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Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 2:46 pm
by Sebastian B
I have just read Ibidem No. 28 1963. Ronald Wohl's study of the "Setup Technique" is wonderful and well worth studying. The principal behind the "Setup Technique" is not new, but does anyone Know if there is other published studys that are as thorough as Mr Wohl's?

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 4:10 pm
by Joe Mckay
Yeah - it is a great article.

Allan Slaight had a routine with a similar concept in IBIDEM as well. It is called The Eclectic Deck and can be found in Volume 3 (page 765) of the bound reprints.

Also - Stewart James has tackled this theme as well. One is his legendary Robot Deck effect. And the other is his ON TO TORONTO chapter. Both of these can be found in The James File. The ON TO TORONTO chapter deals with the novel concept of stacking a deck for a series of effects from a shuffled deck of cards. The idea being you take a borrowed deck and as you perform each effect - you secretly set up for the next effect at the same time.

My notes on the Stewart James books may be of some use to you:

http://forums.geniimagazine.com/viewtopic.php?t=48263

And you can read about the Robot Deck here:

http://stewartjames.magicana.com/P_stack_within_stack.htmll

This thread may be of use as well:

http://forums.geniimagazine.com/viewtopic.php?t=49041

And also this thread is worth checking out as well:

http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/viewtopic.php?topic=460701&forum=2

From a wider perspective it is worth remembering that most memorized decks have this sort of structure built into them. You perform a series of a tricks that reset themselves leaving you with the deck back in memorized order. And then finish with a strong trick that destroys the stack.

I gave some thoughts on this area in a blog I used to help out on as well:

https://doubledeal.wordpress.com/2010/11/29/memorized-stacks/

https://doubledeal.wordpress.com/2010/12/01/more-memorized-stacky-stuff/

Lastly - when dealing with tricks where one trick sets up the next - the following procedure is worth using.

I am not sure who to credit but the earliest reference I have found (if I remember correctly) is in a Bob Longe book. Although I have heard others credit it to Jon Racherbaumer.

1) Hand a deck out to be shuffled.

2) Take back the deck - and run through the cards. You apparently throw out random cards to the table.

3) In fact - you throw out cards (face up) such that the ones left in your hands are in red/black/red/black/red/black/red/black... etc order.

4) The cards face up on the table are random. The cards left in your hands are in red/black/red etc order...

5) Place the pile of cards in your hands on the table - face down. And turn over the pile of cards on the table - face down.

6) Use a magician's force to force the packet of cards in red/black/red etc order on the spectator.

7) He shuffled the cards - saw you throw out some random cards - and then "freely" selected one of the two piles of cards.

8) Yet - you are left with a random mixture of red/black cards and he is left with a pile in strict red/black/red etc order.

9) Use the cards in his hands for a Gibreath shuffle effect. A favourite of mine is Roy Walton's 'Game Law' effect. The reason I like this trick is because the deck is not given one riffle shuffle (as in most Gilbreath effects) but two riffles shuffles...

-----------------------

That said - my favourite Gilbreath effect is probably Ben Harris's 'Invertz' from his book 'Off The Wall' and 'Magnetic Bipolar Miraskill' by Michael Weber which can be found in the August 2006 issue of GENII magazine. The Weber effect is great but it does make use of one-way backs.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 4:38 pm
by Sebastian B
Mr McKay,

Thank you for taking the time to answer. Your list will keep me occupied for some time, Love it :)

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 5:37 pm
by Joe Mckay
I am not sure if I mentioned this in any of the links above - but Max Maven's concept of 'Ecological Magic' is a very useful one as well.

The idea is this.

Imagine you have a trick that ends with a card reversed second from the top. Rather than correct the card - you find another trick that requires a card reversed second from the top.

Of course - it is not hard to secretly move a card from second from the top to the bottom or the top and so on...

So - you don't need to look for tricks that make use of whatever "leftover" cards are left from a previous trick. Since often you can easily move those cards to the position needed for the following effect.

Anyway - this is a powerful idea. Sadly - I cannot give any specific advice in this are since I got burned out with card magic before I had a chance to research this area. It is a shame since I am sure there are a lot of powerful combinations in magic in which the "leftover" cards (which would usually be corrected before the next trick) from a previous effect can easily be put in place for a follow up effect that requires certain cards to be reversed and so on...

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 6:31 pm
by Sebastian B
That is a fascinating concept. In Wohl's articel he talks about diffrent types of delayed setups: Partial delayed setup, complete pack delayed setup and special cases of delayed setup. I finde the "Partial delayed setup" particulary interesting and a concept i would like explore further. Mr Mavens concept of "Ecological Magic" sound very interesting, it would be interesting to further explore a combination of "Partial delayed setup" and "Ecological Magic".

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 7:08 pm
by Joe Mckay
Another clever idea is this...

Have a stack of cards face down at the bottom of a face up deck (let's say the stack consists of 5 cards).

Cut off the top half of the deck and hand it to spectator A to shuffle.

When he returns the cards - place them face down below the card in your hands.

Now spread through the face up cards - until you reach the face down cards.

Hand the face up cards to spectator B to shuffle.

When spectator B returns the cards - return them face down to the bottom of the cards in your hands.

Apparently - both spectators have shuffled half the deck each.

Yet your stack of cards is back on top of the deck.

This is a Martin Gardner idea. The same idea is used in The Penumbra issue 9 (see 'The Maddox Stack') as well as a Miraskill variation by Max Maven in one of the Semi Automatic Card tricks volumes. It is in Volume 6 or 7. I am not sure which.

Also - Karl Fulves has a similar approach in the book Deceptive Practices.

I think Benjamin Earl has explored this concept as well. But I am not 100% sure.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 7:40 pm
by Sebastian B
Thank you for sharing that idea, thats great. :)

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 6th, 2017, 11:39 pm
by Bill Mullins
Joe -- after step 4 in your first post above:

5. Take the pile that is in random order. It should be something substantially less than a whole deck.
6. Use Lennart Green's 1-2 shuffle to divide it into reds and blacks. (or his angle separation, or Lorayne's Great divide, or culls, or whatever floats your boat).
7. Faro them so they are also in RB order.
8. Add them to the RB stack on the table so the whole deck is now in RB order.

Even if people think you have over-handled the cards, since you have done completely different things to the pile that is originally in RB order, and the pile that you separated and faroed, no one will suspect that they both are in the same RB order.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 7th, 2017, 7:42 am
by Joe Mckay
Good thinking, Bill.

My favourite card cull is a simple one that John Bannon came up with. I remember seeing it in MAGIC magazine I am not sure where else he has taught it though.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 7th, 2017, 9:34 am
by Joe Mckay
Okay - to add to the above. I am not sure if John Bannon ever came up with a card cull.

The one I had in mind was a sleight-free one by Bro John Hamman which was in the Feb 2007 issue of MAGIC magazine.

Although it is more for culling stuff like 4-of-a-kind rather than separating the deck into reds and blacks (which the Lennart Green cull is designed for). So the Lennart Green cull is the way to go here. Just as Bill correctly pointed out!

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 8th, 2017, 9:08 am
by magicfish
I just went down to my library and re-read this article. Very interesting stuff. Thanks Sebastian.
Joe, I really like that Gardner Idea. Very versatile.
I think I first started using a delayed setup after learning Randy Wakeman's A Dime A Dozen.
It's a tabled four ace cutting sequence. And the end of the write up, as an afterthought, the author mentions that after all four aces have been produced, the original order of the complete deck remains intact.
I began exploiting this right away.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: January 8th, 2017, 9:36 am
by magicfish
Also, in perusing that bound volume of Ibidem I read that Harry Lorayne had written to Lyons about a Ransom item called Brown Study being similar to part 2 of his Location Supreme from CUCM.
This sent me back to my library to rediscover Location Supreme (very devious).
Funnily enough Location Supreme uses a 16 card top stock which got me pondering Ronald Wohl's essay again.
Ive come full circle before finishing my Sunday morning coffee! Thanks fellas!
Man I love magic books.

Re: Ibidem No. 28 (April 1963)

Posted: May 18th, 2017, 6:46 pm
by Joe Mckay
Joe Mckay wrote:That said - my favourite Gilbreath effect is probably Ben Harris's 'Invertz' from his book 'Off The Wall' and 'Magnetic Bipolar Miraskill' by Michael Weber which can be found in the August 2006 issue of GENII magazine. The Weber effect is great but it does make use of one-way backs.

I just stumbled across this thread again.

Just want to correct a mistake from an earlier post.

The trick I had in mind was 'Splitting The Difference' by Gordon Bean. It is in the May 2005 issue of GENII magazine. It is a clever variation of a sneaky John Kennedy approach to the Out of This World plot. It makes use of one-way backs and The Gilbreath Principle.