talkmagic.co.uk

I was haing a little think today, just a little think, don't want to over do it , that I tend to assume that most people are familier with cards, however at my school, people often ask me to remind them what each of the cards are, "Jack" seems to be a difficult one. Even fewer people can feel confident about shuffling a deck. Maybe it's just my age group, or maybe it's where I live, it could just be the people I hang about with, I don't know. My dad's very keen on card games so I was familiar with them from an early age, but I often forget that not everyone is as familiar with them. I would class cards as an everyday object, basicaly becuase I've always had decks lying around the house and even more so since I got into magic, so to me they are everyday objects. In the book "Magic For Every Occasion" it says under "Magic for Romance, golden rules", "ladies do not enjoy long, complex card tricks-be warned" I think this is true for most people, not just us females, and especially true if the person you are performing for is not familiar with cards. What's the point of all this? I'm not sure, but the voices in my head told me to write about it, and i've been working on an investigation all day now so I had to post about something. I suppose a point could be, It doesn't matter how great at card slights you are, if they don't know what a deck of cards is, you'll never impress them, but it's still not a very good point. Well, back to latin investigation..................

I do magic at my local takeaway. The guy who owns it is Muslim and he doesnt understand cards..........at all. I hear what your saying mistress. I woulnd calss a pack of cards as an every day object because some people will go through life without owning a single pack of cards but some people will, it just depends on your interests

I have to agree, give a deck of bikes to any of my m8ts and you need a safety net, if they aren't small, old and sticky they are in trouble, lol

nil carborundum
BaB

main reason i bypassed cards and whent to props was that when i was growing up the magic on telly was props and coins very few card tricks, and as you all have said the only time i used cards other than for magic was coincidently wile living in scotland.

iv'e ordered some bikes and royal road purely for practise value and as a reference for talking online proberbly wont do many tricks in my shows as kids have short memorys, haveing said that i find if you get a kid to draw it on a white board and hold it against there chest then you get a GREAT REVEAL especialy if you change what they drew, oh there i go again talking about props again

Interesting thoughts.

I don't do kids as I haven't got any to learn the required skills from/practice on. (and it's illegal-hang your head BaB, not funny)
I do accept to myself though that I only learned cards as I thought without that skill I couldn't consider myself a real magician, this board has since proved that theory wrong and now I find I am slowly moving away from cards.

It can be a lot of work and the reactions are no better or maybe even smaller than other forms of magic. I guess I will be told it's all in the performance m8 on that one but honestly people are more oh well done then **** me, how did you do that?
I think Derren summed up why he left cards behind him perfectly, shame I can't remember what he said, lol (on Devils PictureBook).

I still do them and will continue to do so but whatever I do with them I can see people "knowing" it's sleight of hand or trick cards etc. As far as they think they know what happened just not when and how, where as other stuff really does leave them open mouthed.
Just my thoughts I guess.

Yes I need to improve but then I need to improve my other magic as well. The first time you dance a match in someones hand compared to the first time the AC rises to the top or whatever, I dunno, I find people ask me about the other stuff in wonder and just say very nice about the cards.

BaB

what you said about short memory, 90% of my stuff is done to people under the influence so maybe that accounts for some of it

kids / drunks not much to choose between them is there.

as for magic with cards its a well known fact that magicians use cards for magic same as its well know they use smoke and mirrors for all stage illusions .

so they expect you to do some magic with cards so are already disapointed ahead of time, use them by all meens as afundamental training tool, but in a show use a haugnted key (silver not gold its a design issue) instead i garenty you will get a much bigger reaction

I find most people can relate to cards. Even if they dont recognise the name of the suits they can recognise the pictures/pips allowing them to keep track of cards. If they dont you can always remind them by going through a few cards at the beginning. Fanning and pointing " so from this regular deck you have a choice of any including the 6 of hearts *point* jack of clubs *point* king of spades *point*" keep doing until all the suits are covered. you could skip cards inbetween the suits speeding this up.

Hope this has been of some help.

I just read this on another forum and thought I'd ask something, this is by no means the only place I have read this so here is the quote :

"To be sure, when you purchase some of the cheaper Rider Backs, you get lower quality cards, but by and large, you can at least work with the cards that come in a deck of Bikes. "

Is this true in anyones opinion?

The reason I ask this is this, I have only ever ordered two lots of bikes, the first was a brick and the second was six packs from a different store.
The first set were perfect, smooth round the edges, unmarked round the edges.
Now I have only opened four of the next batch and actualy examined them but 3 of them have cutting marks on one side and all four are really rough round the edges, as if I cut them myself or the plastic coat isn't applied to the edges. As you can imagine this feels quite different and I fear will mark and let moisture in quickly.
Anyway I am not here to have a go at a store but these cards were only something like 25p a deck cheaper but feel terrible.

So am I alone in this paranoia or should I just wait for the white van with square wheels to come and get me?
Either way I've just ordered more and will let you know how they compare but would be most interested in your thoughts

BaB

Personally cards have never been my thing, It's certainly the magic I least like to watch. If the card chosen appears behind glass, stuck to the ceiling or something then I find it a bit more interesting than just finding the card.

Saying that I have had some pretty good reactions to card tricks, even when I've just done better non card tricks ( in my opinion )

So in conclusion I have to say, that different people prefer different types of tricks and therefore we should consider variety in what we do, that way we cover all bases, that is of course unless we specialise and seek out the right type of audience.

As to your question about Bikes BaBaBoom, I dunno as I must be one of the only ones here that has never used a pack of Bikes.

just recieved two packs in the post will let you know and your not alone m8.

I must admit due o everyone rating Bikes so much I had planned on buying some at some point. I noticed CostCo and Wand were both very cheap. I wondered was it buying cheap ones from these kind of sources that resulted in a naff pack?

I got 24 packs from costco, 12 red, 12 blue and there is only 1 naff pack in it but i will use that for T+R card, even with one naff pack in 24, id buy from costco as it works out at about £1 3p per pack

Sounds like the problem may well be with Bikes then rather than the supplier. Bab where were yours from?

This topic touches on many other associated points made over the past few months - we all assume Bikes are the biz because that's what's mainly used by the pro's and the selection of gaffed cards and trick decks seems to be larger in Bikes than any other type. The fact that they are poker sized and therefore slightly wider than the usual UK bridge size doesn't really matter but might make any card trick a little easier to see.

I once asked if anyone actually played ordinary card games with Bikes and the screams of horror must have been heard in Ohio so I guess they are mostly reserved for magic routines. I'm now wondering if this is the case in the USA - do they use Bikes as ordinary cards or are they mainly for magic there as well? Perhaps Scott, Russ or Neil could answer this one for us?

12 months ago I would have fought tooth and nail to avoid doing any card tricks as all the ones I'd seen up to that point were so boring and only of the 'pick a card, look at it, remember it, put it back, shuffle, shuffle, wham bam is that your card Ma'am?' type. Since then, of course, a whole new vista of effects using cards has opened up for me and there are many routines which don't rely on the old formula or are different enough to appear fresh and unusual - Cardtoon 1 and 2 (even if they are on Carta Mundi rather than Bike stock), Double Back, NFW! for instance; Stripper and Invisible Decks plus those where the deck is normal but stacked and, of course, the proper card tricks using sleights with an unprepared deck. All this means that anyone doing a card trick ought to be able to show something interesting rather than the 'old stuff'.

I agree that anyone sitting at a table and offering just card tricks needs to be very, very good or the specs will slope off somewhere else. If you add other effects with ropes, nails, other types of card (Diceman etc) you can offer something professional and entertaining.

It all boils down to how good the performer is - cards will always be suspect as everyone knows that trick decks exist and card sharps are not to be trusted. The same is not so true of ropes, nails and so on and, for some reason, these are assumed to be perfectly normal - yeah right!

I find that while people will know hearts and diamonds they will confuse spades and clubs. I think i heard Mac King call clubs "Puppy Feet". I tend to remind people of this as it sets an image in thier head. They wouldn't know what a club looks like!!!

Also i have on occasion asked for a card to be picked and when they look at the their face turns as they try to remember what it's called.
"You remembered it?" I say.
"Yeah," they reply hesitently.
"It's a club," I say, "Call them Puppy Feet if you like."