theory11 — Magic Tricks & the World's Finest Playing Cards

What is your go-to card trick?

Van Gogh

Van Gogh

Jul 17, 2022
96
59
Hi everyone, I‘d like to know what your go-to card trick is, the trick that you would always do if someone handed you a deck of cards and asked you to preform (It has to be impromptu). Mine is Out of this world, or if the audience is less interested, I preform the ambidextrous card routine.
 
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I usually do a right card/wrong card trick. They pick a card, return it, I find the wrong card and place it in their hand. Then it turns into theirs.

The reasons I start with this trick are:
1. There's no setup.
2. It gets good reactions as it's a fairly magical effect
3. There's very little sleight of hand so it's easy for me to do without screwing it up
4. It's simple and plays out fairly quickly. Generally I don't want to open with a trick that takes awhile to get to a climax. If they're interested in seeing more I'll do something with a bit more process.

I used to do ambitious card a lot but occasionally people would just sort of stop paying attention after the first phase of the card coming to the top, even though there's 2-3 phases after that that are arguably stronger than the first. Like they seemed to think that was the end of the trick and I always felt awkward going "Wait there's more" like Billy Mays.

Also, just out of curiosity, what is the ambidextrous card trick?
 
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Antonio Diavolo said:
I usually do a right card/wrong card trick. They pick a card, return it, I find the wrong card and place it in their hand. Then it turns into theirs.

The reasons I start with this trick are:
1. There's no setup.
2. It gets good reactions as it's a fairly magical effect
3. There's very little sleight of hand so it's easy for me to do without screwing it up
4. It's simple and plays out fairly quickly. Generally I don't want to open with a trick that takes awhile to get to a climax. If they're interested in seeing more I'll do something with a bit more process.

I used to do ambitious card a lot but occasionally people would just sort of stop paying attention after the first phase of the card coming to the top, even though there's 2-3 phases after that that are arguably stronger than the first. Like they seemed to think that was the end of the trick and I always felt awkward going "Wait there's more" like Billy Mays.

Also, just out of curiosity, what is the ambidextrous card trick?
Click to expand...


Can't go wrong with righting a wrong!!;)
 
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Antonio Diavolo said:
I usually do a right card/wrong card trick. They pick a card, return it, I find the wrong card and place it in their hand. Then it turns into theirs.

The reasons I start with this trick are:
1. There's no setup.
2. It gets good reactions as it's a fairly magical effect
3. There's very little sleight of hand so it's easy for me to do without screwing it up
4. It's simple and plays out fairly quickly. Generally I don't want to open with a trick that takes awhile to get to a climax. If they're interested in seeing more I'll do something with a bit more process.

I used to do ambitious card a lot but occasionally people would just sort of stop paying attention after the first phase of the card coming to the top, even though there's 2-3 phases after that that are arguably stronger than the first. Like they seemed to think that was the end of the trick and I always felt awkward going "Wait there's more" like Billy Mays.

Also, just out of curiosity, what is the ambidextrous card trick?
Click to expand...


The abidextrous card routine is like the ambitious card routine but it involves a lot of flourishing and the card instead of teleporting to the top of the deck teleports from one hand to the other. I found this to be a great alternative to the ambitious card trick because it kept the spectator interested in the trick (because of the flourishing). Every routine is different, like the ambitious card trick, but this trick is far less well known.
 
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Antonio Diavolo said:
I usually do a right card/wrong card trick. They pick a card, return it, I find the wrong card and place it in their hand. Then it turns into theirs.

The reasons I start with this trick are:
1. There's no setup.
2. It gets good reactions as it's a fairly magical effect
3. There's very little sleight of hand so it's easy for me to do without screwing it up
4. It's simple and plays out fairly quickly. Generally I don't want to open with a trick that takes awhile to get to a climax. If they're interested in seeing more I'll do something with a bit more process.

I used to do ambitious card a lot but occasionally people would just sort of stop paying attention after the first phase of the card coming to the top, even though there's 2-3 phases after that that are arguably stronger than the first. Like they seemed to think that was the end of the trick and I always felt awkward going "Wait there's more" like Billy Mays.

Also, just out of curiosity, what is the ambidextrous card trick?
Click to expand...


Right card wrong card tricks are very visual, and short and sweet, this is appealing to almost everyone and as such is normaly a good choice to start a routine of tricks. However, as a stand alone trick I would use something else. It is true though that I almost never just do one trick for someone so that’s not much of a problem.
 
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Van Gogh said:
Right card wrong card tricks are very visual, and short and sweet, this is appealing to almost everyone and as such is normaly a good choice to start a routine of tricks. However, as a stand alone trick I would use something else. It is true though that I almost never just do one trick for someone so that’s not much of a problem.
Click to expand...
I think that's the beauty of the trick. Most of the time it makes them want to see more.
 
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Shteevie said:
Finger on the Card, as popularized by the late Gary Ouellett. It's a "wrong card/right card" sort of routine as well and it's been my signature trick for nearly 30 years now.
Click to expand...

Just looked at a performance and WOW.
Where do you learn this trick, I’d love to have it.
 
There's a few things I'll do, if I am in the mood to perform card tricks.

My default would probably be a variation of Card To Pocket as it has no set up and allows me a lot of interplay with the people I'm performing for. Otherwise it'd be my ACR, or if I have a moment to do some sneaky setup, a routine that combines two different Tony Chang tricks.
 
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Van Gogh said:
Just looked at a performance and WOW.
Where do you learn this trick, I’d love to have it.
Click to expand...

You can order it here:
www.vanishingincmagic.com

Finger on the Card

Already a classic, this is the trick that started it all! The effect, essentially, is a two card transposition, but carefully framed in the...
www.vanishingincmagic.com www.vanishingincmagic.com

I'm curious to know where you saw a performance of it. Did you see it online?
 
The first card trick I ever saw online, way back, was Joker's Wild by Oz.
As someone who did some simple card tricks, it blew me away.
I had no idea it was possible to do something like that with a deck of cards. I decided to purchase, and down the rabbit hole I went.

So for me, I've it's my fast, go-to, one-shot effect. Done it thousands of times and it always gets the same strong reactions from people.
 
If someone hands me a deck, then depending on context, audience, and condition of the cards, I will likely do one of the following:

Gemini Twins (Fulves)
A simple force and reveal (usually as an interactive lie detection game)
Pre-Prefiguration (Elsdon/Jennings)

If I'm not handed a deck, but still asked to do a card trick(!) I always have in my wallet:

Ungimmicked B'wave (Maven)
Three cards for traditional 3 card monte
 
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