talkmagic.co.uk

So I was just looking on ellusionist and see they've got a big marketing drive going for their new "Ultra-Gaff" deck. I was just wondering what TalkMagic's card magicians though of these sorts of gaff decks.

Personally, I find them tacky. I have the regular Bicycle gaff deck with stuff like the aces with shattered pips, the 3-and-a-half of spades and the kings with skeletal faces, etc... I've never once used any of them.

When you do magic with a regular deck of cards people can really appreciate your skill and sleight of hand, but I get the feeling that if you pulled out an ace of spades with the center missing they'd just be like "OK, that looks cool, but you've obviously just bought a trick card" and the magic is liable to be lost. Even moreso with this new gaff deck they're pushing on their site - some of the cards look so extravagant there's really no way I can see that people are going to "believe" the effects they are going to be used for.

Having said that I do love to collect different decks just to have them, so I'm probably destined to buy one, haha!

don't do it!

i bought the ghost set, not to use, but to keep...

plus, the easiest gaffs to make in the world that look kinda odd and maybe semi-realistic is if you just take a decent eraser to a playing card

other than that, i agree...they look bunkum...plus they're usually ten or twenty quid...you can get a decent book for that price...

abraxus wrote:plus, the easiest gaffs to make in the world that look kinda odd and maybe semi-realistic is if you just take a decent eraser to a playing card

That'll work with bikes, but in my experience that's an anomaly: the ink on many brands of cards (piatnik for example) cannot be erased.

Which is better depends upon what you want, of course.

I don't really like these kinds of gaffs either, I use df and db cards quite often but to openly show a gaffed card for what it is just says 'hey I'm using trick cards'

I use a blank face card occasionally to make it seem as though the forgot to print the deck.
It works quite well.
Also good for a cheeky vanish!

One argument in favour of things like this, is the simple fact that when I show someone a regular card, and then do some magical jiggery-pokery and it turns into their selected card, very few people over the age of about ten believe that the card has magically changed itself. They know the card has been switched, they just don't know when or how, and that's where the amazement comes in. So if that same card were to turn into a blank card, or a picture of Daniel Garcia laughing himself silly and rolling in money, that moment where they realise the card they're holding is not what they thought it was is the same.

I own an ellusionist gaff deck, and like most other people who own them, I never use the gaffs in it. The reasons for this are:

1) Most of the gaff cards suck. Seriously, is anyone returned to that childlike state of wonder and amazement by a pip moving down the side of your king of diamonds under incredibly conspicuous cover of your thumb? And let's face it, a badly drawn skeleton on a card is fairly ridiculous looking anyway, so it's even more ridiculous looking when it suddenly has a giant 6 of hearts in it's hand. If you want a really visual trick with cards, take the time to learn something really visual, don't do boring tricks with pretty cards.

That said some of them are nice. I like fancy aces, the fading queens are a nice idea, and I have a poker routine which ends with the skull kings (although I've not done it in a long while).

2) Nearly every handling I've seen for the gaff cards is the same, and much as I love p***ing, and use it a lot in the magic I do, it's a lot of money for 52 glorified colour changes.

3) Every gaff card you use has to be added to the deck, then stolen away again, and kept in some pocket somewhere where it will inevitably bend and stick out like a sore thumb the second you add it to your working deck.


I apologise if I seem a little damning of the Ellusionist gaff decks, I'm sure some people put them to very good use, but I'd be willing to bet that Messrs. Garcia and Houchin AREN'T two of those people, no matter how much they say they are on the (doubtless hugely extortionately priced) DVD.

With respect to the new UltraGaff, it seems like it'll be used just as much as the gaff deck before it, only this time the pretty cards look stupider. Noone is going to believe the card has a battery in it, it's obviously a two dimensional image. Give your audience some credit.

Lady of Mystery wrote:I don't really like these kinds of gaffs either, I use df and db cards quite often but to openly show a gaffed card for what it is just says 'hey I'm using trick cards'

I totally agree with you. Gaffs that are never meant to be noticed - such as a db - are the best. I don't get the fascination they have over at ellusionist for the crazily printed weird cards.

I can sort of understand if the effect is done as a pun - like forcing the 7 of clubs and then bringing a pair of 3-and-a-half of clubs' out, because that's funny if you present it properly and for the right spectator. In fact, I might start working on something with those cards soon.

After a bit of pondering, what they should really do is sell each gaff card as a seperate item so people can buy just the ones that they can see themselves using. Ellusionist are hardly going to do that, though, considering they seem much more interested in harvesting the piggy-banks of the pre-pubescent than providing a genuine source of quality products and tutorials.

My biggest problem with the Ellusionist gaff decks is the astonishing lack of imagination and creativity that goes into make them. I did a review of the Gaff Deck Red Bicycle (you can find it here)

http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/ftopic12609.php

This deck was seriously hyped - and in execution, it was incredibly lacking. 10 cards were dedicated to the "sudden prediction" where a normal (gaff) card is shown, then changes to show a prediction of a selection. This is all well and good for one effect - but 5 different sets of 2 cards to do, essentially, the same effect??

They also cram in old, common gaffs and label them as new, awesome street magic magic cards extraordinaire (or some other type of awful marketing jargon).

In the case of the Ultra Gaff deck - there are a few clever ones (I actually think the battery cards can be cool, combined with a production of real batteries.

However, like Serendipity - I am not convinced that Mr. Garcia and Mr. Houchin actually use these day-to-day.

It should also be noted that a few of the gaffs in there, are just slight reworkings of gaffs in the red deck.

I liked CAJ deck - you might look into that one.

Queen of Clubs - if you're after singular cards out of curiosity's sake if nothing else, then cards4magic.co.uk have single cards for sale...

i think quite a few years ago, i did a devil amongst the angels kinda thing based on a sankey effect...

they do tombstone shaped bike cards in small packs too for novelty...blank on both sides...

Don't use 'em, can't vouch for 'em. (I love Fargo...)


Er, yeah - no gaffs. I agree, conspicuous, a bit naff and no more magical than just a decent card trick. What I might be interested in is something that allows you to get a card signed, and then you move the pips, smudge the ink etc. but then, you're not going to want to give away an expensive gaff every time.

DB, DF, BB, B.F and DB gaff cards I think are a bit different, I use those fairly regularly.

Farls - absolutely LOVE the new avatar!

The only gaff deck I own is the Ghost gaff deck but I hardly ever use any of the cards; I purchased it because I had a spare £15 at the time and was just curious. What the hell, I thought. Bit of a waste of money, but you live and learn (or just live, in my case).

Like some of you, the only gaffs I tend to use these days are the standard Bicycle gaff cards which the spectator never even knows is there. Which is just the way I like it. All these fancy Ellusionist decks are rather expensive, anyway.

By the way, if anyone needs gaffed cards in small quantities as opposed to an entire deck, I can recommend Bicycle Tricks (run by our own Philip Sweeting)...

http://www.bicycletricks.co.uk/cards-fo ... ties-here/

I think it all boils down to who you perform things too! Generally speaking, looking at the demo's-the deck is marketed to performing it to gullable USA school kids. I imagine most of this forum wont be doing that on too regular a basis!

To far to travel

i did see one quite good gaff trick once the magician got two people to pick two cards said right im going to find your card becaus e he was intimating they both chose the same one (or something like that) audience had a slight argument about which cards they had chosen. Hey presto magician reveals the 3 and 7 of clubs and diamonds card, audience goes away happy

Adrian Morgan wrote:

abraxus wrote:plus, the easiest gaffs to make in the world that look kinda odd and maybe semi-realistic is if you just take a decent eraser to a playing card

That'll work with bikes, but in my experience that's an anomaly: the ink on many brands of cards (piatnik for example) cannot be erased.

Which is better depends upon what you want, of course.

Nail varnish remover on an cotton wool or an ear bud for delicte areas takes the ink off bikes too.

Russ
www.smartmagic.co.uk