Cards in Magic & Conjuring: page 44

The Svengali deck of cards is a specially prepared deck of playing cards (Poker-sized or Bridge-sized) that can be used by magicians or entertainers to perform various tricks. The deck and the tricks performed with it are assisted by its unique design and require almost no skill. It is based on a very old principle of entertaining deception and confidence game manipulation.

The cards of the deck can be flipped or riffled to create the illusion that the deck is completely ordinary. It can even be apparently mixed and shuffled. The trick involves a spectator choosing a card from the deck and...

A detailed explanation and breakdown of how to back palm a playing card.

The author shows the aspiring card magician how to make playing cards appear and disappear from and into thin air using a sleight-of-hand technique known as back palming. Many photos assist in comprehending this at-first difficult-looking move. But with a bit of practice, it is within reach for any dedicated student.

This technique is typically used on stage but it can also delight in an impromptu setting close-up and it can be done with other thin flat objects besides playing cards, such as business cards, credit...

The Double Lift is a powerful move but it is also easy to do it wrong, meaning not deceptively. In this ebook, the author will show several ways to learn and effectively perform this sleight and how to perform a variety of card tricks using this technique.

• Introduction
• Choosing a Deck of Cards
• The Grip
• Methods for Performing the Double Lift
• Some Card Tricks Using the Double Lift
  • Several color changes including the Scrub Board Change
  • Four Card Assembly
  • Wrong, Wrong Again
  • Name Your Card

1st edition 2015, PDF 46 pages.

The Si Stebbins Pro Stack is highly interesting for any card stack enthusiast. Dr. Solka has taken the venerable Si Stebbins Stack and removed an inherent weakness, the rigid alternation of suit colors and strict suit rotation. The way he has done this is ingenious and will fly by everybody - magicians included. The single rule to remember is so simple that anybody can do it effortlessly. The seemingly random sequence of colors and suits is such that the deck can be spread face up without risk of detection from lay people as well as magicians.

The Card to Position relationship is explained...

A marked deck for people who have less than perfect vision or need glasses.

A blockout system for marking cards has been developed based on the widespread Bicycle Rider Back 808 deck. The development focused on good discernibility of the system for magicians with impaired vision. The marked deck can be prepared in less than one hour.

1. Introduction
2. Card and Suit Values
3. Basic Principle – the Clock Design
4. Marking the Card Value
5. Marking the Suit Value
   1. Suit and Card Value in Different Marks
   2. The Stage Version
   3. Suit and Card Value Together in One Single Mark
6. One-way Marking
7. Predecessor...

The venerable Sequeira stack from 1612 has been refurbished using the present day shadow concept. The Shadow Sequeira Stack allows to determine preceding and succeeding card as well as smooth translation from card to position and vice versa. The description of this universal stack is an exclusive extract from the author’s book In the Shadow Realm of Playing Cards.

version 2.02, 16 pages.

A new, potentially faster, method to clock a deck of cards.

'Clocking' a deck of cards means applying some kind of counting method to identify one card that has been removed from the deck. The idea is very old and dates back to at least 1708 (Jaques Ozanam's Recreations Mathematical and Physical). Typically one makes two passes through the deck. The first to identify the value of the card, and the second to identify the suit. The key in making this method deceptive is to be very fast in your counting, which is dependent on the details of the counting procedure. Dr. Solka offers a new method,...

An easy-to-calculate version of the Si Stebbins stack.

The name 'Snibbets' (Stebbins reversed) was coined by Rusduck. It denotes a reversed Si Stebbins stack where instead of adding 3 to get to the next card's value one substracts 3. The first to publish a negative step version was Ernest Hammond in The Magic of Tomorrow. While this may seem a rather inconsequential change, it has some advantages over the classic Si Stebbins stack. In this ebook, Dr. Solka takes you through the details of this lesser-known version of Si Stebbins.

1st edition 2022, PDF 19 pages.

Now, one of the mentalism's greatest "self-working" effects has been simplified to the point where it really is self-working! One early reviewer referred to Mirabill as "Miraskill minus the skill."

Take a bit of “Miraskill,” a twist each of Mirabill and “A View To A Skill” and mix with “Minimal Miraskill.” Between Stewart James, Herb Zarrow, John Bannon and Dr. Bill, you will have one of the strongest effects possible to perform over the telephone.

The good doctor had been seeking a way to perform Mirabill over the phone ever since its release but it seemed impossible. Until now.

Telephone Bill looks and sounds different than any of the above but utilizes James’s original brilliant principle and is every bit as squeaky-clean as Mirabill. Live and in person it is mind bending. But over the phone? Your audience...

Doug MacGeorge presents a fast-paced packet trick based on "Dr. Daley's Last Trick." A packet of four Jokers are cleanly shown - they suddenly transform into four Queens of Hearts before your spectators' eyes. This highly visual trick uses sleight of hand and ordinary playing cards.

1st edition 2021, PDF 3 pages.

Conn-juring contains professional magic developed for the real world. 42 pages, photo Illustrated.

Includes:

Flush Brush 2.1 Painting the Royal Flushes.

After-Afterburn A flaming biz-card production.

Joints 3 coin vanish / recovery.

Coin Spectacle Elbow, Knee & Neck... w/ repeat!

Plausible Presentations An essay.

One Conn's one coin flurry and thoughts on the subject.

Rab-bit (sponge) vanishes & reappears on a speks shoulder.

This Little Pinky A dissertation on the pinky count (3 routines.)

Dante's Sandwich A synergystic sandwich sequence; Elmsley's "Point of Departure" meets "The...

Twelve wonderful card routines and one non-card memory feat bonus effect: Mental Shopper.

Almost all the sleights employed herein are basic, therefore easy to do. The exception is the Faro shuffle, which is used in two effects. There is little mention of patter included, as the effects do not require set patter. It is left to the reader to use patter that fits his particular personality.

Some of these effects have previously appeared in Apocalypse, The Linking Ring, and The Minotaur. The balance are appearing here for the first time. Doug's two personal favorites are: Midnight Speller, and The Cardician...

"Donny Orbit exhibits a fresh approach with his effects. I always look forward to his stuff!" - Joshua Jay

Six amazing close up routines from an extremely offbeat thinker. 'Off the wall' plots with a direct and practical approach. Not only is this magic you'll use, it's magic that'll make you smile, shake your head, kick yourself and swear out loud - all at the same time!

"I could try and draw comparisons to other magicians. I could tell you that...

Here are 19 clever and entertaining card magic miracles that can be performed with prepared cards. Explained are several amazing principles involving prepared cards, with ingenious ideas for their use. Also included, with special permission, are several creations by Ford B. Rogers, which were published in this book for the first time.

Here's what's included:

• Foreword
• "Incomprehensibility" (Rogers)
• The Key Card (Two Methods)
• Forcing a Card (with the Key Card) A Feat of Apparent Mindreading
• The "Reversed Card" Principle
• The Prediction
• The "Self-Shifting" Pack (Two Methods)
• The Card...

Broken
This is the launching point of the journey. Don fuses the essence of powerful theatre with mystery entertainment to open your eyes and ears to a new way to approach your performances.

"Most mentalists know Don Theo knocked it out of the ballpark with his introductory book Teardrop. However, Theo's 'Broken' makes his first treatise now seem like a bunt. 'Broken' is a beautiful, artistic work that forces the actor in each mentalist to rise to the surface and make some very necessary waves within our art." - Mick Ayres

Svenvelope
The star of the show, this jawdropping three phase routine...

Everybody owns a card box. Many magicians own several. Seldom are they used for anything more than vanishing a card. Now here's a whole new breath of life for them - fifty ways to put them to work. You will find complete routines here, or effects which can be used alone or in combination with other effects. This kind of reading stimulates your thinking, so that you will see places in your show where a card box is just the right answer. Reference ebooks of this type belong on every magicians digital shelf. They are the recipe ebooks of our trade.

• Introduction
• A Word About Card Boxes
• Comedy...

The Comprehensive Guide to Making Money Pitching Svengali Decks

Hundreds of thousands of dollars have been made on selling the humble Svengali Deck and yet few people ever learned the inner secrets of how to pitch the deck successfully. This DVD fills that shortage.

Don Driver pitched for twenty-five years all over the country. He learned his pitch from S. David Walker, the Grand old Man of Svengali pitching who has been at it since the early 1940s. Mr. Walker learned from Mickey MacDougall, the creator of the Svengali pitch.

Explained in detail is a pitch that has been polished and...

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.

The three routines described in the PDF are:

JASPER, THE MYSTICAL SNAKE: A cute effect involving a bunch of cards with different colored circles and a card showing a picture of Jasper, the mystical snake. The card having Jasper's picture on it is initialed on both front and back by the spectator and the circle cards are also thoroughly mixed by him. The spectator after mixing the different colored circle cards selects 2 of them and Jasper is able to reveal the chosen colors but in a dramatic manner. As a climax, all the other cards having other varying colored circles on them turn blank....

This new e-book contains five of U. F. Grant's forgotten and almost lost card miracles. The first four effects are from a booklet released in 1931 that contained what Grant considered to be his four best card effects. The release was called: Counterfeit Card Miracles. It is very rare and almost impossible to find today. Devin has taken the four effects and updated them and expanded the directions. These are real magician foolers!

#1- A spectator shuffles his own deck of cards and looks at one, remembering what number from the top that card is. For example, he may choose to remember the card...

This was one of Sid Lorraine's most popular tricks. It has been off the market for more than 40 years. Devin Knight obtained permission from the Abbott Magic Company to release this again and to update the original directions. How good is this effect? Well, it was one of the late Doug Henning's favorite tricks and was personally taught to him by Sid. Doug Henning used it everywhere, including in some of his touring stage shows, showing it on a big screen behind him.

A playing card is selected and kept a secret from the performer. The performer shows five small white cards blank on both sides,...

Using your own deck or a borrowed deck, you turn your back to the spectator. The spectator can shuffle the deck while your back is turned. The spectator removes the top 15 cards from the pack just as they come. From those 15 cards he is to remove all the black cards and put them in his front left pants pocket. The remaining red cards, he counts and then places them in his right front pants pocket.

Next, he takes a few more cards from the remaining deck, the number to correspond the number of red cards in his right pants pocket. If he placed 7 cards there, he would remove from the deck face...

Challenge repeat lie detector test

This is one of the most amazing self-working tricks you will ever see. It is so ingenious that you will fool yourself when you first perform it. Many magicians say that they can't fool their wives. Rest assured, this effect is so amazing that it will blow your wife away with no feasible solution; not only her, but most of your magic buddies as well. Read every word carefully and then ponder how such a thing is possible. This is done with a borrowed deck under challenge conditions.

Borrow a deck or use your own. Have a spectator shuffle the deck and then...