How to do Magic Tricks

Advice and Support for Magicians

How to Store Your Playing Cards

by Merchant of Magic Leave a Comment

As a magician, your playing cards are the tools of your trade. As a card collector, you invest in beautiful decks that are true works of art. Either way…  Keeping your playing cards safe and in good condition is a top priority. 

The good news is that it’s pretty easy to look after your playing cards so they are ready to go when you need them. Here are some easy tips on how to store your decks like a pro. 

Keep them in their box

Playing cards come with their own card case called a Tuck Case. Although these cases are often as decorative as the deck themselves, they have a valuable job to do.

Whatever you do… Resist the temptation to simply wrap a rubber band around your deck of playing cards and think that’s a job done right. The rubber band will not protect your deck from bumps and scuffs, and can also apply uneven pressure to the middle of the deck causing it to bow or warp. 

Playing cards that are left out of their box and also take on moisture like a sponge. They are paper.. so need to be kept dry to prevent them from warping. If you lose their tuck box. Keep them in an airtight container to ensure they stay at their best.

Storing your playing cards in a card clip or card guard

The next level of card storage, and a must if you intend to carry your cards in your pocket through the day, is a good playing card clip or guard. There is a wide range of card clips and guards to choose from. From the basic plastic or metal clip, through to beautifully decorated and covered clips. They all do the same thing: Protect your cards from being dented from a drop, and keeping them pressed and in shape as you store them. 

Playing card display cases

There’s a wide range of excellent playing card display cases and protective boxes on the market. These are often made from acrylic, perspex, or wood. As well as showing off your decks to the world, they are a great way to reduce dust, UV and humidity from going to work on your collection whilst on display. 

Heat & humidity are your enemies

Keeping your cards away from excess heat or cold is fairly easy to do. Direct sunlight is never a good idea, as it can heat up the deck and also fade the colours over time. 

The hard part is humidity. Store your playing cards in the driest and coolest part of your house. 

Keep your card collection away from the bathroom and kitchen and make sure the area is well ventilated. If you have a large collection, you could even research using a humidifier in the same room as your collection.  Whatever you do… Don’t store your card collection in a box in the shed or garage. You may have a nasty surprise when you open the box after a few years of storage in a damp area…

Have fun with your cards

Collecting cards is a fun hobby and can become very profitable if you manage to collect and store some rare and limited edition decks. However, it’s important to remember that they have a purpose… A reason for being. They’re designed to be used, spread shuffled, and played with. Rather than just buying decks and storing them away, play with them! Learn some card magic tricks to perform to show off your cards and entertain people at the same time! It’s their reason for being and it really is a great feeling to crack open a new deck… 

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Filed Under: how to do magic tricks Tagged With: playing cards

Learn Magic Card Tricks Even If You Have No Time To Practice.

by Merchant of Magic 2 Comments

learn magic card tricks in just 10 minute practice sessons.

Jason writes:  The things I struggle with are finding the time to practice and learn magic card tricks correctly. How do you make time?

Yep, there never is enough hours in the day. Magic very quickly becomes an obsession and there are plenty of magicians out there that commit many hours daily or weekly to their practice of card technique. Good for them! Many burn out over time and drift away from their practice, but a few keep going and go on to become masters of the art.. The good news is you DON’T need hours each day to learn magic card tricks… well, you do need some time, but not hours…  just 10 minutes, twice a day…   that’s all!

WHAT!?! 

It’s really true… I’ve been training magicians for the past 20 years and in that time I’ve discovered something very useful for anyone starting to learn card magic. You see, A funny aspect of skill learning is that we humans get more benefit from short frequent practice sessions than we do from long ones. Most of the benefit from a session happens in the first 10 minutes. After 10 minutes it’s a case of diminishing returns, as our attention decreases and fatigue from repetition builds up. 

It’s exactly the same with fitness training.. Back in the day, fitness coaches told their students to do at least an hour of cardio.. But research slowly discovered that the gains from each workout came from the first 20 minutes of the session.. Many trainers knew this, but ‘customers’ wanted an hour long session to get their moneys worth and to perceive ‘value’. As this changes and research into training developers, the popularity of HIT training reduced effective training sessions into much shorter workout sessions. The same applies when we learn card magic. We can capitalise on this by practicing in short ‘micro sessions’ of just 10 minutes, with several hours between sessions.  

10 minutes in the morning and 10 at night.. Everyone can get up 10 minutes earlier if they put their mind to it. 

 

It’s easy for beginners to learn magic card tricks 

Starting to learn magic card tricks can be a bit like starting a New Years resolution… It starts well, but simply doesn’t last. A process of short regular magic practice sessions every single day is infinitely better than none.

Quick sessions are easy to ‘fit in’ to daily life and therefore less likely to be skipped. Feeling pressure to take time out for a long period of training can lead to avoidance and excuses because of guilt that builds up.  If you start associating feelings of inadequacy and guilt with your magic practice you’re not going to be able to do it as easily.

Tell me more about how to learn magic card tricks with short practice sessions!

If you’re interested to learn more about this, I’ve written a book on techniques and practice drills for learning sleight of hand. You can get a free copy of the book  here: ‘approaching magic practice’ 

Hope this helps you 

Dominic Reyes

 

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Filed Under: how to do magic tricks Tagged With: Practice magic

How To Make Money Doing Magic

by Merchant of Magic Leave a Comment

Make Money Doing MagicMagic is an awesome hobby—and for a lot of us, the enjoyment we get out of it is more than enough to keep us satisfied!

But did you know that there are actually a lot of creative ways you could earn money through magic?

Here are three simple ways you can use your magic skills to pay the bills!

 

No1 Paid Gigs

This is the most obvious of all the methods, but it’s definitely worth mentioning. This is the most common and ‘tried and tested’ way to earn a very decent income through magic.

Here’s how it tends to work…

You build yourself a website that lets your prospective customers know a little bit about you and what you can do for them. This isn’t as hard as it sounds, and if you really don’t feel like doing it you can always hire someone else to do it for you.

You can learn all about how to make your own website to promote your magic here…

Alternatively, you could create some business cards to hand out next time you’re out performing magic. The most important thing is that you have SOMETHING for your potential customers refer to—whether it’s a website, business card or even a Facebook page.

The next step is getting your name out there—ask your friends to spread the word and consider setting up a few paid ads to get things rolling. Once you get a few gigs under your belt word of mouth should start spreading and you’ll naturally get people coming to you.

What type of gigs should you be performing?

There are a few different types of paid gigs magicians tend to go for (and they each have respective benefits and disadvantages).

Restaurants

This is a good starting place for magicians looking to start making their way up the paid gigs ‘ladder’. Performing at restaurants is a good way to get used to performing magic to unfamiliar crowds, and since you’ll generally be ‘table-hopping’ anyway, you’ll be performing for small groups at a time. Make sure to hand out your business card at the end of each performance!

Weddings

Weddings tend to pay nicely (of course they do—it’s a wedding!) so if you can get yourself a few of these booked then you’ll do very nicely for yourself.

A great tip for getting weddings booked is to attend ‘wedding fayres’ which are usually venues where couples can check out all the different kinds of things they’ll need for their wedding and how much they’ll cost. For example, photographers will often be in attendance at this event—looking to secure a few events.

You can do exactly the same thing as a magician (and chances are, there won’t be many other magicians there to compete with). This is your chance to impress the couples and pitch your value as an entertainer at their function.

Here’s a free ebook about marketing yourself for weddings

Corporate Events

This is a style of show where businesses will pay magicians to come in and present lessons and motivational ideas for the employees through the medium of magic. Or sometimes, it’s just purely for entertainment.

Either way, it’s a good atmosphere to perform in and often pays nicely!

Busking

If you’re not quite ready for paid events like we talked about above, you might benefit from getting your start on the streets.

Street magic and busking are less of a ‘step up’ from casual magic, but they still provide you with the chance to earn while you perform.

​Check out this resource on getting started in busking!

 

No.2 Create Your Own Magic

If you know a thing or two about magic and have a creative flair, you can earn money through creating your OWN effects or gimmicks.

There are plenty of magic shops and companies that will then pay you good money for your efforts! Or you could create your own website and sell your effects exclusively through there.

Here’s a great blog post​ published here at the MoM that teaches you all about creating original and unique magic tricks.

 

No.3 Affiliate Marketing for Magic Shops

The other two ideas we’ve discussed so far have been pretty standard. But here’s something you might not have considered…

Affiliate Marketing.

What is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing sounds complicated, but it’s really quite simple. You can earn money by promoting OTHER people’s products (all you need is a link).

How does this relate to magic?
Well, as it happens, you can become an affiliate of the Merchant of Magic ​here.

That means you can get a unique link for EACH of our products that will enable you to earn a commission whenever somebody clicks through your link and buys the product.

For example, if you made a YouTube video performing one of your favourite new effects, you could drop a link in the description that would take people to the Merchant of Magic to buy that same effect (which would earn you a commission!).

This approach definitely won’t work for everyone, and I’m sure many people would find it easier to go with the more traditional method of performing at paid gigs and functions, but it’s definitely worth considering if you haven’t yet done so.

So there you are! Three simple ways to earn some extra cash through nothing more than performing magic!

Do you have any questions we didn’t address? Feel free to get in touch with us.

About the author: Benji is a hobbyist magician from the UK who also runs a magic site over at thedailymagician.com​.

NEXT:

Why you should practice before you perform

6 Things Magicians Never Do

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  • Confidence For Magicians
  • The Indian Shuffle

Filed Under: how to do magic tricks Tagged With: magic, Magicians, Marketing for Magicians, money

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