Incarnation – Marc Oberon
$99.95
http://www.murphysmagic.com/product.aspx?id=55148

The Hype:
Marc Oberon latest gimmick has been a year in the making. Called Incarnation, it provides the ability to manifest thought and offers countless presentational possibilities for magicians and mentalists alike.

Instructional DVD

There is a full instructional DVD included with the effect, so you will be able to see each step in detail

My Take:
Frank Zappa once sang "Wowie Zowie Baby, You're the one!" I think he could have been singing about this new release from Marc Oberon. After watching the DVD and playing with the gimmicks, I think I have fallen in love.

I have seen Angelo Carbone's "The Gift" and thought it was pretty much the ultimate in cleverness but that was before I saw this. Angelo, move over.

What you get is a 21 minute DVD (not that long but there is so much information packed into it plus it is a lot of fun to watch), a clip that does some incredible stuff, a notepad that does likewise, some playing cards that are probably one of the neatest gimmicked cards I have ever run across and some extra cards used in some of the routines. I was actually shocked when I opened the box as to how much had been packed in there.

This is not a hard trick to do. The majority of the difficulty will be in presenting it. It will take significant rehearsal to get this ready for prime time but there are no difficult moves. With practice, there is not a one of you who could not do this trick.

Here are the tricks you learn.

Effect One - The magician has the clip on the front of his jacket with a card clipped inside. A deck is on the table. The spectator names any number from 1-52. The deck is counted to that number and the card is shown. When the card in the clip that has been in sight the whole time is removed, it is a perfect match for the spectator's card.

Effect Two - The spectator is asks to think of the value of a card, no suit, just a value. He is shown a card listing a number of different cards. Without asking for any information, the magician removes a card from the clip, asks the spectator to name his card and shows the removed card to match. All this without having the spectator name either value or suit. This is based on an effect by Larry Becker from Stunners and it is indeed a stunner.

Effect Three - The spectator picks a card then is asked for their Zodiac sign. When the card is removed from the clip, not only is it the selected card but it has the spectator's zodiac sign written on it.

Any one of these is a reputation maker. I hate to gush but the sheer cleverness of everything in this package boggles my mind. I realize that mentalism effects generally sell for more. Take a look at Docc Hilford's booklets. I guess this keeps the secrets out of the hands of those who are just curious. But you usually get only a pamphlet or minimal props for your cash. You have been given the props for an entire act here. The only thing you might need to add is an ordinary deck of cards.

Sorry Angelo. The Gift is amazing but I have a new love. $99.95 may seem a lot for a trick but this is worth every penny of the cost especially if you are a working pro. One thing I will guarantee you is that once you open the box and watch the DVD, plan on just sitting around for an evening playing with his gimmicks. Pure genius! Out of 5 stars, this rates at least a 6.

Why didn't you mention the paper cards which look nothing on earth like real playing cards ?

I thought they looked just fine in the video. This was not meant as a closeup trick, but guess you are entitled to your opinion. Thanks for your comment.

That's because you are thinking like a magician. I've been using this for four months in close up situations and not once has anybody mentioned the cards because they are usually blown away by the effect, the card is folded up and put away.
The card in a Kennedy box doesn't look like a folded card, the same goes for some of the other boxes out there.
Before perfect score came out some of the mercury folded cards I got away with proved to me that as long as it is handled correctly you can get away with a lot.
I think I do a pretty good mercury fold 90%of the time but perfect score is amazing.
Personally I will be quite happy if this trick isn't used by the masses 😀

To each his own, I think when you're confortable with a trick, you won't be avle to do it right in front of people. It happened with this, the notebook is akward, the cards are akward, the only thing I would consider using is the clip ^^

I totally agree each to his own, but how much serious practice did you give to the cards and the note book, not much I suspect because neither are difficult to do if you put the work in. But if you get them out of the box and play with them for a bit I agree they could feel awkward and difficult to use.
Watch Mark use them, does it look difficult. The answer is no. This is not like learning to do the pass, I practiced for around two weeks, not much of a sacrifice for some great effects with multiple uses that because they are not sold or advertised like a lot of magic you won't find many magicians performing them 😀

Nice comments, Rowland, Thanks.