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Do you bother to round the edges of the shortened end?

Yes, otherwise they would look very odd and invite suspicion. Use a nail file, emery board, fine wet & dry paper, nailclippers or corner rounding punch from a craft shop.

The only time I use a corner short I cut off half the card and its not raised suspicion.

However if you want a neat solution i suggest using a nail clipper

yup, I always round the corners off. I'm not sure if it would get noticed or not though if you didn't but I've never taken the chance.

Use an impromptu "corner short" and you eliminate the problem completely, no need to round anything off, because its a complete playing card.

I normally use a curve/moon cut short card which doesn't require any rounding. You only need to square the cards in the hands and you can riffle/cut to it without first tapping the deck. You can also riffle shuffle when using it as a key card and still maintain it's relative position.

showed a trick to magicians tonight (using the short card) and with a full card spread they didn't notice it.

I think i might keep pushing my luck with the square edges - life on the edge and all that

JellyBaby wrote:I think i might keep pushing my luck with the square edges - life on the edge and all that

For the sake of the 30 seconds or so it will take to neaten up the edges, surely it will be worth completely eliminating any possibility of being caught out...


Thats my mentality anyway, being a perfectionist and a professional .

M

In the DVD "Get Nyman" Andy Nyman said something that really hit home with me on watching it for the first time. I can't remember his exact quote, but the basic principle was that it pays to show some balls when doing magic. This is why he uses cards with incredibly obvious markings, short cards that stand out a mile, and frequently hands out heavily gimmicked decks. The point is that if you're doing your job properly, noone is going to be looking at that short card/marked card/etc.

That's not to say I exercise *no* subtlety when shortening cards and the such, but generally I opt for ease of use over invisibility, as the spectators shouldn't even consider anything tricky going on with the deck.

When I use short cards I always round off the edges using a pair of nail clippers, it makes the card not stand out so much and it takes like TWO SECONDS A CORNER, sorry for capitals but I feel it is a point that needs to be made as it WILL enhance the effect, if a spectator looks at card and believes there is something wrong with it, even if they cannot identify what it is, they will not pay attention to what you are doing, instead they will spend their time working out what is wrong with the card.

Chris

I think if a spec is looking at a gaffed force card I'd be doing something terribly wrong, by it's very nature it should be invisible.

No what I mean is sometimes you can get someone that will believe a deck is 'fixed' I have never had anyone catch me using a short card but people can become suspicious, I did have one guy once go "He is using a Svengelly Deck!!!" despite the fact I wasn't and he called it a SvenGELLY deck, people were adamant that there was something wrong with the cards.

Chris

You could just go out and buy a pack of shorts. (Playing Card shorts, not actual Shorts!!!)

at times, i've just used an old pair of scissors and trimmed off what i need and used them that way...never been caught...

i don't usually bother trimming the edges for some reason...but when i have, i've used nail clippers...

Can you buy long cards? or wider cards as well does anyone know?