Cards in Magic & Conjuring: page 50

Another miraculous red-black trick from the inventor of Out Of This World.

A spectator shuffles both halves of a deck over and over - yet it is revealed that both halves are in the same red-black order!

Performed under the strictest conditions imaginable, and it works every time.

1st edition 1975, digital edition 2015, 5 pages.

"When I first read 'Scribble' I had a huge smile on my face for the entire time I was reading it. I've just spent the past half an hour trying it out and an even bigger smile appeared! So cleverly constructed, it's a creation of genius!" - Iain Moran

STRANGER
Mat's 'Invisible Deck with a regular deck' opener. A cased deck of cards is placed on the table. A spectator names any card - a completely free choice. The deck is removed from the case and the named card is shown to have been impossibly predicted ahead of time.

COIN CON
Mat's 'take everywhere' coin effect. Four different...

The Mark Twain stack is a Si Stebbins stack with a four-apart sequence in SHoCkeD order. It was first published in the February 1935 issue of Modern Mechanix and Inventions magazine. This is a reproduction of this article.

The Mark Twain stack, also called the Riverboat stack (see for example Magic Card System), due to the abundant gambling on Mississippi riverboats, gets its name from the practice on these riverboats to frequently having to measure the water depth. If it was two marks, pronounced 'mark twain', it was ok.

1st edition 1935; PDF 4 pages.

New Era Card Tricks is the masterpiece of Roterberg's publishing efforts. Scholars are pretty sure that the elusive Erdnase must have known and read this book. It is still today an extremely good and important work on cards. It is a book any serious card man should read. This is to a large part the foundation on which a lot of the later card work has been built. A good part of this book is essentially a translation of the German work Der Moderne Kartenkünstler by Friedrich W. Conradi. Richard Hatch wrote a wonderful introduction that by itself is worth reading. He starts:

Twenty-one card tricks from the inventive Scotsman.

1st edition, 2000.

BACKLOG: You spread the deck with the faces upwards and invite a spectator to select any card - free choice. This is left face up on the table. You give him the deck and he now spells the name of his card - first the suit, then the value. This produces two random cards. The values of these cards are added - they might be a 3 and a 10 = 13. When the spectator turns his card over it has the number 13 boldly written on the back!

THE DETECTIVE: A spectator selects a card from a packet. Using the name of the famous fictitious...

This is a nice routine where several times the black tens change into the red tens and then the red tens change into the black tens and it keeps changing like this several times. Performed in an off-beat manner this is a really strong effect.

runtime: 9min 49s

You show seven Jacks of Hearts and one Ten of Spades. By putting the Ten of Spades face-down on the face-up Jacks, all cards turn magically face-down. But the climax is still coming. Once the cards are turned face up they are now all Ten of Spades except one Jack of Hearts.

1st edition 2022, video 3:11.

A close-up "lay-out" type effect based on a mythical game, "New Zealand Brag".

You deal out the shuffled Aces, Kings and Queens, yet miraculously when the hands are turned over they have separated into suits and, what is more, each hand is in their right order, Queen, King, Ace! Something very different in card magic.

1st edition 2018, 5 pages.

The Next Stack is a cyclical stack that is as easy to learn as the Si Stebbins stack but can withstand scrutiny, unlike the Stebbins stack. In the Stebbins stack, the increment of 3 or 4 could be visible to a participant if observed keenly. But in the Next Stack it is almost impossible to recognize the sequence.

The Next Stack is named as such because literally it is based on the "Next" principle, which is a novel, innovative principle. Given any card you can instantly know the next card.

It will take all of 5 minutes for you to learn this cool principle and start applying it. This principle...

Spectator selects and remembers a card that is lost back into the deck. Another spectator deals cards into the performer's hand and stops anytime they want. The card stopped at is the first spectator's chosen card.

This version uses the Havana Bottom Deal. This video does not include a detailed explanation of the Havana bottom deal.

runtime: 3min 1s

Ian Baxter here, introducing something new from me in the 'Card Stabbing' arena. Nicely Stabbed! offers not one but two approaches to this evergreen card mystery. But rather than have me rattle on about this, I'll ask reviewer and fellow Australian David Jones to offer his opinion.

When Ian Baxter told me that his next manuscript involved the concept of forcing an unknown card, I was intrigued, to say the least. What resulted from this offbeat thought was a very clever, streamlined and almost sleight-free method for a known classic. A spectator stabs a card anywhere into the deck and ends...

Aldo Colombini performs and explains an amazing three phase routine from Nick Trost, which requires only a regular deck. Very easy to perform.

EFFECT:

1) The deck is shuffled and divided in half. A spectator reverses a card in one half. Both halves are placed side by side face down. You turn the top card of each half over dealing them above the halves. The dealing continues. All the pairs are different. When the spectator´s card is reached, the card of the same color and value turns up in the other half!

2) The spectator now riffle shuffles the halves together (read that again). You hold the...

Four amazing distinct changes: First, four cards of one value (say the four Fours) are shown. They have blue backs. One by one each of these blue-backed cards turns face down. Second, all the cards change to red backs. Third, the faces all change to red suits. Fourth, the backs are now marked, each has a large X printed on it! Instead of the X's any message can be revealed.

Requires three blank backed cards.

video 5:10

Most tricks explained require a double backer, sometimes the same back double-backer, sometimes a different back double-backer.

• Introductory
• The Two Fold Miracle
• Insto-Transpo!
• The Startling Stop!
• The Double Force
• Double Comedy Relief
• "Satan Behind You"
• Chameleon Backs
• Remote Control
• False Faces

1st edition 1933, 8 pages; PDF 14 pages.

A timely favorite for any magician with a deck of cards in hand is Think-Stop. With a popularity spanning decades, this absolute classic has attracted attention from virtually every known card expert of the 20th and 21st centuries. Practical additions and/or worthwhile improvements to this gem are rare indeed. However, this brand-new handling from Australian card man Ian Baxter easily meets that challenge.

Reviewer David Jones comments:

"The Stop Trick is a stunning card effect which has traditionally depended on the use of a psychological force and hence cannot be relied upon to work...

Four kings change to aces, the Pellikaan way.

You will need:

• double backer
• wax

length 3min 1s

This is a marvelous ebook on mostly sleight-less card magic. The only skills you will need to bring to these effects are presentational. Pros will tell you the presentational aspect of a trick is more difficult to master than any sleight or move. That probably is true, however, these effects have been selected and re-worked so as to have built-in impact so that your presentation can even be as direct as simply stating exactly what you are doing. This is the most basic form of presentation, but it remains effective for those who do not have the creativity or inherent comedy to develop entertaining...

This routine was first published in Allan's Moose Notes. The subject of the performance is shuffle tracking. Spectators are signing the four kings, which are lost in the pack. Nevertheless, the magician finds them. But then they magically change to the four aces and the kings are found in various pockets of the magician's suit.

runtime: 16min 3s

Perform a second dealt into the hand rather than onto the table. This is particularly useful to have a card appear at a certain position in the deck. (Also part of Move Mastery 1.)

runtime: 1min 49s

This is a routine Roger Klause and Allan Ackerman worked out in the 70s. The effect is the classic find the black lady. The classic effect is to throw three cards on the table face-down. Here the cards are simply displayed and counted to the table to achieve the same basic effect: the spectator never finds the black lady. The three card monte is expanded to a four card monte and the climax is that the cards change to the four aces.

runtime: 9min 36s...

Look carefully because this effect is a real fooler. I have shown it to many magicians and no one of them had a clue. This is the perfect end to your sandwich card routine. It looks like real magic. The two queens inexplicably approach each other inside the card case to capture the card signed by the spectator. It looks amazing! Really easy to do. You have all the materials at home to build the gimmick. I am really proud of this routine. I show you how you can end clean.

• No glue
• No wax
• No force
• No double-sided tape
• No double face card
• No double back card
• Easy to do

1st edition...

This is one of my all-time favorite card tricks (miracles); because after seeing it, most spectators say, "NO WAY!"

Imagine this; you spread a regular deck of cards face up between your hands. All the cards are seen to be different. You tell your spectator that you want him to remove one card behind your back so there is no way you can see the card he selected. You turn your back towards him and spread out the cards face up behind your back. He is asked to remove any card and not let you see what it is. Next he takes a Sharpie pen and puts his initials on the face of the card. He inserts...

Aldo Colombini applies smart routining to turn a difficult effect typically requiring palming into an easy routine without any palming. The spectators signed card travels to the pocket twice without palming. There are no duplicate cards or any other gimmicks. The card you produce twice from your pocket is the spectator chosen and signed card.

Recorded live at the Convention at the Capital 1999.

runtime: 7min 52s

Many performers like to end their Ambitious Card routine by making the card vanish from the deck and cause it to reappear in some impossible location such as their wallet or the card box. The problem with that is that the effect of the Ambitious Card is that the selected card continuously rises to the top of the deck. Once the card vanishes from the deck, it is no longer the Ambitious Card. It is a vanished card. When it is produced from the wallet or wherever it becomes a reappearing card.

Nobunaga Rising is a perfect ending to the Ambitious Card because it seems just as impossible as the...