Title: Wallet Weapon
Artist: Lloyd Barnes
Producers: Enigma Ltd.
Link: This can be purchased at any of your favorite Murphy?s Magic retailers.
Retail Price: $30.00
Learning Difficulty: Easy to Moderate.
Length of DVD: 60 minutes
Notes: Complete assembly required.
Features:
? Play Movie
? Scene Selection
A utility device that can be used to produce a signed card from a wallet, turn blank paper into real money visually from your wallet, billet switch for mentalism effects using your wallet, or a torn and restored card trick from your wallet.
Normally when you think card to wallet you think of a magician producing a large over sized wallet from their pocket, and then taking out your card from inside this wallet. Have you ever sat there and said to yourself: ?Now there?s a normal looking wallet. I bet he uses that every day!? Of course you haven?t because the damn thing is the size of a Mac truck. You know it?s only for show. Now enter Wallet Weapon by Lloyd Barnes. You can use your own hip pocket sized wallet and still produce the classic mind boggling effect. More over, and you all know how much I love utility devices, this thing is flexible enough that you could produce other things such as billet switches, and other mentalism style revelations.
The gimmick is easy enough to construct but I?ll be honest, I HATE arts and crafts when it comes to magic tricks. I sucked at Art class in school and I?m the last person you want handling sharp objects. Building gimmicks at home from scratch has always been a challenge for me. Blessedly the Wallet Weapon as a gimmick isn?t that hard to construct. You are going to have to permanently modify your wallet though in order to use this gimmick. Those squeamish about modifying your every day wallet may want to go out and get a cheap one just for this purpose. The good news is the modification you need to do is completely undetectable to anyone else and won?t hurt the structural integrity of the wallet in any way. It took me about fifteen minutes to build mine, and I?m slow. I suspect now that I know what I?m doing I could put another one together in about seven minutes if I had to. The construction is just bloody simple.
Half of the DVD is spent showing you how to build it, and what the reactions look like, the other half is spent on explaining how to perform with it. The only real tricky part about performing with the Wallet Weapon is performing a Mercury fold with a playing card. If you don?t know how to do a Mercury fold then Lloyd does teach it. Once you?ve got the Mercury fold down, you?re good to go. Lloyd also teaches you one other routine not using cards before giving you other ideas on what you can use the Wallet Weapon for. The routine that he teaches takes a blank sheet of paper and turns it into a real bank note.
Paper to Money:
You tell a story about needing emergency money, produce a blank sheet of paper, show it, and then take another from your wallet. The second you pull it free and give it the magic shake it becomes real money.
The Wallet Weapon is a nice way to incorporate a card to wallet style effect into your routine without needing to go out and purchase an expensive magicians wallet built for the same purpose. Given that you can use it for other effects as well makes Wallet Weapon a versatile device that can be changed to fit individual performing styles and needs. It?s practical and it can be made cheaply. The things you need to make the gimmick will cost you less than $10 bucks and I?m high balling that price.
I?m impressed with what Lloyd has created. It?s a nice piece of versatile magic, and its uses only are limited to your imagination. Personally I feel that some of Lloyd?s suggestions are weaker than others; such as the paper to money bit, or a torn and restored card idea, overall I think he?s got a solid piece of magic that you?re going to use every day.
When I give my product scores below I am measuring them on a scale of 1 to 10. 1 Being absolute the worst score possible, and 10 being the absolute best, making a score of five average. The four points that I grade upon is Product Quality, Teaching Quality, Sound & Video Quality and Overall Quality.
Product Quality: 7
The price isn?t bad, and the gimmick is easy enough to construct. If the gimmick wears out, building a new one won?t take long at all. The only minor drawback is you have to build it yourself.
Teaching Quality: 8
The tutorial is easy to follow.
Video & Sound Quality: 9
No sound or video problems.
Overall Quality: 8
If you don?t want to carry around a magicians wallet for the purposes of doing a card to wallet or you just want to have an alternative effect handy in your back pocket then Wallet Weapon is a great utility device to own.
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