With all the buzz about the Atomic Deck and magicians arguing whether ACAAN is a good trick or not, it got me thinking about why magicians are fascinated by ACAAN.
Here’s my theory why magicians are into it, there’s really only one way to do it and that’s a memorized deck and a displacement. That method isn’t easy to do and beyond the reach of a beginner magician. Most magicians are lazy and don’t want to put in the work, so selling a method that’s “easy” for something that’s beyond most magicians skill level solves a problem and leads to sales.
That’s it, it’ makes the difficult attainable for people who don’t want to put in the work.
The problem is there compromises that are made to make the trick easy that change the trick from an Any Card At Any Number to something else. Usually a Selected Card at a Any Number, or Any Card at Selected Number or combination of the two. There’s nothing specifically wrong with those effects, but they’re not ACAAN.
The things added to make the trick easy take away what makes the trick amazing, and that’s how simple the trick is. Name a card, name a number and boom the card is there. Not name a card, now roll these dice, multiply that by nine and add 13, now deal to the number and your card is there. The added procedure kills the effect. Magicians who think the plot is boring are bored by the added procedure that makes the trick easy.
Magicians love to say, “it’s not the effect it’s the presentation that matters” are the same ones that say ACAAN is boring. Those are the magicians that aren’t putting in the work. The effect matters! What would you rather have:
1: Strong effect with a weak presentation
2: Weak effect with a strong presentation
3: Strong effect with strong presentation
I think we can all agree that number 3 is the goal. That means you need to put in the work!
-Louie
Tag: close up magic
Magic UnCorked in Portland!
A couple of nights ago I made it out to Magic Uncorked in Portland, OR. It’s a magic show in a wine shop that happens semi regularly. The show features three performers and is a lot of fun!
I’m new to this area, however it seems that magicians are really out there supporting magic, there were about six of us that weren’t performing!
Its a great venue and the performers were John Stevens, Moto, Craig Martin and hosted by Dave, who is a magician and co-owns the wine shop Ora et Labora.
The show started at 6pm with drinks and roving close up magic, then the parlor style show started at 7:30pm and went till just past 9pm. For $35 a ticket that included a drink, it was a great deal!
If you have shows in your area, go out and support them!
-Louie
Magic Jam!
One thing I’m lucky to have is a group of creative magicians that I hang out with! When one of us is working on something and gets stuck, usually one of us can solve the problem!
I’m working on a trick with money that needed an ending. It’s a counting trick, similar to a touch the screen style math trick. The challenge was I got to the forced dollar, but didn’t know how to reveal it. It needed more than, “you picked the twenty dollar bill“.
We played with it for a little bit and finally someone just yelled out the solution. Like it was a kettle slowly boiling, but when it finally boiled it was the perfect ending to the trick!
If you’re not creating with a group, you really should!
-Louie
Atomic Deck
The new hot trick right now is the Atomic Deck, which is an ACAAN, here’s the trailer, then I’ll give you my thoughts on it:
When I watched the trailer and the first thing that jumped out at me was this:
That’s a very specific statement, not “NO ROUGH AND SMOOTH”, so that instantly tells me that it’s roughed, just not by traditional methods. I don’t know how I feel about that in its marketing as it’s technically correct, but very misleading.
That aside, the trailer above leaves out something very important, this trick requires a phone or computer. Of course this part of the trick is completely left out of the trailer. It is mentioned in the ad copy, so it’s only sorta deceptive in its omission from the video.
With the current issues that Inject 2 is having, relying on app or website isn’t a good long term solution. The site is only good as long as the deck is selling and they’re paying for the hosting. You’re relying on something outside of your control for the trick to work.
OK, not to the effect, it’s not a true ACAAN in my opinion. You have multiple cards named and multiple numbers and then you essentially pick the combination that will work the best. So instead of Any Card at Any Number, it’s more of a “Selected Card from a Selected Group of Cards at a Number from a Selected Group of Numbers“. That’s a huge thing that to me distances this from the Berglas Effect.
It should look like this:
Spectator names a card and a number. The cards are dealt and the card is at that number!
Here’s a video of me doing ACAAN at a gig that I was just supposed to be playing the organ at, however someone requested I do a magic trick.
@louiefoxx When someone asks the musician to do a magic trick! #magictrick #cardtrick #musician #magician #acaan #king #organist ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
I want to be clear, I’m not saying the Atomic Deck is bad, I am just commenting on how it’s marketed and what it’s marketed as.
That’s my old man talk about how ACAAN should be to truely be an ANY CARD AT ANY NUMBER, not just a CARD AT NUMBER.
-Louie
Money Across
In playing with the fake “Movie Money” another trick I wanted to do was something like a card across where a selected bill travels from one packet to another.
This is the solution that I came up with:
@louiefoxx The $400 magic trick! #magictrick #money #moneymagic #trick #400 #magician ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
I like how this trick turned out, it’s got a less packet trick feel to it that many of these other tricks do. I think it feels very similar to Phil Goldstein’s Shinkansen, but has a different method.
-Louie
More Money Magic
A strange little trick that I came up with using some money:
@louiefoxx Magic trick with money! #magictrick #money #moneymagic #tendollars #forty ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
It’s interesting, but not the greatest trick ever. There’s too much process, it needs to be more direct for it to be good. I like the idea of the upside down bill moving up the stack. It reminds me of a trick that Alan Ackerman (I think) showed me when I was a teenager in the 1990’s with a stack of coins. It was 3 half dollars and an English penny. The English penny started on the bottom of the stack and moved up to the top one position at a time.
This trick with the upside down ten dollar bill moving up the stack was an early experiment with rough and smooth with bills. This one used different areas being roughed and I think that has possibilities with bills.
Here’s another trick with roughed zones on bills:
@louiefoxx Making money like magic! #magic #money #dollar #mineymagic #onehundreddollars #moneyhack ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
I’m having fun playing with the bill magic!
-Louie
Wireless HDMI
Thanksgiving was a few months ago, but I want to say that I’m thankful for this this thing to come into my life!
It’s a wireless HDMI system. This allows me to not have to run a cord from my camera onstage to where ever their HDMI input is. I’ve used it a lot since I got it and I just upgraded it. Before it had to be plugged into power, but I bought the batteries for it, so now I don’t need a power outlet. My video is pretty much 100% self contained now, I just have the output wires from the camera to the wireless HDMI. It’s soo much more mobile now and setting up so soo quick!
-Louie
Packet Tricks with Money by Larry West
Recently I’ve been playing with packet trick techniques using money instead of cards. I discovered this set of lecture notes by Larry West that has two trick using bills like cards for a packet trick style effect.
The two tricks is the lecture notes are very similar, in fact they are the same effect, but with different methods. One uses a gaffed bill and the other doesn’t. I think that one of the reasons that money packet trick magic isn’t really a thing is because to make any gaffed bills, like a one dollar bill with a ten on the backside might be crossing the line with what’s legal or not. Also the cost to put them out as you’d have to add the cost of the bills to the trick.
Anyway, here are the two money tricks from Larry West’s lecture notes:
@louiefoxx Cheating the con man! #magictrick #magic #money #conman #counting #math #magiciam #vintagemagic ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
@louiefoxx Hustling the Hustler! #magictrick #money #magic #moneymagic #hustle #con #vintagemagic ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx
I’m not sure which version is better.
-Louie
Working With Cool People!
One of the challenges working as a magician is that it can be a very solitary experience. You travel alone and frequently perform alone. The other night I got to work with Brian Ledbetter, who I’ve known for years. It was great to BS in the green room.
In my off seaon (not summer) I’m usually working by myself, so this was a nice change. Gigs with friends are the best and I look forward to them!
-Louie
Am I a Roving Mentalist?
An upcoming roving gig I have wanted a mentalist, not a magician for their event. The agent who contacted me about it knows what I do in my show very well and asked if I could do it. My stage show has many mentalism things in it that just aren’t really presented as mentalism and my roving is the same.
I said “yes” to the gig, but need to reframe what I do a little bit to put it into the context the client wants. The material that I’m planning on taking out with me:
- ACAAN – I published an old version of what I do in a linking ring from 15 or so years ago
- Spoon/fork bending – I published this as The Perceptive Bend in Vanish Magazine around April 2019
- Paint Swatch Matching – I published this as Pick Our Rooms Paint in Vanish Magazine in I think July 2024
- Color Block Prediction – This uses a small block with different colors on it and it uses up to three different methods throughout the routine. One of the methods is original to me, the other two are based on marketed items.
- Number prediction – This is basically Acidus Novus for the method and a follow up to the color block trick
- Pet’s Name Divination – This is my routine using Peeked by Joel Dickinson. Peeked is a really clever effect/method to gain information on a card in the context of a divination type routine.
That’s the roving set and it’s way more material than I’ll need for two 45 minute sets for 400 people. I think that I’ll do two different sets for each time I’m out. That will solve the problem of people mixing with other groups and having seen something before.
-Louie