Visual Sleight of Hand Techniques to do with Coins or Rings – Ratings

Clint asks:

'I would like some really visual slight of hand techniques that I can do with coins or rings. While I have some experience with cups and balls, linking rings, and card tricks, I am pretty new to pure slight of hand.'

Adding some a few routines or even a small 'bridge section' into your act, that involves some sure sleight of hand with everyday objects such as rings or coins, can both impress your audiance and add balance to your act. I'll suggest some of the best visual sleight of hand routines to consider adding to your act, but first, a warning..

Being Consistant

Visual sleight of hand techniques take a great deal of practice to master, so it's important to take the time to choose sleights or magic routines carefully, so your time is effectivly used.

Have you ever seen Derren Brown suddendy launch into a coin coin flourish routine in the middle of his show? How about Dynamo Magician Impossible performing Hippity Hoppity Rabbits? These magicians have a consistant image that they reinforce by the types of magic tricks they perform. In your magic, we recommend that you do the same. The magic tricks you choose to learn should complement your existing material. If your card magic tends to have a gambling theme, them adding in some coin magic, or poker chip tricks, will keep the act 'on theme'. Conversly, if you have a high degree of comedy running through your presentations, then a sudden display of card fourishing, whilst looking inpressive, will not 'fit' with your act. Make sure you choose magic tricks that work together to tell a greater story, or communicate a common message about your act in general.

Here's 5 of the most popular visual sleight of hand teaching guides that professional magicians order from the magic shop:

World Class Manipulation Jeff McBride

Jeff McBride is one of the most famous sleight of hand magicians in the world. His complete understanding of sleight of hand magic is first class. As a teacher, he is an engaging and enthusiastic speaker on the meaning of magic and its place the world. In this DVD, Jeff teaches techniques of the master sleight of hand experts. Jeff walks you step by step through a wide range of techniques. A lifetime of sleight of hand can be mastered with this DVD.

Ring Thing

Although this isn't hardcore sleight of hand, it gets the same reaction from the public. It's a fast and easy way to introduce sleight of hand manipulation into your working set. David Blaine, Jeff McBride and Gregory Wilson among others speak very highly of Ring Thing, with good reason!

It’s a fast, visual, ring magic routine that can be performed anywhere. You remove your finger ring, throw it back at your hand , and it instantly returns to your finger!

Sick – By Ponta the Smith

Fancy mastering some serious coin magic? This is a coin magic DVD teaching how to make coins smoothly disappear, reappear and change right in front of peoples faces. Working in just one of these sleight of hand techniques can lift the whole of your act to a new level.

De Ring

This without doubt the most awesome teaching guide for ring manipulation that you can own. De'vo's ring sleight of hand is simply stunning. De'vo has been performing ring manipulation for over 20 years. The style and technique taught will have you in disbelief! Finger ring magic, taught by the finest sleight of hand expert in the field.

Contact by Tyas Frantz – DVD

In Contact Juggling, balls are rolled across your hands and body in visually attractive patterns. Many magicians are starting to adopt this skill to build into their magic. Producing a ball by magic, then having it come to life and dance around the magician, before vanishing again.

Contact Jugglers use a range of objects from pens to tennis balls. The most common object is a 3" acrylic ball. Contact balls are clear, so they don't seem to be spinning. This allows the magician to produce a visual effect wherein the balls seem to be moving or floating across the body. It's that effect that sparks the interest of magicians to Contact Juggling.

What have we missed?

Those are the most popular training guides for sleight of hand with everyday objects. However, there is a huge range of excellent material on the market. What would you suggest? Leave a comment in the section below:

6 Halloween Magic Tricks – Recommended Ratings and Reviews

by Merchant of Magic Leave a Comment

As Halloween is creeping up, you may be wondering what kinds of Halloween magic tricks you should be performing. I’ve had a little think and compiled a list of magic tricks that are perfect for creeping out those around you.

The Haunted Deck

There are few stronger effects that you can perform with a deck of cards than the haunted deck. After seeing Dynamo Magician Impossible perform the Haunted Deck on his TV series, many people would love to see it with their own eyes.

There are so many ways to perform an amazing haunted deck as detailed on our blog post dedicated to this awesome magic trick.

Any playing card can be freely selected by the spectator. It is lost in the deck and then placed onto a table, spectators hands or other sturdy surface. The deck of playing cards then comes alive and visually cuts itself revealing the spectators chosen card.

Sickness Trilogy

Looking for a gory set of magic tricks with the real cringe factor? Well look no further than the Sickness Trilogy!

Three amazing tricks with truly disgusting climaxes.

Saw – A finger ring is swallowed, then using a necklace you visually saw it into your neck and slowly rip it out revealing that the ring has passed onto the necklace.

Sick – A signed coin is placed in your mouth then swallowed. Next you show that you have a razor blade, and begin to slice into your arm. The spectators signed coin is then visually pulled from the gaping wound.

Excise – A needle is pushed into your neck and a length of thread is slowly swallowed leaving some hanging from your mouth. Prodding around your neck you find the needle hole and begin to pull the swallowed thread from it, the more you pull from your neck the shorter the piece from your mouth gets, until with one tug the whole lot comes out from your neck with the needle knotted onto it.

I’m feeling queasy writing this, so if your audience members faint during your performance, you’re doing a great job!

Confessions of a Needle Swallower

This truly is a time tested magic trick that has taken Steve Spill years to perfect.

Some needles are placed into the mouth and swallowed, a length of thread is then also swallowed. The thread is regurgitated and pulled from the mouth showing that the needles have become knotted onto it.

This comedy magic trick plays just as well to a thousand people as it does to one, but scrape away the humour and you can make this a truly horrifying experience for your spectators.

Risk

You should be looking to perform an amazing Russian roulette magic trick. Risk provides the age old effect, using industrial staple guns that your spectator gets to fire into your head. Luckily, from the four displayed, only one is loaded. The spectator gets 3 chances to cause you grievous bodily harm, and fails each time. You can now pick up the remaining staple gun and fire it casually into a block of wood showing that it really was loaded the whole time.

A much more pocket friendly version called Cobra Kiss is also available.

Phoenix Prophecy

This innovative new magic trick puts a twist on traditional prediction routines. For a start, it uses fire to reveal the prediction and is incredibly visual. Unlike some other prediction magic tricks, Phoenix Prophecy is right there in the spectators sight the whole time. It can even be done with paper or money borrowed from them, which I think makes the magic so much stronger. You get your spectator to think of a name, a number or a word. On a piece of paper, you can write down your prediction, and pass it to them to hold. Get them to reveal what they thought of and turn over the paper. It’s wrong! Oh no, what are you going to do now!?! Pull out your trusty lighter and wave it under the paper and watch their word visually appear before their very eyes in the scorch marks

Devils Mark

From the incredibly innovative mind of Jimmy Strange comes a truly Satanic magic trick perfect for Halloween. Did you know that the number 666 represents a person, not Satan? It is said that the number 666 appearing on someones body means they are an acolyte of the beast, Satan’s helper. Remove the Death tarot card from your pocket as you explain this and clearly write the numbers 666 across its face. Wave the card over a lighter and the numbers visually vanish, only to appear on your spectators hand. Bow down to Satan’s new follower and slowly back away looking terrified.

How to Learn Magic Tricks With Poker Chips – What the Magic Shop Recommends

by Dominic Reyes Leave a Comment

Want to learn some cool tricks with poker chips?

It's a great way to impress your poker friends, and also transfers nicely over to coin magic. Lets look at how to get started:

1) You need some poker chips.

We recommend you invest in good quality clay poker chips as you are going to be working with the chips over a long period of time. Cheap plastic poker chips can work fine, but the clay chips have a much better feel and weight. You can pick up packs of clay poker chips very easily from most online magic shops.

2) You need some expert tuition on tricks with poker chips

We recommend learning from Poker Columnist and Entertainment Award Winner, Rich Ferguson in his excellent DVD on the subject of tricks with poker chips. The DVD covers over 70 tricks with poker chips, often seen on TV or performed by professional poker players.

The DVD also includes a range of poker chip tricks by Rich that are his own unique creations!

3) Whilst learning the skills, cheat and take a shortcut.

There's nothing wrong with using a gimmick to start performing poker chip tricks right away. As long as you are also learning the sleight of hand poker chip tricks, it can get you performing and building up a reputation for poler chip skills right away. Imagine being able to spin a poker chip on the very tip of your finger.

Check out this poker ship trick in action: