Magic Tricks

I only do card magic. I mostly do impromptu card magic with borrowed cards, sometimes I use stacks with my own cards, but never gimmicked decks (unless it is a gimmicked packet trick) . I have nothing against gimmicked decks, it is just that, they can only be used for one trick. If one does a full card magic 30 minute act the presence of a gimmicked deck makes lack of continuity in the performance, which looks awful. Gimmicked decks are wondeful for a one time killer eye-candy trick, but not full card acts.

This is why I love this DVD. It has only three cards tricks in it. But this is exactly what beautiful card magic is all about. Magic that your spectators will remember. The cards are ungimmicked. So you can immediately transition into your follow up effect, or even hand them out to a spectator to keep.

I love that the demo video for each trick is in its full act (except for "Triumph and Triumph Again", which is cut, but nothing crucial is missing). Unlike some of the video demos here on PenguinMagic that are dishonest in their presentation, this demo shows it all to you.

The DVD is of very high quality, with visual effects added when necessary, and Asi is a good teacher. It comes with a menu with selections which makes it easy to use and come back to.

Here are my individual reviews of each trick.

Triumph and Triumph Again: Let me start by saying what I do not like about this trick. It is not impromptu (obviously). However, if you can RoadRunner cull the cards quickly, you can quickly set up the necessary cards in the process of finishing up some trick that requires you to spread the cards (an andvanced card magician would be familar how to seperate the suits slowly and secretly in the guise of doing other tricks). But this will not keep the suits in numerical order. So the effect will look the same but out of numerical order. It will be weaker, but it will be impromptu, and strong enough to amaze audiences.

AACAAN: There are so many ACAAN variations on magic sites. All claiming to have a clean version. Many of them use gimmicks, and those which do not, they are nowhere as good as Asi's variation. The version that Asi uses is gimmickless, but it does use a stack. You can see how it appears in the demo, nothing is left out. It really does look that smooth. Usually the ACAANs I have seem are pretty bad, but this is an exception. Furthermore, it teaches you a utility shift move that makes it possible to position a card into any position in the deck. This utility shift move can be used for other strong predictions and opens up a whole new door of possibilities. This trick is obviously not impromptu and needs a stack. However, this is one of those tricks where it be unnatural to shuffle the cards, since it is a prediction trick, and the deck needs to be undisturbed. Use it as powerful opener to completely devastate your audience. This trick/utility is worth the price of the DVD alone.

Double Exposure: This is now one of my favorite cards tricks of all time. It is impromptu, very artistic, visual, and strong magic. My only complaint is that Asi turns his back in the demo for a moment. I highly suggest to simply do a Hermann half-pass, even if you are scared of doing it, use the selected card as easy misdirection. But the rest of the trick is beautiful from start to finish. And it finishes your spectators with a memorable photo of the magic. This trick is worth the price of the DVD alone, and is even better than AACAAN.

This magic is not self-working. It requires a substantial amount of sleight-of-hand. Fortunately, for me it took me a day to get all of these tricks in order (but I been doing FASDIU from-a-shuffled-deck-in-use card magic for a very long time, and am comfortable with the required sleights at this point).

As other reviews have said. Do not buy this DVD if you are not going to practice this. You will just ruin the tricks. This DVD is a reward for all of those card magicians who rely on FASDIU skill instead of gimmicks. If you are one of those, definitely buy it. You will be most satisfied.