The Phoenix Deck by Card Shark
The Effect - not an effect of course, but yet another means to achieve them. Essentially a replacement of sorts for the popular Bicycle deck by USPCC; also printed by USPCC and has the same finish (air-cushion).
Cost: 3.00 Euro or USD, plus shipping (3.50 Euro for EU orders and $5 US for the rest of the world, regardless of quantity ordered)
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)
Now, that would depend on the effects you perform, I think.
Review
Card Shark says:
"The Phoenix Deck is not another deck in the long list of fancy decks that flooded the magic community over the past few years. Nothing against any decks from Ellusionist, Theory11 or others, they look cool and interesting and they find their card collectors, but I did not want to invent "another fancy deck". In my opinion these decks are not usable for everyday magic as they look so unusual that they will easily arouse suspicion. At least lay people will always be more aware of "trick cards", even if the cards have no built-in features.
That is why the Phoenix deck does not look too modern or extraordinary, as it should not look too suspicious for lay audiences.
The name of the Phoenix Deck is given by the mythical sacred firebird. It has a 500 to 1,000 year life-cycle, near the end of which it builds itself a nest of myrrh twigs that then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix or phoenix egg arises, reborn anew to live again. The new phoenix is destined to live as long as its old self. (Wouldn?t it be a great story to start with to do a torn-and-restore card trick?)
The Phoenix Deck is an alternative to the often used Bicycle Deck, both are printed at US Playing Card Company. The standard Phoenix Deck is just the beginning of a whole new era for card magic. The best way to describe the difference of these two decks:
The Bicycle Deck is made for Poker players and is used for magic,
whereas the Phoenix Deck is made especially for magicians but can also be used for Poker playing.
In the last few months the limitations of the Bicycle Deck got more and more obvious as the politics of US Playing Card Company changed dramatically for us magicians:
* no more trick cards where the back design, Joker or Ace of Spades will be changed.
* no more Jumbo decks
* no more blank cards, double backers or double facers stocked at USPC
* no more marked decks, Twilight Angels etc.
* new card case design that does not show the card back on the back of the card case, also the used colors have changed
Even if we think that magic is the most important thing in the world, people outside of our community think quite different."
Key features of the standard Phoenix Decks:
* printed at US Playing card company on Bicycle cardstock, with air-cushion finish, so the cards have the well-known Bicycle quality
* the decks are cut in the traditional way like the top notch Richard Turner Decks
* the new deck order is optimized for the Tamariz Stack, you can immediately start the necessary faros to get into the stack
* Phoenix faces and Bicycle faces are identical with a few exceptions
* the Ace of Spades is pretty close to the Bicycle Ace of Spades
* all other Aces are specially designed for better visibility. Fine details make them beautiful for close-up performances also, these fine details blur out on distance and will get invisible on stage.
* the common used (old) Aces are also included in the deck so if you cannot get warm with the new idea of large aces, use the old ones!
* the back design is modern and classy, not too fancy to draw suspicion
* the back design has a very visible but pretty well hidden oneway marking
* the backs where especially designed to hide additional information in the gaffed cards
* the Phoenix card case uses the traditional layout of the Bicycle card case, also there are NO tricks or information on the card case that the cards are optimized for magicians. So you are able to leave the cards on the table after your performance as a souvenir for your audience.
* if you cannot find your well-loved gaff card in our portfolio, we can easily custom print them for you.
* for professional magicians: We offer special deals for print your business card on the blank faces of the Phoenix Deck, just contact us for more details
* the faces have a built-in feature that you have to find out by yourself. If you are a good magician you will find it and can make use out of it.
* a lot of trick cards are already available like blank cards and double backers, marked decks and trick sets, more will come soon.
* also the most common trick decks are available like Brainwave Deck, ID, Stripper and Svengali Deck
This Filthy Yank says:
There's already been a fair amount of hemming and hawing on several magic forums before these even came out, which I found to be a bit unfair since how can you truly render an opinion for something most of us have never touched?
That said, mine finally arrived today. My first impressions are as follows:
-Appearance: If one isn't looking too close, I'd almost say they wouldn't notice that these are not bikes. I doubt most lay people care, yet I think these do an ok job of looking similar without violating any trademarks (call me crazy).
-Stock: The card stock is very similar to what we are used to from USPCC, although these are a bit thinner - contrary to a lot of custom decks that have come out in recent years that tend to be a bit thick.
-Finish: Same finish. I A/B'd these next to a set of bikes, and couldn't feel the difference. I'm sure there isn't one.
-Handling: As mentioned above, these are allegedly cut "traditionally." If you have ever owned or handled the decks USPCC makes for Richard Turner (which he sells), same deal here. This feature is supposedly great for faro shuffles (see above). I can't say that my faro is really good enough to verify a claim like this one, although I will say that riffle shuffles were a bit smoother with this deck, as were many swivel cuts I performed. I will say this: it may take your hands a short amount of time to get accustomed to the thinness when executing a D/L or T/L.
Overall - I will not give these a rating, only because I feel no number could portray these fairly - it really depends on your current opinion of bikes, and these cards - which you'll just have to handle personally. I do think anyone who does card magic owes it to his or herself to get a few decks and see if they like the feel of them. I like the inclusion of the new (larger pip) Ace of clubs/diamonds/hearts - I'd much prefer that look for any kind of 4-Ace production or related effect. That said, if you don't want to use them, you don't have to! Additional cards with the stock designs are included.
I haven't yet performed for anyone with these, and that to me will be the ultimate test. Depending on how much you end up paying for these compared to bikes, I can see these being ideal giveaway decks for those effects where you give the deck to your participant as a means to show it's not a trick deck.I'm not sure if this is a first, but surely there haven't been many decks in history where the trademark was owned by a magician, and I think this virtue added to the others above leaves us with little to fear in this scenario.
-Keith
