Practicing Palming

[Guest]

I have been doing card magic for almost two years but I am far weaker at palming than I would like to be. I use the occasional gambler cop or lateral palm when at the table, but I have decided to devote the rest of the year to learn some serious palming techniques. can anyone give me advice on where to start?

I have close's power of palming, and I know the standard advice about carrying palmed cards around but I find that after even a minute or two, the cards get warped and the sweat from my hands makes the card wet and sticky and otherwise unsuitable for practice.

do any of the members have some suggestions for delving into this underexplored (by me at least) area of card technique?

[Carl Mercurio]

If you're just looking for palming technique, i.e., getting the card from the deck into your hand, any number of card books can help you. Expert Card Technique or Erdnase are good places to start. The description of Howie Schwartzman's handling of the top palm is in Magic Monthly. The new Carney Book of Secrets has some nice touches on top and bottom palming. And Vernon obviously has a lot of work on palming.

For me, palming is as much about attitude, misdirection and motivated action as it is about technique. In the recent Ross Bertram issue of Genii, David Ben writes about how Bertram would steal and then hold out a card so his hands were empty. When doing Matt Schulien's Corner in the Glass you have to palm a card and tear off its corner, which requires a lot of misdirection (getting the spectators involved in handling the deck to take the heat off). Check out the Randy Wakeman-produced video on Heba Haba Al if you want to see someone handle a classic palmed card very naturally.

[Guest]

Barry Price also has a book out called "Palming for the Terrified"

Just another reference...

www.JeffEzellMAGIC.com

[Pete McCabe]

Vernon's Topping the Deck palm is in Select Secrets. Or if Jamy Ian Swiss is doing one of his workshops, you can learn it there. That's where I learned it. Personal instruction from Jamy on this move alone is worth far more than the cost of the workshop.

Topping the Deck is one of those moves that's so good, that once you learn it, you can stop looking for a better way to palm a card and turn your attention to something else.

[Frank Yuen]

Topping the Deck is one of those moves that's so good, that once you learn it, you can stop looking for a better way to palm a card and turn your attention to something else.

Agreed, if you are looking for techniques then learn Topping the Deck.

Frank Yuen

[Dennis Kyriakos]

Sammy

Mr. Mercurio :rolleyes: is right. Attitude is very important in palming. Technically, it's relatively simple to steal and hold a card in your hand. However, when one first starts palming cards there is a lot of guilt involved. You feel as if the audience is burning your hand. And if you feel bad about it they will.

The only way to get over that is some therapy. The best therapy in this case would be to perform one effect in each set you do that involves palming. It could be as simple as holding out a card and asking the spectator to shuffle the deck. Find or build a simple effect where the moment before the palm you provide some -for lack of a better word- misdirection. There's plenty of material out there.

John Carney's new book and Worker's 3 (I believe) have some GREAT advice on palming.

The best advice is to learn a basic top and bottom palm then GET OUT THERE AND PERFORM effects that require them.

regards
Dennis

Mr. Mercurio....heeheehee :D

Hey Carl!

[Ian Kendall]

To be honest, if you have Close's Power of Palming video, and/or Workers 3, you have the learning material presented in the best way.

Having said that, noone seems to be touching on the main problem; the cards becoming sweaty and warped. The short answer to this is to hold the cards for a shorter time :) Hold the deck and palm a card off, check for a couple of seconds that you have a good grip and everything is fine and then replace the card, cut the deck and repeat with another card. This way none of the cards will get too much work and you can practice the technique over and over.

Then, when you want to hold out for a long time get a few scratch cards and carry them in your pocket. As you walk around, hold one in palm and foget it. Since the cards are old spare ones it matters not that they might become warped. As soon as it does, throw it away and start again with a new one.

Then go out and palm in front of people ;) If you are apprehensive about palming in a routine at first, just palm a card out and put it back as you talk to the audience. It will just be like a practice session, but you will see how easy it can be to hold someone's attention away from the deck. When you gain confidence you can move onto the palming routines proper, as others have indicated here.

Hope this helps.

Ian