. It was the trick you had to have. And it didn't let you down when you bought it. And if you do Gary Freed's advanced handling, you can show all the cards face down at the beginning.

Clarke

Funny how this post showed up today...I just retrieved my NFW from the drawer and showed it to my girlfriend(the standard version where one "joker" is already turned over). It blew her away!!!

I agree, this is one of the great packet tricks available. It gets amazing reactions!

It's still my favorite packet trick, & I
perform it often ...

Have to break it out again; it IS amazing!

Great trick.

Yes, this is a great trick!

Greg

The challenge is finding a convincing way to initially display four jacks.

Glad to see that others share the love of this great packet trick too.

Todsky, I have yet to see anyone do this trick any better than it is presented in this video. I took the time to learn it just this way. And it's a very convincing show of the initial 4 jokers, pretty easy to do, very effective and with practice it becomes the perfect opening move to the routine. I pull it out my wallet or pocket and go into just like this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_4Q6ZstiTI

To me, this handling is so well done and smooth that it's hard to beat and that's why I left well-enough alone and began doing it just this way. I hate to see people bending the cards to make the magic happen at the end, just looks awful, out of place and fishy. Tack on a poorly done Elmsley and even doing the initial count badly and it kills the intended finesse of the trick. Look at how smooth this guy in the video makes this all happen, just wonderfully done.

The only thing I do a bit differently is slow it down some as I don't have to finish in a hurry like in the presentation video, in :30. But if you can practice and do it that smoothly you will make an already great effect even greater and more rhythmically magical, IMHO.

Marion, that's a great video: he makes it look very clean. I will study and learn from it. Thanks!

Yeah Todsky, it really is. Like I said, I have yet to see anyone do it any better, though I have seen many do it worse. Every move in the presentation of that video is perfectly motivated. The reveals are logical and within the natural flow of the presentation. The patter is spot-on with the moves. The opening show of 4 Jokers looks real and though the regular implied notion that you have 4 jokers works as well, clearly it's more effective to start out showing the 4 cards face down and then actually as you say they are as 4 Jokers, is it not?

Funny thing is, that it's pretty easy to start that way as in the video. I guess people didn't want to belabor the moves with another count and since it all goes by pretty fast, to just say you have 4 Jokers works as well...Guess it's easier to just say and act as if you have a million dollars to a large extent than to be have to actually show it.

Anyway, I typically change routines as I present effects but this particular one and a very few others I have left the way I found them because the presentations were flawless to begin with. So instead of adapting the thing to me, I adapted to it and so present perfection every time I do it, IMHO.

I actually had the opportunity to do this trick twice at the barbershop yesterday for some people there...It absolutely blew them out their shoes! The effect is so easy to immediately setup & present, and the moves just flow, and specs can follow easy enough for the big pay-off of amazement at the end. One barber, no 3 of them, watched at different times and they said they were watching my hands all the way through, no way those 4 Jokers could've become 4 Aces...but they did.

I then did a coin trick before I left, my "ReVisiTed," which was enough along with NFW as an opener, to leave them completely in awe.

So, the soup is already made when it comes to this great trick as you see it in this video, nothing to add or take away, just heat & eat.

There are hundreds, no probably thousands of cards tricks out there and it's fun to know a few that you can do for people quite expertly. I can do several and do do others at times that are fun to present, gaffed and or un-gaffed. I typically like to do 3-5 different ones and I work on being the best I can at those. A couple with a deck and a couple of slick packet tricks you can pull out anywhere. Anywhere I go, I am happy to be able to pull out NFW (even when I don't have a deck with me), it's truly one of the very best cards tricks I have seen as validated by most people that have experienced it, either as the presenting magician or as a spectator.

This is a great trick, for some reason its at the back of my 'magic' drawer ! must dig it out..

NFW, I'm surprised NFW isn't your premiere trick!

You would think so ...

regards
NFW

MB, thanks for that video clip. Elmwood was the first to release this and Paul Richards, a talented Magi in his own right, does it superbly.

Clarke

Sometimes we get caught up in looking for "better" or "newer" tricks, only to realize that we already have something that can't be beat. That's NFW, when it comes to packet tricks.