Imagine showing your spectator a deck of cards laid out in an app on your phone. There are two buttons, “Shuffle” and “Flip Cards”. You demonstrate how the buttons work. The cards are face up and you shuffle them several times. The spectator sees the cards are shuffled. You flip the cards face down and shuffle again. You set the phone down and turn away, telling the spectator to touch any of the face down cards. They do, and their selection is turned face up. You have them concentrate on that card and then you read their mind, revealing the card. You can immediately repeat the effect.
Continue reading “Mind reading phone app and more”New Android Trick App
The Future of Card Magic is Digital
You’ve just performed the perfect classic card trick: a spectator selects a card, keeps it secret, and you’re ready for the big reveal. But instead of fumbling through your deck, you pull out your phone, launch your QR code app, and hand it to them. “Scan this,” you say. “Yesterday, I had a strange feeling… that your card would be chosen.” They scan the code, open the dedicated webpage that pops up, and there it is: their chosen card, staring back at them from the screen. Forget the deck—the future of impossible prediction is now woven into the digital world.
Continue reading “New Android Trick App”Three Card Mystery: Remote Performance Edition
What’s New in This Version?
I’ve updated the Three Card Mystery trick to support remote performance via a phone call. Here are the key improvements:
Continue reading “Three Card Mystery: Remote Performance Edition”The Three Card Mind Reading effect as a phone app
First let me describe the classic Hummer Trick.
It’s a beautiful card trick that looks like genuine mind reading, yet requires no sleight of hand, no marked cards, and practically no skill. All you need are three cards and an understanding of simple logic.
Continue reading “The Three Card Mind Reading effect as a phone app”The Last Trick of Dr. Daley extended.
While teaching a student the Elmsley count as a setup for “The Last Trick of Dr. Daley,” I made an interesting mathematical observation. Starting with the four aces in Black, Black, Red, Red order (face down), the Elmsley count creates a predictable cycle:
- First count: B,B,R,R → B,R,B,R
- Second count: B,R,B,R → B,R,R,B
- Third count: B,R,R,B → B,B,R,R (back to start)
This three-count cycle became the foundation for a routine that provides for a two phase Daley effect.
Continue reading “The Last Trick of Dr. Daley extended.”Dai Vernon’s Slap Trick
This is basically a “Card at any number” trick that I found in a book:The Vernon Chronicles — Volume 2: More Lost Inner Secrets. (1988), by Stephen Minch,published as “The Slap Trick” Stephen Minch,’
Continue reading “Dai Vernon’s Slap Trick”The Holmes Deduction
A Mathematical Card Mystery
Adapted from Richard Vollmer’s “Einstein’s Favorite Trick”
Opening Quote
“Just as detectives have their methods of deduction, magicians have their own theory of elimination. It states: ‘When you run out of friends to show card tricks to, the only people left are relatives… and they’re the hardest cases to solve.'”
Continue reading “The Holmes Deduction”My thoughts on Key Card Techniques in Card Magic
I am teaching a young man card magic. So I wrote this up as a first lesson on the basics.
Continue reading “My thoughts on Key Card Techniques in Card Magic”Card Tracking Trick revisited
I asked an AI to analyze the math behind the 4×4 and 2×2 grid used in the Card Tracking Trick. The math also works for other square grids, although I think it would be impractical to go larger than 4×4. So what happens when you deal a 3×3 grid.
Card Tracking Trick
I have to admit that I am a Facebook user. So the other day the Facebook algorithm decided to show me a video of Jason Ladanye performing a self working card trick that uses a 4×4 grid of cards. See https://www.youtube.com/shorts/-PWpDE6w-Ns?feature=share. It is a great self working trick, but I rarely have the performing space for a 4×4 layout of cards.
So I do the same effect with a 2×2 grid. Here are the instructions.
Continue reading “Card Tracking Trick”