Quick Question? :)

[BlackQueen]

I recently got into magic, mainly card magic, about two months ago. I can do most basic tenchniques, but I really love doing this and would like to expand my knowledge. Could anybody reccomend me some decent books/DVDs/Props that I could get? They don't necessarily have to be card magic, just something that will help me progress Preferrably in the 0-30$ range, I'm poor d: Also, any words of wisdom would also be great!

 

[ReservoirRed]

You might find card collage volume 1 in your price range. It's what you're looking for.

 

[MagicZack]

You might find card collage volume 1 in your price range. It's what you're looking for.

Agreed. This is a great choice.

 

[Aaron.Williams]

First of all, Welcome to The Forums! Hopefully you'll enjoy it here! Pretty much everyone is really nice and helpful, and if you need help with anything, don't hesitate to post (which I'm sure you know)

For the question, for a nice little list of books that you could get, check out Jason England's download, "What To Read". He gives a nice list of books that the beginner card magician should get. Oh, and its FREE.

One book that I would recommend is Nick Trost's book, Subtle Card Creations. The tricks are extremely easy to do and perfect for the beginner. He also teaches a huge list of sleights, forces, shuffles, etc. that no card magician can live without.

 

[Austin Fields]

You might find card collage volume 1 in your price range. It's what you're looking for.

Card COLLEGE - oh the irony.

 

[Robert//Livingston]

'The Royal Road to Card Magic' is like $6 if you get the Dover edition. Also 'Expert Card Technique' is around $15-20. That right there is more than enough material for a while

'Bobo's Modern Coin Magic' can be found relatively cheap, also 'Mark Wilson's Course in Magic' is very cheap and amazingly helpful.


My advice for you: Spend $15 and get "Mark Wilson's Course in Magic", and "Royal Road to Card Magic" from Amazon. That will cover a boatload of magic

 

[DesertStorm]

First off I would like to say WELCOME to the forums! and next to answer your question: I would agree with everyone else and say that the book "Card College vol.1" would be a great starting book. However once as you get farther into the more advanced range I would recommend "The Expert at the Card Table" (which is not in your dollar range unless you buy the "Bible edition" from Dan & Dave which would cost you about $15 without shipping. But is a "must read" for anyone aspiring to be a card magician.) another book which I have found useful for both beginners and advanced people is the book "Drawing Room Deceptions" by Guy Hollingworth. Also the book "The Complete Walton" is a great starting book. You can also check out the video theory11 made on what books to get and the video is a free download which you can find in the Magic Tricks section by adjusting the price range to zero dollars. Hope this helped and contact me if you Have any further questions!

All in all heres a quick list of the books I would recommend and the prices of each.

- "Card College vol.1" by Robert Giobbi $31.95 from Dan & Dave's website
- "Expert at the Card Table" by S.W. Erdnase price range varies and can get up to $70 but you can purchase the Bible edition from Dan & Dave for $15!
- "Drawing Room Deceptions" by Guy Hollingworth $35 once again from Dan & Dave
- "The Complete Walton" by Roy Walton This book can be found in some places but is a "Hard to find" book in my opinion so I can't give you an exact price estimate. Sorry

But start off with these few books and check out the books being sold at Dan & Daves site! They are great books and ALL of them will help you in one way or another. Heres a link to their site. http://store.dananddave.com/books/

You can find most books people recommend on their site.

Hope this helped! And once again I just want to say Welcome!

-Colter

 

[Robert//Livingston]

I would agree with everyone else and say that the book "Card College vol.1" would be a great starting book. However once as you get farther into the more advanced range I would recommend "The Expert at the Card Table" (which is not in your dollar range unless you buy the "Bible edition" from Dan & Dave which would cost you about $15 without shipping. But is a "must read" for anyone aspiring to be a card magician.) another book which I have found useful for both beginners and advanced people is the book "Drawing Room Deceptions" by Guy Hollingworth. Also the book "The Complete Walton" is a great starting book. You can also check out the video theory11 made on what books to get and the video is a free download which you can find in the Magic Tricks section by adjusting the price range to zero dollars. Hope this helped and contact me if you Have any further questions!

I wouldn't start with any of those books. Jason England has said "Think of 'The Royal Road to Card Magic'' as High School, the 'Card College' as College courses, and 'Expert at the Card Table' as Graduate School.

'The Complete Walton' is out of print, and hard to find. I still haven't found a copy of Volume 1 OR 2.. There's no way you would enjoy "Expert at the Card Table" unless you're really really interested and progressing with it, because it is REALLY dry. 'Drawing Room Deceptions' uses sleight of hand that would be difficult at early stages in card handling.

 

[alex2011]

Crash Course 2 by Brad Christian is all you need.

 

[Aaron.Williams]

Crash Course 2 by Brad Christian is all you need.

ALL he needs? If you're gonna get the Ellusionist Brad Christian DVDs you might as well get Ninja, How to Do Street Magic, Ninja 2, Crash Course

 

[DesertStorm]

I agree with you completely I was just giving him some valuable resources to use when either starting out because all of the books I listed (excluding the expert at the card table) all have simple beginner tricks and sleights which are all needed before excelling in magic. Just because there is advanced stuff in their pages doesn't mean it's not beginner worthy. Challenging yourself to succeed will get you much farther in magic and life in general. But I was actually going to suggest the royal road to magic but I left it out in my post obviously and is the book besides the card college vol1 that I would recommend because card college gives very basic sleights that are beginner level and then gradually becomes more intense and difficult as you get farther into the book. So even though the books I listed are mostly advanced sleights and such they give great tips and techniques that are able to be used as a beginner.

 

[alex2011]

ALL[/B he needs? If you're gonna get the Ellusionist Brad Christian DVDs you might as well get Ninja, How to Do Street Magic, Ninja 2, Crash Course

Yes I think all you need is Crash Course 2. That's enough if you're creative. A lot of good material in there. Use those principles to create or enhance your effect.

 

[DesertStorm]

I wouldn't start with any of those books. Jason England has said "Think of 'The Royal Road to Card Magic'' as High School, the 'Card College' as College courses, and 'Expert at the Card Table' as Graduate School.

'The Complete Walton' is out of print, and hard to find. I still haven't found a copy of Volume 1 OR 2.. There's no way you would enjoy "Expert at the Card Table" unless you're really really interested and progressing with it, because it is REALLY dry. 'Drawing Room Deceptions' uses sleight of hand that would be difficult at early stages in card handling.

I would agree with that point however first off I forgot to list The Royal Road to Card Magic which is one of my favorite beginner books. But all of the books I listed have useful information to people whether or not they're advanced or beginning (excluding Expert at the Card Table which I just put in there as a "must read" book if you're looking to excel in magic and sleights. Iv'e read all of these books and all of them are valuable. However he never said he was a sole "beginner" as if he's never picked up a deck. He knows how to do some sleights so he might be more towards the "intermediate" level depending on when he started and how hard he's been working. But I agree with your post completely and will definitely edit my post and add Royal Road to Card Magic.

 

[DesertStorm]

Also I would say before you perform make sure you have the sleights down enough where you can do it without having to work to hard and to where YOU can barely see yourself doing it and where you doubt whether or not you've done it at all in the first place.

 

[Aaron.Williams]

Yes I think all you need is Crash Course 2. That's enough if you're creative. A lot of good material in there. Use those principles to create or enhance your effect.

True, but it doesn't teach all of the sleights and moves that she needs to be a sucessful card magician. That's why we're recommending most beginner books that teach fundamental card moves. Crash Course 2 mainly focuses on moves used for the Ambitious Card

 

[alex2011]

True, but it doesn't teach all of the sleights and moves that he needs to be a sucessful card magician. That's why we're recommending most beginner books that teach fundamental card moves. Crash Course 2 mainly focuses on moves used for the Ambitious Card

Yes those books are good but you don't need all of the sleights and moves to be a successful card magician. Yes Crash Course 2 mainly focuses on moves used for the Ambitious Card but try to forget the Ambitious Card and use those principles to perform other effects.

 

[ReservoirRed]

Yes those books are good but you don't need all of the sleights and moves to be a successful card magician. Yes Crash Course 2 mainly focuses on moves used for the Ambitious Card but try to forget the Ambitious Card and use those principles to perform other effects.

He/she is looking for a place to start off in magic. Given that most forum members are pasteboard enthusiasts, we have, for the most part, simply bypassed recommending good books on coin magic, apart from bobo. I do not perform coin magic, so im unable to recommend anything, apart from bobo which im led to believe is 'the expert at the coin table'. But you are not only bypassing coins, you're bypassing all good starting points in card magic, almost to the point of recommending that he/she does NOT get books like card college, that are universally accepted within the community as some of the best books for beginners, and you're saying he/she doesn't need them, all he/she needs is an ambitious card dvd, which is exactly what crash course 2 is. The dvd is about 30 dollars, the book can be bought for less. The book will teach you a lot more sleights and tricks through well thought out, well written and well illustrated teaching that will help anyone wishing to learn the basics progress fast. It's cheaper, and it's far superior. If you still disagree, i think you should pick up a copy.

 

[alex2011]

He/she is looking for a place to start off in magic. Given that most forum members are pasteboard enthusiasts, we have, for the most part, simply bypassed recommending good books on coin magic, apart from bobo. I do not perform coin magic, so im unable to recommend anything, apart from bobo which im led to believe is 'the expert at the coin table'. But you are not only bypassing coins, you're bypassing all good starting points in card magic, almost to the point of recommending that he/she does NOT get books like card college, that are universally accepted within the community as some of the best books for beginners, and you're saying he/she doesn't need them, all he/she needs is an ambitious card dvd, which is exactly what crash course 2 is. The dvd is about 30 dollars, the book can be bought for less. The book will teach you a lot more sleights and tricks through well thought out, well written and well illustrated teaching that will help anyone wishing to learn the basics progress fast. It's cheaper, and it's far superior. If you still disagree, i think you should pick up a copy.

I'm not recommending that he/she does not get books. I have Card College volume 1 and I agree it's a good book.

I'm also not saying that he/she needs an Ambitious Card DVD. All I'm saying is, Crash Course 2 has a lot of good material and if you're creative, you can create your own effects by using those principles.

 

[YRAMagicMan]

All of this talk about Royal Road being to advanced for a beginner is crazy, I started with Royal Road! I can't speak for Card College, so I'm not gonna try, but I'll put in my 2 cents for Royal Road. When I started in magic, the first thing I did was look up magic books on amazon.com. I came across Royal Road and eventually got my hands on a copy. When I started working with it I already was well versed in basic shuffling, minus the controls, but Royal Road quickly taught me everything I needed to know. I actually had no concept of what a double lift was, or that magicians hold breaks and control cards, I knew absolutely nothing about magic aside from the fact that it was cool. Royal Road did an excellent job of introducing me to all of that. In fact, I still use some a lot of the material I learned from Royal Road, and I've been doing magic for 5 years now.

I should probably say that this wasn't supposed to come across as an angry post, though I'm guessing it did. Sorry for that.

Now that I've finished putting my two cents in for Royal Road, I'll second the recommendation for Bobo's and throw in a recommendation for Penguin Magic's In the Beginning There Were Coins. This recommendation comes with a caution though. Coin magic, for me at least, has been much more difficult than anything else I've tried. This DVD is helpful, but I've never been able to use very many of the routines effectively, and I've put in a good amount of practice. That being said, once I picked up Bobo's a few years later, things just started to click. This may be because I'd worked out some kinks in my performance while learning sponge balls, but it could be that Bobo's is just that awesome.

Mark Wilson's book is also an amazing resource. It covers all areas of magic from cards to coins to illusions to ropes to mentalism, everything. If you're not sure what area you want to go into, this is THE book for you.

 

[alex2011]

All of this talk about Royal Road being to advanced for a beginner is crazy, I started with Royal Road! I can't speak for Card College, so I'm not gonna try, but I'll put in my 2 cents for Royal Road. When I started in magic, the first thing I did was look up magic books on amazon.com. I came across Royal Road and eventually got my hands on a copy. When I started working with it I already was well versed in basic shuffling, minus the controls, but Royal Road quickly taught me everything I needed to know. I actually had no concept of what a double lift was, or that magicians hold breaks and control cards, I knew absolutely nothing about magic aside from the fact that it was cool. Royal Road did an excellent job of introducing me to all of that. In fact, I still use some a lot of the material I learned from Royal Road, and I've been doing magic for 5 years now.

I should probably say that this wasn't supposed to come across as an angry post, though I'm guessing it did. Sorry for that.

Now that I've finished putting my two cents in for Royal Road, I'll second the recommendation for Bobo's and throw in a recommendation for Penguin Magic's In the Beginning There Were Coins. This recommendation comes with a caution though. Coin magic, for me at least, has been much more difficult than anything else I've tried. This DVD is helpful, but I've never been able to use very many of the routines effectively, and I've put in a good amount of practice. That being said, once I picked up Bobo's a few years later, things just started to click. This may be because I'd worked out some kinks in my performance while learning sponge balls, but it could be that Bobo's is just that awesome.

Mark Wilson's book is also an amazing resource. It covers all areas of magic from cards to coins to illusions to ropes to mentalism, everything. If you're not sure what area you want to go into, this is THE book for you.

Agree with you man! Royal Road is good. I actually created a variation of the trick Thought Stealer which became a magician fooler. Card is selected and signed, placed ANYWHERE back in the deck. ANY number between 1 - 52 is named. The spectator HIMSELF deals that number of cards and the last card is the signed card.