Deck Switching

[Scodischarge]

My initial reaction is that you don't want to switch to the shuffled and then back to the original deck order. You are repeating the effect when your audience is burning you.

@Maaz Hasan is right. For this, you want to use a gimmicked deck switch. The problem is that the routine is not structured to provide you with the misdirection to do any deck switch. The focus is your handling of the cards and they will be burning your hands. Most deck switches cannot withstand that level of scrutiny.

My solution is to use a gimmicked deck that allows the cards to be in new deck order and shuffled at the same time. There are a variety of ways you can do that. Sometimes when you move from skill (false shuffles) to magic (instant change in the deck) you will have to use some sort of gimmick.

Thanks a lot for the feedback on the routine itself, as I said, it's more of a vague idea that won't be realized for a few years at least.

As I already wrote Maaz Hasan, even if it may not be possible, I'll try to learn to do it gimmickless, unless even I have to admit it's impossible in this situation (yeah, I'm stubborn and hopeless that way).
I don't know anything about gimmick so far, could you send a link to such a deck?

In any case, thank you for your feedback!

 

[Maaz Hasan]

That book costs five grand on amazon....

Does it actually?

It costs 55 bucks on his website and on Penguin, but it is currently out of stock.

 

[Maaz Hasan]

@Scodischarge I think you may not be totally understanding how deck switches work. Unless its for a camera, deck switches are never angle proof or frankly able to be done cleanly with someone burning you. They rely so heavily on audience direction and patter that they are nearly impossible to do it without them in most cases.

Of course there are exceptions to this. But for the scenario you've given, it's going to be very hard to do a deck switch without a gimmick.

Think about it this way:

A deck switch relies on 2 basic ideas: Getting rid of the hot deck, and moving in the cold deck.

Lets suppose you move in the cold deck the way you want, with it hidden in your hands. At what point are you going to be able to retrieve the cold deck in the middle of your performance with the audience burning your hands without making an necessary gesture? But lets say you do manage to bring it in.

Where does the hot deck go? Do you lap it? Lapping a card or two is understandable, but if there are spectators to your left and your right, it'll be hard to cleanly do with 52 of them. Luckily, there are tons of people that have done work on that specific scenario, and it is absolutely possible. But is it at all practical? No, why would you take it over a gimmick? It's not like the audience would end up knowing whether it was a gimmick or not.

 

[RealityOne]

I don't know anything about gimmick so far, could you send a link to such a deck?

Not for sale. Would have to be self made. Need to use your imagination.

 

[Scodischarge]

I think you may not be totally understanding how deck switches work.

Frankly, that's quite possible. This wasn't something I thought about for a long time. It was more of an off-the-top-of-my-head-idea, of which I wanted to check whether or not it's possible to be done.

Lets suppose you move in the cold deck the way you want, with it hidden in your hands. At what point are you going to be able to retrieve the cold deck in the middle of your performance with the audience burning your hands without making an necessary gesture?

As I said, I hadn't thought about the idea a lot. The (very vague, and as I discovered later, very impractical) initial idea was to do something like a card switch but with 52 cards instead of one or two. The movement I thought about went something like this:
While I'm talking, I gesture a bit with my right hand (which is holding the hot deck). My left hand retrieves the cold deck from my lap and casually rests on the table, palm looking in my direction, in the palm of course the cold deck. As I lift my right hand from the table to slightly shake the deck ("shuffling" them, as described before), it passes underneath and behind my left hand. In that split second the deck switch is made and the two decks simply switch position.
That was my initial thought, I was simply wondering whether that or something similar is actually achievable with a gimmickless deck switch.

why would you take it over a gimmick? It's not like the audience would end up knowing whether it was a gimmick or not.

As I said, that's got nothing to do with the audience, that's all me. I don't care whether the audience knows, it's just my (inappropriate?) pride that I don't want to be reliant on anything but myself. And, as I mentioned, the difficulty of it all is the reason I got into card manipulation, particularly gambling moves, not just because it looks cool or something.
I may end up using a gimmick, but as far as possible I want to do without.

Thank you for the explanation of how deck switches actually work, indeed I wasn't aware of all the detail

 

[Scodischarge]

Not for sale. Would have to be self made. Need to use your imagination.

Ok, thanks a lot

 

[johnny wizz]

Hello there,
I've had this vague idea for the beginning of a performance*, for which I'd need do a deck switch. Does anybody know a good technique for that? It would have to be a really quick move, done in half a second or less. What I've got in mind is something like the switching of one or two cards as seen in some gambling demonstrations, but of course with the whole deck.
Is that possible, and if yes, where can I find that sleight? (Of course, it doesn't have to be exactly like what I just described. But it should be as quick as possible.)

Thank you all for your help!

PS: I'd like to keep it gimmick-free.


*By "a performance" I mean, should I ever be in the situation. As I've only started with card magic / gambling moves a few months ago that won't be any time soon.

Hi, I'm new here but have been around Magic for a few years now. Let me give you an analogy. I was in my local pub the other night and an elderly farmer walked in. In the course of conversation I gathered that he came from Warloggan which interested me because I had to get there for an appointment the next day. So when there was a break in conversation I asked him.

"Excuse me sir, but I need to get to Warloggan tomorrow,how would you suggest I get there?"

The old man looked my way, took a swig from his glass and stroked his beard. Then he leaned forward and spoke to me in hushed tones.

"Young man" he said, which tickled me because I am over 60' "young man, if I were going' to Warloggan, I wouldn't start from 'ere." And with that he supped up and tottered out of the pub laughing.

Now, I think that this is your problem. Because of your so far limited experience in magic you are looking at starting out from the wrong place. You have an idea as to the outcome of what you want to perform and you have decided how best to achieve that outcome i.e. By a gimmick less deck switch. What you haven't done so far as I can see is explore the many different ways in which you could achieve your desired result without using a deck switch. True, you might want to hand the spectator the deck to examine after the effect but that is different. Then the trick is done. All the heat is off you. The spectators won't be burning the deck. In those circumstances a ballsy open switch will suffice. Nobody will suspect you of changing the deck after the trick is finished.

Now, there are a number of ways that you could pull this off that I am not going to disclose here. But just give what I am saying some thought. Deconstruct the trick backwards. Start where you want to finish and look at the alternative ways of reaching your destination.

I repeat my farmer friends advice. I wouldn't start from here!!

 

[Scodischarge]

Hi, I'm new here but have been around Magic for a few years now. Let me give you an analogy. I was in my local pub the other night and an elderly farmer walked in. In the course of conversation I gathered that he came from Warloggan which interested me because I had to get there for an appointment the next day. So when there was a break in conversation I asked him.

"Excuse me sir, but I need to get to Warloggan tomorrow,how would you suggest I get there?"

The old man looked my way, took a swig from his glass and stroked his beard. Then he leaned forward and spoke to me in hushed tones.

"Young man" he said, which tickled me because I am over 60' "young man, if I were going' to Warloggan, I wouldn't start from 'ere." And with that he supped up and tottered out of the pub laughing.

Now, I think that this is your problem. Because of your so far limited experience in magic you are looking at starting out from the wrong place. You have an idea as to the outcome of what you want to perform and you have decided how best to achieve that outcome i.e. By a gimmick less deck switch. What you haven't done so far as I can see is explore the many different ways in which you could achieve your desired result without using a deck switch. True, you might want to hand the spectator the deck to examine after the effect but that is different. Then the trick is done. All the heat is off you. The spectators won't be burning the deck. In those circumstances a ballsy open switch will suffice. Nobody will suspect you of changing the deck after the trick is finished.

Now, there are a number of ways that you could pull this off that I am not going to disclose here. But just give what I am saying some thought. Deconstruct the trick backwards. Start where you want to finish and look at the alternative ways of reaching your destination.

I repeat my farmer friends advice. I wouldn't start from here!!

Thank you very much for the very elaborate response, it has definitively given me some food for thought. However, allow me to post a preliminary response.
If I understand correctly, you are saying that I thought a gimmickless deck switch would be best, when I thought about ways to achieve the end. You are saying that I got so fixed on this idea that I ignored all other ways. (That is how I interpreted your analogy.)
This is not 100% true. First of all I don't think a gimmickless deck switch would be best. I have been convinced by this already by @Maaz Hasan and @RealityOne. But I think this is where the confusion originates. I think the reason I am misunderstood (at leat I think that I'm misunderstood there) is my motivation for doing this.
I'm not doing this to give spectators a fun time. I'm not doing this for the looks on my friends' faces when I pull off some amazing trick. That is all relatively unimportant to me. I wouldn't even have the patience to train for years until I am able to do that. The reason I do this is because I like handling cards. That's it. Compare it to and athlete, let's take a climber. He doesn't climb to impress people with his strength and dexterity, but simply because he loves doing it. That's how handling cards is to me.
Now, the reason I don't want to use a gimmick is the same reason this climber doesn't use a helicopter to get to the mountain peak. That's not the point of doing it, he would say. He doesn't just want to get to the mountain's peak, he wants to do it this way.
Why do I even want to do something so difficult? Because it is difficult! Why does the climber search for more and more difficult mountains to climb? Because he needs the challenge. I want the challenge.
What I just wrote sounds extremely pompous, especially as I've only been doing this for a few months, and I apologize for that, but that is how I feel at the moment.
Long story short: I want to do the switch without gimmicks because that would take the fun out of it for me. If I can't do this part of the routine, well, then so be it.
The reason I started this thread was originally to find out whether a switch of the sort I'm looking for exists, I didn't mean it to grow this big.

However, I greatly value your input and I'll keep it in mind. I apologise for the length of my answer.