Picture Yourself as a Magician

348 Pages·2008·17.89 MB·English

by  Wayne N. Kawamoto

Picture Yourself as a Magician © 2008 Course Technology, a part of Cengage Learning.
Wayne Kawamoto
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In Memory of Lynn Reinecke Horton, 1956 – 1995
Acknowledgments
Thanks To:
Megan Belanger, for your vision and the opportunity To my restaurants and bars who provided me with
to write this book. magic gigs. Special thanks to John Petrillo, Judith
Walker, and Michael Voeltz.
Jenny Davidson, for being my editor. Your timely
advice and feedback at every stage of this book To all my clients who have welcomed me to their
was greatly appreciated. Brandon Penticuff, for pro- parties and gatherings and into their homes, as
ducing a great-looking DVD. To all of the Cengage well as the many companies, venues, schools,
Learning staff who lent their artistic, editorial, and libraries, and cities. It’s an honor to entertain at
marketing expertise to this book. your special events.
Nick Carifo, for allowing me to bounce ideas and To my event planners and agents who have sent me
tap into your in-depth magic expertise, and acting to numerous parties and corporate events. Special
as technical editor for this book. A couple of years thanks to Chuck and Bambi Burnes, Kitty Fisher,
back, you allowed me to borrow one of your Rhonda Bright, Terry Conci, and Hermann and
signature magic routines for a television audition. Nancy Leone.
I didn’t get the part. But more important, I knew I
I’ve had so many friends who have supported my
had a true friend in magic.
magic, including Tim and Cathy Peron, Ken and
My friends at About.com, in particular Elana Chris Widaman, Deborah Neal, David and Ruth
Breshgold, who always provides me with timely Aldrete, Raymond and Maria Foster, Mark and Kelli
and useful advice. It’s a privilege to write about Grace Kurtz, Ted and Julia Bacon, Curt and Susan
magic at Magic.About.com. McPherson, Scott and Shelly Wilson, Harry and
Ginger Hirakawa, Nick and Cindy Paz, Jim and Susie
Lauri Goldenhersh, for letting me know that there
Elliot, Wayne and Sue Reinecke, and Alan Reinecke.
was an opening for a writer to cover the world of
magic, and all your advice on entertaining.
The Magic Castle and Academy of Magical Arts for
Kozmo, for inviting me to be a regular commentator
providing an incredible venue for watching and
for Reel Magic Quarterly, the video magic magazine.
researching magic. To the many magicians who
Gregg Keizer, for helping me to launch my freelance provided advice, suggested techniques and tricks,
writing career. You’re an awesomely talented writer. and helped fine-tune routines and moves. There
Thanks to the many editors who gave me freelance are so many magicians I don’t know by name who
work over the years. I still freelance in the technol- freely offered me advice at the Magic Castle library.
ogy and small business areas thanks to Lauren Thanks to Gordon Bean, who provided me with
Simonds, Michelle Megna, Forrest Stroud, and private instruction in my early days, and Andrew
Dan Muse. Goldenhersh, David Groves, and Jim Skaggs.
Acknowledgments v
Christopher Tindall, for your vision and opportunity My Mom, Chiyo Kawamoto, my uncles and aunts, my
to teach magic to your students. grandparents, and my late father, Frank Kawamoto,
I was able to attend college and choose careers
because of your many sacrifices and hardships.
Vincent Lowe and Matteo Lowe, for helping out
with the levitation photos in this book.
To Kim Horton and Dana Horton, my nephew and
niece. Almost everyone can claim to have a crazy
The many magicians who taught me magic via
uncle, but you have two. I’m proud of you guys.
their books and DVDs, including: Mark Wilson,
Sherry Horton, you are family and your business
Jeff McBride, Eugene Burger, John George, Geoff
acumen and drive are an inspiration to others.
Williams, Jay Sankey, Mike Powers, Daryl, Shaun
McCree, Martin Lewis, Dan Tong, John Carney,
Thom Peterson, Bob Sheets, Whit Haydn, Bill To my family who put up with all of the magic
Abbott, Joe Diamond, Paul Gallagher, Lee Asher, and my crazy hours. And for this book, there were
Andrew Normansell, Nathan Gibson, Joshua Jay, always pictures to take and new tricks to try out.
Al Schneider, Kenton Knepper, Richard Osterlind, Thanks for all your patience and assistance.
Dan Fleshman, Bill Malone, and Bill Tarr. Your Love ya,Janet (the best writer in the family),
lessons, routines, and techniques are a part of the Alysha (the artist), Justin (the singer and actor),
magic that I entertain with today. and Molly (the equestrian, artist, and actress).
David Copperfield, Doug Henning, Walt Disney,
and Ken Burns, for perpetual inspiration.
To my friends Alan Goto and Serge Handschin (did
I finally spell your name correctly in this book?)
who were around the last time I was writing books.
This book is done, let’s do lunch. To the Rev. Keith
Yamamoto—I always enjoy getting together and
talking magic. One of these days, I’m going to
watch one of your “fiery” sermons.
About the Author
Wayne N. Kawamoto
In prior lives, Wayne has worked as an engineer,
is a full-time profes-
project manager, and freelance writer. He has an
sional magician who performs at corporate and
undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering
private events, as well as at restaurants and bars
and an MBA. Prior to becoming a professional
in Southern California. He has performed for the
magician, he reviewed video games and movies and
Los Angeles Dodgers and at the Los Angeles County
wrote about small business topics for publications
Fair, and entertained at events for Target stores,
such as Business Week, PC Magazine, The San
Nordstrom, Lockheed-Grumman, Countrywide,
Francisco Chronicle, Cinescape, and more, and
Century 21, and many more. He is the editorial
published several consumer books on personal
guide for the Magic.About.com online magazine,
computers.
where he reviews magic products and teaches
magic. His website is www.magicwayne.com.
Wayne lives with his family in the community
of La Verne, which is near Los Angeles.
Table of Contents
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv
Chapter 1 The Art of Magic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
The Tricks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
The DVD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Materials. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Types of Magic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Learning Magic Skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Next Steps. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Chapter 2 Easy Tricks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Visualize the Tricks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Offering Cards for a Spectator to Select. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Aces High . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
The Searchers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Number Down. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Four of a Kind—Version 1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Four of a Kind—Version 2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
The Prediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
The Reversed Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Next Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Chapter 3 Basic Card Handling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Visualize the Card Handling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Dealing Cards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
The Overhand Shuffle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
viii Picture Yourself as a Magician
The Hindu Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
The Table Riffle Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
The Riffle Shuffle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
The Straight Riffle Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
The One-Hand Cut. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Next Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Chapter 4 Basic Sleight-of-Hand with Cards . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Sleight Difference. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Visualize the Card Handling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Basic Key Card Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Card Controls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Overhand Shuffle Key Card Glimpse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Hindu Shuffle Key Card Glimpse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Charlier—One Hand Cut Glimpse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Overhand and Hindu Shuffles—Bottom Card Glimpse . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Hindu Versus Overhand Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Holding and Controlling a Break . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Double-Undercut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Overhand False Shuffle and Card Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Controlling a Card with the Overhand False Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Hindu Shuffle and Card Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Overhand and Hindu—Top to Bottom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Changing the Position of a Card. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
False Three-Way Cut—Version 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
False Mixing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
False Three-Way Cut—Version 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Maintaining the Top Card with a Riffle Shuffle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
The Cross-cut. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Free Choice? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
The Hindu Force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Deeper Cut Force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
The Card Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Flourishes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Card Springing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Next Steps. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Table of Contents ix
Chapter 5 Great Card Tricks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Visualize the Tricks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Finding a Spectator’s Card (Two Themes). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Spelling to a Selected Card. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Do as I Do. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
The Rising Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Impromptu Prediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Simple Prediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Impossible Predictions and Locations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Animazement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Picture Yourself as a Magician—1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Picture Yourself as a Magician—2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Lost and Found. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
The Ten-Card Poker Deal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Gambling-Themed Card Tricks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Dealing a Royal Flush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
More Card Tricks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Next Steps. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Chapter 6 Trick Decks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Using a Trick Deck in the Correct Manner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
One-Way Force Decks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
The Svengali Deck. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Svengali Properties. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Running Through the Deck and Forcing a Card. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Svengali: The Moves. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Cutting the Cards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Shuffling the Cards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
A Second Force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
A Third Force. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Spectator Finds His Own Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
The Prediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Svengali Revelations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Card to Impossible Location. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Card Stab. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Card at Any Number. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109