sleight of hand – Page 4

The Phoenix Ace Move

I don’t know why, but I’ve been fascinated by the Phoenix Ace move. I don’t know the official name of the move but this is the one where you have a multiple cards held as one and you palm off the stack leaving one card visible. I think it’s really more of a stage more, but I’m trying to come up with uses for it where you’re palming off of the deck.

One I’m playing with uses an outjogged double card that’s in the middle of the deck. Another one is this one below:

@louiefoxx Waiting for the post office to open, so heres a card trick! #cardtrick #magictrick #postoffice #waiting #sleightofhand #kingofhearts #car #bored #louiefoxx ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

I don’t think this is something I’d ever really do, but it’s fun to play with. I think that maybe if I keep playing, something useful will happen with the move.

-Louie

More Vallarino Book Stuff

I’m still working through the JP Vallarino book. It’s all card magic, which I’m fine with. The book for me had an early hit with his Hypnotic Rumba Count, which I really liked, but then the next few things were pretty redundant and just variations on things. For example his take on the Elmsley Count was basically a style thing and while style is important and important to how he performs, it’s not really actionable information for me.

JP Vallarino magic book by vanishing inc

In the book, the Optical Center Steal is something I’ve done since I was a teenager, and while I came up with it on my own, it’s something that I just assumed was common knowledge. I guess it’s not.

The Revolutionary Control I think gets its name from the rolling action the cards make, and not that it’s a “game changer”. This is another example of a variation, I think Harry Lorayne had a control that was very similar to this.

I’m just wrapping up the section on card sleights, and getting into the tricks. I’m hoping that there will be some more stuff that interests me in it!

-Louie

NFW Card Trick + Hypnotic Rumba Count

Sometimes the universe hands you something fun. I was cleaning the office and found a set of Gary Freed’s NFW card trick. This is a great trick where four jokers turn into four aces. The provided routine is alright, and when I was younger and working at Market Magic Shop in Seattle I developed a better handling for it that was much better looking than what was in the instructions.

When I found the NFW set last night I immediately recognized that JP Vallarino’s Hypnotic Rumba Count would work really well with the NFW card set!

Using the rumba count makes this a very direct change of four jokers to four aces! I think this would make a great trick for a preshow video as it’s simple, direct and a good trick!

-Louie

Kings to Jokers to Kings

After playing with the Hypnotic Rumba Count yesterday from the book Vallarino yesterday, and coming up with simple Jokers to Kings effect, I found a natural extension of that trick. I took it a step further (backwards?) and the trick has four kings that turn to jokers, then back to kings.

Like jokers to kings from yesterday, I should say that this routine is super obvious with the move and I’d be shocked if it hasn’t been done before. The important thing about creating is that you play with every idea. For me it’s about flexing my brain’s creativity muscles, not necessarily creating something that’s never been done before.

-Louie

Hypnotic Rumba Count

I just stared reading the JP Vallarino book that was put out by Vanishing Inc. It’s all cards, which I’m not opposed to, as I enjoy playing with deck of cards.

The first thing in the book is the Rumba Count. This is a way to show four cards as the same card. The second thing in the book is the Hypnotic Rumba Count, which is a variation of the Rumba count and something that I don’t think I had ever learned in the past.

When I learn a new move, I try to figure out what I can do with that move before I explore what other people have done with it. It’s just a fun creative exercise. Sometimes it leads to new things, but usually I end up recreating the obvious thing with it.

The first thing I came up with is a change of 4 jokers to 4 kings

@louiefoxx Four Jokers Card Trick! From the new JP Vallarino book by Vanishing Inc #cardtrick #magic #sleightofhand #vanishinginc #louiefoxx #cardmagic #jpvallarino #playingcards ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

This is definitely the obvious thing to do with this move and probably the first thing that JP Vallarino did with it.

-Louie

Fiddling Around

Play is important! You should play with magic as a creative exercise. Learning from a book is good, but sometimes just fiddling around with a deck of cards or whatever with no purpose will lead to some fun things.

Here’s what I came up with the other night:

@louiefoxx Quick Card Trick! #cardtrick #cardmagic #sleightofhand #louiefoxx #magictrick #cardchange #aceofspades #bigfoot ♬ Vibes – ZHRMusic

There’s not much to it. I discovered I could drop an outjogged, double card from the deck into my hand below it. Once I kinda figured out the technique, I needed to figure out what to do with it. That ended up my a slightly flourishy card change.

Will I ever seriously use this? No.
Was it fun to figure out? Yes

-Louie

Wrong Guesses

The other day I posted this video on TikTok:

@louiefoxx Optical Illusion with a ring and some safety pins! #opticalillusion #switchingplaces #weddingring #safetypin #louiefoxx #magictrick #magician #closeupmagic, ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

One of the comments I got was someone trying to explain the trick:

This tells me that going off screen isn’t an unknown technique to people anymore. However it’s now more like a “it went up your sleeve” kinda comment, where it’s an explanation that’s wrong 99% of the time.

What I love about the comment in this particular trick is how far off they person was with guessing. The two pins are super gimmicked, the only thing that’s ungimmicked is the RING!

-Louie

Pretzel Magic!

One night, last week after my show a kid came up to me as asked if I could do a trick with his pretzel stick. I took it and did a quick little routine:

@louiefoxx Pretzel Stick Magic! #pretzelstick @roldgoldofficial #sleightofhand #magic #magician #louiefoxx #pretzel #snack #disappear #pinalcountyfair #pinalcountyfairgrounds ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

Of course this wasn’t planned, but I’ve done things like a coin flurry in the past, so the structure of what I was going to do I was familiar with. The part I was worried about was the sleeving and I was kinda amazed that I got the pretzel into my sleeve! Sleeving is something that I can do, but never really have done it in a show, so it was fun to do.

Personally I love “playing” with magic, it’s what keeps me in love with it. I think if I did the same thing the exact same way every time, I would have burnt out a long time ago!

-Louie

Lapping On Video

One of the things I’m playing with in my Tik Tik videos is not bumping the edge of the screen to ditch things. Here’s an example of a ditch where my hands are in full view the whole time:

@louiefoxx Magic With a Stolen Fork! #fork #mexicanrestaurant #magictrick #magician #louiefoxx #silverwaretrick #magic #surprise #stolen ♬ original sound – Louie Foxx

I’m essentially using my forearm to block the drop of the fork. It’s a good clean up, that honestly I think only magicians will notice or appreciate that I didn’t take the lazy route of just dipping my hand to the edge of the screen. It’s not always possible to do it this way, but I think whenever possible using slightly more creative ditches are better.

-Louie

Tommy Wonder Cups and Balls

I’ve always been interested in Tommy Wonder’s Cups and Balls routine. I finally plunked down the cash and picked up this set:

tommy wonder two cup routine by raphael and bluether magic

Right out the gate, I think the bag is a little bit too small (not long enough) for the cups. You need to be able to tie it shut with the string with the cups in the bag. I really had to force/stretch the bag to get the cups into it and tie it shut. This isn’t a huge deal, as over time I imagine it will stretch and get easier (I hope).

I started by reading the routine in The Books of Wonder Vol 2 and working it out. The routine didn’t feel right, so I then watched some videos of Tommy performing the routine. There’s a lot of flow that’s missing from the book and it really would have benefitted from having a bullet point list of the effects that happen in the routine.

Here’s one of the videos I watched:

One thing that I noticed about the routine is that it’s not a show stopper like when you see Gazzo, Ammar or Bob Read do the cups. At the end of those, there’s a punctuation at the end, a definite end. Tommy’s routine is more of a middle piece than a closer.

In Tommy’s book he mentions that he’s known to magicians for his cups and balls. There’s a clue there, I don’t think he thought it was the best for non-magicians. It’s certainly innovative in how the loads were done, with none from the body/pockets, and resets instantly, but I’m not sure that translates to non magicians as much as it appeals to magicians.

I’m going to learn the routine, and give it a try, hopefully I can get it down in about a month for a week long run of shows I’ll be doing next month.

-Louie