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The Effect
Coins magically move between the magician and the spectators hands.
Cost
£31:99 from various on line suppliers, including Talk Magic sponsors!
Difficulty
(1=easy to do, 2=No sleights, but not so easy, 3=Some sleights used,
4=Advanced sleights used, 5=Suitable for experienced magicians only)
2 - 3 for most of it... Possibly a 4 for the last vanish!
The Advertising Blurb
There is no magic without imagination. Everything starts with imagination; a smile, a sculpture, the Mona Lisa, the Pyramids of Giza. But what if you could take them beyond what they expect? Beyond magic? Beyond their imagination?
Imagination Coins allows your audience to do the magic in their own hands. Simple, clear and beyond anything they can imagine. If you have used Imagination Coins in the past this information will bring you into a new world of effectiveness.
Effect:
The spectator clearly has four coins that they stack in their own hand. The magician does nothing as the spectator imagines giving the magician a coin and somehow even though the magician does not touch or go near the spectator, it happens: the coin ends up leaving the spectator's hand and materializing in the magician's hand. Then, with another feat of imagination, the coin manifests itself back into the hand of your spectator.
Garrett's Imagination Coins concept gets revisited and updated with a treasure trove of special bonuses that get even stronger reactions! He re-teaches the original version now with more detail and more intimate close up instruction. Special Guest Eric Jones stops by to interview Garrett on this effect and share some of his personal thoughts on Coins Across.
Many magicians have taken Garrett's workshop or private lesson on David Roth's Coins Across. Garrett touches on every phase of this classic effect. His complete Coins Across workshop is available here for the first time ever.
As a special Bonus you receive the method for the effect that Garrett calls Jump: four quarters being trapped by two pennies instantly vanish between the pennies and appear into your hand.
"It's more than just a coins across, more than a series of sleights... it's an example of how real magic would look."
- Eric Jones
"It is the only coin trick I would ever do. It's that strong."
- Luke Jermay
"This effect does not just teach you how to manipulate coins, but how to manipulate your audience. That is what the best magic always accomplishes."
- Kainoa Harbottle
Gimmick and small, black, silicon change coin purse included.
Review
Although I do Coinvexed a lot, and also make good use of a coin unique, I'm not a coin magician. However, I've been looking for some more coin magic that's not to hard to perform, that happens in the spectators hands and preferably could almost be called mentalism, and of course, is very strong! This seemed to fit the bill perfectly.
In its basic form, this is a lovely 2 phased coins across routine. Garret also gives us a 4 phased routine for this as well. This is the same as the 2 phased routine, with a more standard coins across section in the middle. I bought this for the 2 phase routine, and that's the routine that I have been using.
What happens is… The magician lays four coins in the spectators hand. The spectator, in their imagination, picks up one of the coins and places the imaginary coin in the magicians waiting hand. The magician opens closes and opens his hand, and the coin has appeared there for real! The spectator now only has 3 coins in their hand!
Then, all four coins are placed in the spectators hand, and the spectator removes one of them, and places it in the magicians open hand. The Magician closes his hand, then opens it again, and the coin has vanished! Despite having physically removed one of the coins, the spectator is holding four coins again!
And this is pretty much how it plays out! Here’s a link to it being performed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYX2RuE1E3U
For your money you get a gimmicked coin (which most magicians will already know, but as I'm not wanting to expose the method, it will be known a "[" for the rest of this review), a very comprehensive DVD, and a little black rubber purse to hold your Imagination Coins in
Now, if you know what this gimmick is, and you've seen a video of the performance, do you need to buy this? I think the answer to this has to be yes! And not just for the moral issues… The DVD is very, very good. There is so much on it! Nothing is left out. You truly have the benefits of the invaluable experience of two excellent magicians sharing their knowledge of a trick they have clearly performed countless times.
The DVD shows performance and very thorough explanations of the 2 and 4 phase versions of this routine, two amazingly good theory sections, with Garrett in conversation with Eric Jones. These alone are strong enough reasons for buying the DVD. There’s a long section on “Zero Coins Across,” about making a coins across as convincing as possible (Also in here is a performance of Erics stunning coins across routine). And there's a whole detailed and invaluable section on audience management, which is so needed as if your helper with this isn't fully controlled, you’re certainly at some risk of things going a bit wrong. These two chapters alone are reason to purchase this, and certainly bare repeated viewing.
This is a pretty easy routine to do, although it's certainly not a beginners trick. I found that the final sleight, a vanish from a clenched fist, far harder than I could do. Garret suggests a way of doing this without any sleights, but to me that wasn't a satisfactory solution, so the first few times I performed this I sleeved the [, but it wasn't working as I'd like as the [ is quite light and didn't sleeve reliably. So I pulled out the Bobo DVD and sat and watched vanishes for an hour or so, and discovered one that's easy and fits in so nicely with this routine. I did this routine three times last night with this new vanish and it worked a treat
(Not that I'm saying that I've improved Garretts routine. Really, I'm not… I've just found a way to do it that I can be comfortable with) Also, with the second phase of the trick, you need to be a little brave to do it… It's a relatively gutsy move. And one that works very nicely. I'm still amazed every time it I do this
The other thing to be aware of, especially with the first phase, it that there are some slight angle issues, but nothing to major. Whilst I've performed this a few times now (I certainly wouldn't be reviewing it if I hadn't), I haven't yet done this fully surrounded, but to be honest, I think that with a little care, it really shouldn't be to much of a problem. The audience management chapters certainly cover this in great detail.
There's a couple of things that to me that are important as far as new magic go these days… the reset is pretty instant… when you take back the four coins from the spectator at the end, they just slide into the hand with the [, and you're away for the next performance. Also, it doesn't need a table to perform.
There's a bonus trick on here, also exceptionally well taught by Garrett, called "Jump" where four coins, sandwiched between two smaller copper coins, jump to the other hand. It looks lovely, but to be honest, all seems a bit fiddly to me, so not a trick that I think I'll be performing… but that's just me. I'm sure that quite a few magicians could get a lot of use from this.
Overall
This is a great piece of magic! I know that a fair bit of this review has been talking about the negative points (the hard final vanish, the slight angle issues and the need for audience control, especially on the second phase) but I have tried to show that none of these are insurmountable, and that this is very do-able. I'm very pleased with this. I now have new magic that I can perform easily, reliably, and that is extremely practical to do. In fact, as long as you have the [ with you, you can even borrow the coins! And with the two theory chapters, you have a masterclass in how to perform magic!
Another practical plus is that the gimmick is easily obtainable and relatively inexpensive, so once you know the routine, you can find a gimmicks that will allow you to perform this all over Europe, in the States, and of course, here in sunny London
For me, the main strength of this, as opposed to other coins across routines, is that it's not just a "Look at me" trick. It happens in the spectators hands, and the routining makes it a very personal event. There's some excellent psychology in here that has this bordering on mentalism!!! I'm sure that the right performer could have the helper questioning their own perception of reality!
This is a product that is not going to sit at the back of the magic drawer, gathering dust. This will be taken out into the real world and used. Garrett and Eric talk about magic being a gift that you give to your audience, and that most definitely is true for Imagination Coins!
