Brainstorm for a better ACR

[LingLing]

Hey all, I am (and I'm sure others are) looking to improve/lengthen my ACR. This is basically how it goes:

• Signed card goes on top, then straight into the middle, comes to top
• Tilt-->card comes to the top
• Then I do the phase where you put it in one half of the deck but it's on top of the other
• Dan and Dave's Hand to Mouth
• Braue Popup

And that's it. It's pretty short, but it is not repetitive at all and is just straight, hard-hitting ACR moves. What do you guys do?

Oh, and I don't do any pass yet because I would butcher it. If I can get heavy enough misdirection (i.e., the spec is hit by a car) I'll do a Charlier pass but nothing else.

EDIT: What's your opinion on Paperclipped as far as an ACR? I think it's a killer trick and would be a great ending to an ACR- but does it fit the plot?

 

[4757joshua2]

This is how I do it:

1. Marlo Tilt.
2. Spectator Insert.
3. James/Ellis Loading Move. ( With an Air Flip Over finish.)
4. Stick it into the middle face-up, then Pass it second to the top. (still face up.) (They are not aware that I did that of course.)
5. Color Change it to the top.
6. Braue Pop-up Move/Fallen/Torn and restored effect/Warp One, which ever I feel like doing.

 

[LingLing]

Spectator insert- do they look at the card first? Sounds like a good routine though. Fallen kills if you can do it right, but it's so damn angle sensitive that I never feel like using it. Color change is a good idea too.

BTW, what is the plot that you use for it? I use the plot that the little circles with the angles are buttons for an elevator, and the spec pushes it- and pushes the "button" on the "wrong" packet for the 3rd phase, it works great. I might try the puppy plot sometime though.

 

[bd]

LingLing, I understand that you want other magicians' advice, but you really need to work on coming up with your own performance style

Get a piece of paper and something to write with, sit down, and start plotting out your ACR (or any other trick/routine). Include notes for patter to the side.

 

[4757joshua2]

You are entirly right ben, but I don't think he was planning have us do the work for him right? Right?

 

[4757joshua2]

Spectator insert- do they look at the card first? Sounds like a good routine though. Fallen kills if you can do it right, but it's so damn angle sensitive that I never feel like using it. Color change is a good idea too.

BTW, what is the plot that you use for it? I use the plot that the little circles with the angles are buttons for an elevator, and the spec pushes it- and pushes the "button" on the "wrong" packet for the 3rd phase, it works great.I might try the puppy plot sometime though.

The Spectator Insert is a move where you give them the card, and then take the pack and dribble it from on hand to the other. The spectator can stick the card in any where they like. You can even hand the deck to them and make it come to the top in their hand!
I just use the old fashion ambitious card patter. (Touched up to my stile of course.)
As to the fallen thing: That's why I have so many endings. All super powerful, and all very different.

 

[bd]

You are entirly right ben, but I don't think he was planning have us do the work for him right? Right?

I'm just noticing his other posts asking similar questions- Routine building help, trick help, etc.

Don't want him to get into a bad habit.

 

[LingLing]

In the Bound thread, it's obvious why I would want help. Other than that, I'm not sure that I am asking for so much help that I'm building a style that is untrue to myself.

And no, I'm not trying to have other people "do the work for me",

Joshua2-Thanks, that's what I thought it was. That and the LePaul bluff pass are the two moves in the ACR that I could, but don't have the balls to do.

 

[aznofspades]

What material do you have for the ACR?

I would recommend Crash Course in Cards 2 (E) and Extremely Ambitious (Jay Sankey)

Spectator Inserts Card
Shuffle Control 2nd from the Top
Double Lift
Spectator Insert
Spectator Turnover
Loading Move with the Card going Across to the other Packet

Closer Ideas
Hand to Mouth with a Folded Card in the Mouth (takes a tiny bit of thinking)
Pop Up Move
Card to Shoe

Check Extremely Ambitious for some more closer ideas.

Paperclipped is a great trick. On his DVD, Jay teaches a whole routine involving an ACR, Card to Pocket, and climaxing with Paperclipped.

If you do the whole routine that he shows, I would recommend doing an ACR without a closer, so it flows into the Card to Pocket better. It also weakens the ACR so that it's still strong but it doesn't overshadow the Card to Pocket and Paperclipped.

PM/ IM me if you have anymore questions

 

[Addy]

Fallen kills if you can do it right, but it's so damn angle sensitive that I never feel like using it.

Fallen is not that angle sensitive. You're very well covered, and the thing you should be worrying regarding angles is the spectators not being able to see the rise, not the spectators seeing the method. Daniel goes over the angles in the video.

 

[4757joshua2]

Yup. I'm going to recommend crash course 2 too. It is a GREAT dvd.

 

[DLeerium]

My ACR requires a bit of work but it hits hard no doubt.

1): Lose card in deck and control to top via cuts/shuffle, then DL and color change.

2): Then Pop up move

3) Then a card to mouth, (or a card to underpants for the ladies ;P)

4) My elevator to nowhere as a closer.

 

[LingLing]

What material do you have for the ACR?

I would recommend Crash Course in Cards 2 (E) and Extremely Ambitious (Jay Sankey)

Spectator Inserts Card
Shuffle Control 2nd from the Top
Double Lift
Spectator Insert
Spectator Turnover
Loading Move with the Card going Across to the other Packet

Closer Ideas
Hand to Mouth with a Folded Card in the Mouth (takes a tiny bit of thinking)
Pop Up Move
Card to Shoe

Check Extremely Ambitious for some more closer ideas.

I really liked CC2, but I'll check out Extremely Ambitious, because it seems like it has some more advanced ideas.

 

[chrystal baller]

try throwing a shape shifter in your routine, people dont expect something that visual.

 

[Ben Long]

I used to do the whole "progression" ACR where I raise the stakes of how openly I make the card rise to the top, but I just got tired of it.

Now, I almost exclusively do a series of changes. I do an Ego Change, then a Shapeshifter, and finish with a change in the spec's hands.

It's a shorter but much more direct approach and I find that I get better reactions.

I also do a "horizontal rising card routine" where I do a pass, a Braue pop up move, and finish with S.W. Elevator (the crazy difficult Chris Kenner one).

I've always though that ACRs were a bit too long and involved. I prefer breaking them apart and doing smaller segments as individual tricks, or I use a single segment to segue into a different trick.

As far as Card to Mouth and Hello Goodbye, I never really considered those to be Ambitious Card tricks. The same goes with any of the TNR plots. Even the little change routine I do isn't really an ACR in my eyes.

My real problem with ACRs in general is that they all tend to follow that "progression" path I mentioned earlier. Just because it is made up of these smaller parts doesn't mean that it needs to be presented as such.

I mean, look at Triumph. There are tons of great variations on it. And most of them, to be perfectly honest, revolve around a similar plot--some variation of the "drunk spectator." Even something like Nacho Mama's Triumph (which, for the record, is a great technical piece) has the drunk spec plot. But then we occasionally get tricks like Paul Harris' "Unshuffling Rebecca," which uses an original idea and an original presentation of the same concept of undoing a badly shuffled pack.

So my question is, what is the "Unshuffling Rebecca" of the Ambitious Card?

 

[4757joshua2]

I used to do the whole "progression" ACR where I raise the stakes of how openly I make the card rise to the top, but I just got tired of it.

Now, I almost exclusively do a series of changes. I do an Ego Change, then a Shapeshifter, and finish with a change in the spec's hands.

It's a shorter but much more direct approach and I find that I get better reactions.

I also do a "horizontal rising card routine" where I do a pass, a Braue pop up move, and finish with S.W. Elevator (the crazy difficult Chris Kenner one).

I've always though that ACRs were a bit too long and involved. I prefer breaking them apart and doing smaller segments as individual tricks, or I use a single segment to segue into a different trick.

As far as Card to Mouth and Hello Goodbye, I never really considered those to be Ambitious Card tricks. The same goes with any of the TNR plots. Even the little change routine I do isn't really an ACR in my eyes.

My real problem with ACRs in general is that they all tend to follow that "progression" path I mentioned earlier. Just because it is made up of these smaller parts doesn't mean that it needs to be presented as such.

I mean, look at Triumph. There are tons of great variations on it. And most of them, to be perfectly honest, revolve around a similar plot--some variation of the "drunk spectator." Even something like Nacho Mama's Triumph (which, for the record, is a great technical piece) has the drunk spec plot. But then we occasionally get tricks like Paul Harris' "Unshuffling Rebecca," which uses an original idea and an original presentation of the same concept of undoing a badly shuffled pack.

So my question is, what is the "Unshuffling Rebecca" of the Ambitious Card?

The "progression" ACR as you call it, is a very good one. The idea is to have bigger and bigger climaxes in order to avoid an anticlimax. If you like to do it that way fine, but stop calling it an ACR because your version is not. And it is a ROUTINE it is supposed to be long and involved. If it is over involved then that is your fault. Just my opinion.

 

[Ben Long]

The "progression" ACR as you call it, is a very good one. The idea is to have bigger and bigger climaxes in order to avoid an anticlimax. If you like to do it that way fine, but stop calling it an ACR because your version is not. And it is a ROUTINE it is supposed to be long and involved. If it is over involved then that is your fault. Just my opinion.

Right, so that would be one of any number of routines. The only thing that makes it an ambitious card is that it keeps coming to the top. That's pretty much the only stipulation.

So who says it always has to be the progression plot? I never found that section in the big book o' magic. I must have just skimmed over that part or something.

And of course I know what a routine is. I do strolling magic, in which you generally don't want to do a single trick for more than two minutes. What you seem to be saying is that it's a good thing to have a sprawling mass of an ACR rather than a refined stimulating trick because it is the definition of an ambitious card routine. If you feel that I'm putting words into your mouth, please correct me, but that's the massage that I'm getting.

What I'm trying to say is that we don't have to be refined to a single plot--we don't have to build everything around the same idea.

 

[LingLing]

I performed my ACR for a couple of people today and they liked it, but they didn't even flinch on the card-to-mouth. Overall, it felt like I was rushing it, so I'm going back to the drawing board- first and foremost I'm going to script it, and I'm going to include Paperclipped as a closer, even though it's not very ACR-ish.

 

[4757joshua2]

Right, so that would be one of any number of routines. The only thing that makes it an ambitious card is that it keeps coming to the top. That's pretty much the only stipulation.

So who says it always has to be the progression plot? I never found that section in the big book o' magic. I must have just skimmed over that part or something.

And of course I know what a routine is. I do strolling magic, in which you generally don't want to do a single trick for more than two minutes. What you seem to be saying is that it's a good thing to have a sprawling mass of an ACR rather than a refined stimulating trick because it is the definition of an ambitious card routine. If you feel that I'm putting words into your mouth, please correct me, but that's the massage that I'm getting.

What I'm trying to say is that we don't have to be refined to a single plot--we don't have to build everything around the same idea.

I though you said that it just kept changing into their card. I re-read a realized you meant you were changing the top card. My mistake.
I did not say you always had to use a progression plot. I just said that I liked to and that I did not understand your dislike of it. You did not stipulate that you were doing street magic anyway. And my ACR is only two minutes. I said "my opinion". That means that is the way I do it. No hard feelings right?...RIGHT?

 

[Ben Long]

I though you said that it just kept changing into their card. I re-read a realized you meant you were changing the top card. My mistake.
I did not say you always had to use a progression plot. I just said that I liked to and that I did not understand your dislike of it. You did not stipulate that you were doing street magic anyway. And my ACR is only two minutes. I said "my opinion". That means that is the way I do it. No hard feelings right?...RIGHT?

Of course not. Never any hard feelings.

But I don't really do street magic. Strolling. Like at sexy parties and such.