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Hi,

I wondered if anyone could offer advice on culling the first or second card of a spread?

Thanks

I would do a swing cut and begin from there, then cull the card or cards in question that are now in the middle.

By definition, culling the top card can't really be done. I think Iain Moran had some advice about how to get away with the second card down in his DVD 'The Cullfather', but from memory I think it amounted to "Good luck!" You'd have to involve some sort of cut, as gunnark says.

I think if I was going to cull, for example, the four aces, and as I turned the deck face up I found the first card to be an Ace, rather than immediately make a cut, I'd be tempted to temporarily ignore the face Ace and go ahead and cull the next Ace down, then undercut after the third Ace and continue to cull from there. At least that way, the action of undercutting the deck will get you two of your Aces on top before the spectator has even realised you've begun to do anything.

You could use Lennart Greens 'Angle separation' cull, if you were culling a few cards. Culling the first card is easy with this technique, it is taught in card college vol 4 and also vol 1 of his dvd set.

I'm hesitant to go into too much detail, as I'm writing an eBook that addresses this point in some detail, but suffice to say that the first and second cards can be culled, using a couple of different methods.

On one hand, it depends on which cull you are using, but assuming it is the standard spread cull the top card is simply a matter of slipping the card off the top into the right hand (which may sound like a trite statement, but it does work and there are other apporaches to mask the action). Culling the second card, assuming that you want to keep the deck in order, takes a wee bit more finesse, but once mastered is no harder than a standard cull.

Sorry to be so vague. More information will be available in a week or two!

Take care, Ian

Thanks for all the advice. All very useful and I appreciate you taking the time.