PDF Review: Impromptorn - David 'Dizzi' Fulde :: Initial Thoughts::

Sep 1, 2007
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Leicester, UK
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Content: Within the 22 pages of the 'Impromptorn' PDF are the secrets to David 'Dizzi' Fulde's handling of the Torn and Restored card plot. The original handling of his is taught, along with an alternate ending where the final piece is actually restored in the spectator's own hand; which is like, well cool. After that, you are treated to probably the main selling point of the effect, the removal of the creases. Along the way David offers tips and alternate ways of doing something, at the end are a few more tips and some funky groovy crediting. :)

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Design: I can't comment on the cover, 'cause David sent me a copy that didn't have the cover. For this, and he knows this, I am removing 7 points off the overall score later. Other than that, the pdf is layed out very simply, nothing obtrusive to hinder the learning process. It's broken up into sections and steps and because David references parts later on, this makes it very easy to find a part you need to go to. To accompany the description, there are pictures scattered throughout as a visual aid to learning this effect, they're not high def, but they're pretty decent webcam(?) quality, you won't have too much trouble looking at what's going on; I'll talk a little more about this in a fewizzle.

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Method: Okay... So I don't know all too many TnR's the three I do know being from Mark Wilson's Complete Course in Magic (an awesome TnR), Sean Fields' Fusion (an awesome PbP [piece by piece] TnR) and Mathieu Bich's TNR (personally, I think an awesome 'special' situation TnR). David's method is different than all of those, though you can see the influence from Sean Fields (who is credited) and perhaps also Daniel Garcia? I think my favourite piece is actually the third restoration as the piece is quite literally touched to the card with no cover and remains there.

Is it impromptu? Yes and No. Could somebody hand you a deck and ask you to do it? Hell yes... though... if they're that type of person that we all love to hate, they might notice something afterward. Is the crease removal impromptu? No, you will need to set this up each time you do it, though it would probably take less than a minute to do so.

Is there a gimmick? Yes, there is a small gimmick. Do you need to have one setup before performing? No... this is impromptu you silly reader, you. Will the gimmick need ditching half a second after you've performed this? Not at all, you could hold out the gimmick for as long or as little as you like.

Is the card examinable at the end? Totally, when you put that final piece together with the card, you can hand it to 'em immediately (as seen in the demo) and let them have a little freak out session with themselves or their friends. Personally, I probably wouldn't get involved with this freak out session, lest you seem a little weird.

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Practicality: Due to it's practically impromptu nature (FASDIU owns j00), this is pretty good. Your angles are about as good as any other PbP TnR; those being about 10 o'clock to 2 o'clock, 9 and 3 maybe but you'd be pushing it and risking major flashy flash flashtasticism.

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Teaching: For the most part, the teaching is fine, the procedure is relatively easy to understand... However, there are parts and steps where I feel the teaching isn't as thorough as perhaps it could've been were it released a little later; granted, there is only so much you can say about a certain thing to do, and explaining something in text can be hard. David explains what you should do, where each piece should go, and there are status checks along the way to help you, all combined with images, of the digital kind, of David actually doing it as the instruction goes along. 6 of the 9 images are of the magician's point of view, though 2 of them weren't actually that helpful with what I think they were supposed to help with.

Nevertheless, the effect is more than learnable and you'll have little to no trouble picking it up but be prepared to be scrolling up and down or flicking back and forth if you decided to print it off.

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The Creases: "No I'm not doing the creases!", Erm... Yes you are David and on top of that you're gonna teach it us! :D This is a fantastic method of removing the creases from a creased up playing card. You will need to set this up but it'll only take about 40 seconds, 60 at most. I would like to make one thing clear though, because I feel the demo video and the product description can give you a false impression, not a major one, but it's certainly not addressed...

Can you do the creases on their signed card? Yes but not how you're thinking, but the card can still be examined.
Can you do the creases on an unsigned card? Hell yes, and they can examine it afterward.

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Difficulty: If you're familiar with precisional sleight of hand, you'll be more than comfortable with this effect especially given the practice. If you're just making that step towards more intermediate handling, I think you'll find this a nice enough challenge that won't be so hard you'll get frustrated and throw things. If you're just beginning, I'd give this a pass for the time being until you think you're ready. Out of 10? Perhaps a 4-6, not that difficult to do, but it's the finesse that'll take the most time and care.

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Overall: For £8.50 (roughly $12.15 at the time of writing this review), I'd say this was a pretty good deal. If the pdf had been spent a little more time on to give everything a good thorough description, I'd say it was a damn good deal. Out of 10, as I stated earlier I'll be removing 7 points so...

0.5/10 :D

Except not really, so I'd say a 7.5 out of 10... If a little more time had been spent on the pdf to make sure everything was thorough, I'd give it a full 8. This is a really nice impromptu signed Torn and Restored card that you can freaking remove the creases with. :eek:

Thanks to David for giving me a copy to review and for my earlier nap which made me so awake afterwards that as I type this, it has quite literally just turned 6am. (I wrote this in notepad last night before putting it on the forums, it is quite obviously not 6am right now)

- Sean

EDIT: Due to the awesome nature of David, he sent me a copy today with the covers included, I can happily say that the cover for this pdf is sexy.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Nov 18, 2008
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CA
Awesome review. Sounds really practical and something I might use on a day to day basis.
 
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