talkmagic.co.uk

This is my presentation of Oil & Water. The routine is from Gerry Griffin's "Complete Card Magic Vol 4".

I know my EC isn't the best but it has been more than good enough to blow some lay people away with this trick over the last week or so. I also (as you probably will) found myself cringing at the sound of all those instances of a dropped letter "H" in words because of my Wolverhampton accent.

Oh, well. 'Ere it is then.
Evmeister's Oil & Water
(No Longer on MVD - Now it's on Vidilife)

P.S. For some reason when I put this on putfile it just wouldn't play so I put it on MVD instead.

Comments welcome

MVD needs you to be a member which is a bit of a hassle to anyone who wants to watch - how about Google Video?

Anyway, overall that was very good. I liked the idea of the reset button . A couple of tips though -

You should work on your Elmsley a bit - it was somewhat awkward and the moment when the packets change was quite obvious - I accept that a lot of it was the camera angle though.

I'm not sure about the ending - it seems obvious that at least three of the blank cards should already be in the end pile anyway. A little more patter justification ("someone pointed out that the marker should now be moved because this pile was 3/4 blank - but then that changed the reset button") should do the trick.

Those two points are both very minor though, on the whole it was great!

Kati

Thanks for the response Kati but a couple of the things you said confused me:

...and the moment when the packets change was quite obvious - I accept that a lot of it was the camera angle though.

Unless I misunderstand what you mean by this then I can quite honestly say that there isn't a packet change. Quite literally the only slight involved is the elmsley count. Nothing else is done that isn't deliberately pointed out to the spectator.

I'm not sure about the ending - it seems obvious that at least three of the blank cards should already be in the end pile anyway. A little more patter justification ("someone pointed out that the marker should now be moved because this pile was 3/4 blank - but then that changed the reset button") should do the trick.

I don't understand this part either. You say that it's obvious that 3 of the blank cards should be in the end pile - do you mean where the jokers WERE or where the blank cards were ORIGINALLY. Either way, the trick appears to the speccie that:
- You move one > it goes back
- You move two > both go back
- You move three > all four move to the opposite pile they started in

After each part of the trick the speccie thinks that all of the cards are back where they started and nothing has moved.

My apologies if I've misunderstood what you mean but to me the only real issue with the trick is my slightly dodgy elmsley count (but that's why I've pounced it onto you guys) but it's "flown" everytime I've performeed this trick so far. Although in my opinion it can't be that bad if I do the same sleight four time in two minutes and still don't get caught. LOL

MVD isnt working for me, it loads the head of the code and then dies.

Rob

About the ending: I might have to retract that remark as I see that it does work, I was confused.

About the elmsley: I meant the moment when the packets switch within the elmsley, i.e. the moment when you return the 2sie to the bottom and take one from the top.

Shall I upload it to Google Video for you?

Kati

Nice I enjoyed that

Interesting concept, but I don't see how this fits under the oil and water heading. Since you're using a "reset" button - it's really a different way of performing reset.

As Katriel said - the Elmsley needs work. However, try to shoot your video from a more top down perspective - it's difficult to hid the angles of the count from the angle you have here.

Nice job. Taking an existing concept and making it your own is always great to see!

Thanks guys.

I've edited the link above to somewhere that doesn't need a login.

Thanks for the comments. I agree Demitri - Why have I called it Oil & Water when it's a Reset trick? Suppose it's 'cause that's what it was called on the DVD I learnt it from. On the DVD it's presented with an "Oil & Water don't mix" theme using four ace of spades and and four Jack of hearts (or whatever) but when I set it up for myself I used jokers and blank cards. So I though to myself, if I'm using all these blank cards why not use one more and draw a little reset button on it? That way I can even (minimally) involve the spectator towards the end.

Katrielalex wrote:

About the elmsley: I meant the moment when the packets switch within the elmsley, i.e. the moment when you return the 2sie to the bottom and take one from the top.

Sorry Kati, I'm still not quite sure what you mean by this, I'm just gonna take it as you saying the same thing that most people will say - "Dude - you're elmsley sucked", lol. I know where I've been going wrong with my Elmsley (Deeply saddened, Alex Elmsley 1925-2006, R.I.P.) as I've been pushing the top card too far forward when it returns to the bottom so you can see it being stolen. I've been working on it over the past few days since I filmed the trick and it's alot better now (though, still not perfect by any means).

I'm not sure that the angle should make a difference to the elmsley count though. The view in the video is pretty much how I perform it (usually people sat around the table with they eye level being about 1ft/1.5-ft above where I'm actually performing the trick) so that's how I decided to film it. I'm always willing to be corrected on this though.

Thanks guys, any more comments - Keep 'em coming.

Sorry, I wasn't thinking when I wrote that. You are right, it is the moment when you return the top card that is the problem bit - apart from that, just relax the count.

Kati

Sorry, another point. I have got a couple of different ways to present this trick one of my ideas was to use the "oil & water" theme and take all blank cards and write on them with a BIG THICK BLACK MARKER "OIL" or "WATER" on each one with a drawing of an oil barrel as the marker and present it that way. Feel free to creatively "borrow" these ideas and even share your own presentations.

Just a little of target but I noticed that Kati has made yet another avatar. Looks like someone's into Photoshop. This has to be your best yet.

Blade Master wrote:Just a little of target but I noticed that Kati has made yet another avatar. Looks like someone's into Photoshop. This has to be your best yet.

Hehe there is a few of us here

, I just discovered the wonders of playing around with images and the script-fu scripts in the Gimp!

This one was a bit of an accident actually, I wanted to get rid of my old avatar as it was ugly so I just got a picture of some cards and started twiddling it. This one's grayscale, then embossed, then fiddled so it doesn't look so grey...

Kati

I live in photoshop!

Which is strange, considering my avatar is a product of Illustrator. So I guess I LIVE in photoshop, but sometimes vacation in Illustrator. Yeah - that's it!

I used to play this game, The Mafia Network which is a game on line.

I used to make pictures for people in it and sell them for Millions!!!!!!! I wish I could do that in real life

I know only really make avatars, wallpapers and MSN display pictures

Edit: The video doesn't work. I'm just getting an error from the site

Try YouTube

Edit 2: Oh, any one here use Flash? Please PM, I don't have a clue how to work it