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00:00 We're about to see a performance of double back.
00:20 Now whenever people see magicians, they say it's the quickness of a hand that sees the
00:24 eye and magicians are trying to distract you.
00:26 I'm not going to do that.
00:27 All I'm going to do is I'm just, are you trying to get in?
00:30 That was distraction, you see, you looked over there, you knew that didn't you?
00:32 You knew it!
00:33 That makes it feel even worse.
00:35 Okay, I'd like you just to remember the values and suits of the cards and see if you can
00:39 remember what you've just been looking at.
00:40 Okay?
00:41 So I didn't realise you were going to take it quite so seriously there.
00:43 What did you do?
00:44 Alright, it's like your driving test.
00:46 Okay, just remember maybe that one.
00:48 Okay, so firstly how many cards?
00:50 Four.
00:51 Yeah, if you don't know the answer to the first question, the rest get quite hard.
00:54 Okay, so it is four.
00:56 The red five, a diamond or a heart?
00:58 Diamond.
00:59 I think we're relying heavily on you here.
01:01 Yeah, yeah.
01:02 I think it's a diamond.
01:03 Can I borrow your hand just for a moment?
01:04 Yeah.
01:05 Okay.
01:06 The black five, is it a spade or a club?
01:07 It's a spade, basically.
01:08 It is a spade.
01:09 The two picture cards, now do you remember if these are the jacks, are these the queens
01:14 or are they the kings?
01:15 Kings.
01:16 Kings.
01:17 Yeah.
01:18 Now if I have the two kings, Clare do you remember the cards I gave you there, the two?
01:20 Five.
01:21 Unless the hand's quicker than the eye.
01:23 Which case I'll be holding on to the two fives over here.
01:26 And on your hand is where I now have the two kings.
01:35 Whenever people see magicians they say it's the quickness of the hand that sees the eye
01:38 and magicians are trying to distract you.
01:40 So I'm not going to do that.
01:41 I'd like you just to remember the values and suits of these cards and I'll see if you can
01:44 remember what you've just been looking at.
01:47 Okay?
01:48 Yep.
01:49 So firstly, how many cards?
01:50 Four.
01:51 Four.
01:52 Four.
01:53 Four.
01:54 Yeah, if you don't know the answer to the first question the rest do get a little bit
01:55 harder.
01:56 But good start.
01:57 The red five, a diamond or a heart?
01:58 Heart.
01:59 I don't know, I just remembered that.
02:00 It's a diamond but at least you're joining in.
02:04 It is.
02:05 You see, it's not, yeah.
02:06 Can I borrow your hand just for a second?
02:12 The black five, is it a spade or a club?
02:15 Spade.
02:16 Yes.
02:17 Still got your confidence, that's okay, it's a five of spades.
02:18 The two picture cards, now are these the jacks, are these the queens or are they the kings?
02:22 They're both kings.
02:23 And you didn't even give him a chance to answer that time.
02:25 Now if I got the two kings, do you remember the cards I gave you there, the two?
02:28 Fives.
02:29 Unless the hand's quicker than the eye.
02:30 Five of diamonds and five of spades.
02:33 That would be the case but if the hand's quicker than the eye then I'd be holding onto those
02:37 two cards over in my hand.
02:38 And over in your hand is where we now have the two.
02:39 Well done.
02:40 This is double back and what you will find is four cards, five of diamonds, five of spades,
02:58 king of hearts and the king of clubs.
03:01 Now these look like four regular cards but one of them is gimmicked and it is the five
03:08 of spades.
03:09 And the way the five of spades is gimmicked is it is two cards.
03:14 There's a king of clubs and a double face card.
03:19 One side is a five of spades, one side is the king of hearts.
03:24 Now on the middle of the king of clubs there is some repositional glue.
03:31 So what happens is that the king of clubs goes face to face with the king of hearts.
03:36 Everything is squared up.
03:37 If I just press it in there that looks just like a single card.
03:43 So to all intents and purposes we have one, two, three, four cards and let's see how we
03:50 can actually use these in the routine.
03:57 So to set the cards I have them on top of the deck.
04:01 It's not entirely necessary, you could have them on the bottom of the deck but I just
04:04 load the four cards on top.
04:06 It's very important that you don't have one of those four cards on the front of the deck.
04:12 What you can do is just add the five of spades gimmick to a regular deck and just have the
04:17 two kings and the five of diamonds use those ones from the deck.
04:21 So I will go through the cards, all the cards, this is sort of angled to myself as I go through
04:26 the cards but just so you can see I'll go through the cards and I'll just take these
04:32 four cards from the deck.
04:35 I'll show the cards and I don't call attention to the number of cards at all but I will simply
04:40 say I'd like you to remember the values and the suits of these cards and I will show the
04:45 cards one at a time like this.
04:49 Give them just a few moments to take a look and then square everything up.
04:54 Now I'll go through the questioning session.
04:58 The first one is a very simple question, how many cards?
05:03 And they will say four.
05:04 Now this is quite good because they've already fooled themselves into thinking that there's
05:09 four cards.
05:10 So if I say how many cards are there, the people will say four and I just say that's
05:15 really good because if you don't know the answer to the first question the rest of the
05:19 questions are quite difficult.
05:20 Now as I say that I am doing an Elmsley Count.
05:24 Now the Elmsley Count is written up in various books but just very, very quickly you've got
05:33 the four cards, what I will do is just hold for me, hold on the left side, my right thumb
05:41 pulls off the first one just at an angle, not straight across, it looks more natural
05:45 to go at an angle into my right hand.
05:48 My left thumb will then push off the top two cards as this card goes underneath.
05:55 Now I'm going to leave this card on the bottom of that little packet and take those two cards
06:00 away.
06:01 So I've now got two and two and then just count, that's number three and that's number
06:06 four.
06:07 So in actual fact I'm counting the first card twice but it's never noticed because the cards
06:12 are face down.
06:13 So at speed I've got four cards, it's one, two, three, four.
06:20 Now just before I put the third card down I will keep just a little finger break above
06:28 it.
06:29 So it goes one, then two and then as I count three I just keep my little finger there and
06:35 count four.
06:36 So this will get me ready for the double lift.
06:40 So that's just the counting of the cards, so now we'll go into the rest of the routine.
06:48 For those of you that cannot do an Elmsley Count, first of all go out and learn it.
06:55 Secondly, here's a way to get the cards into position without doing the count.
07:00 Now this was shown to me by my good friend Nicholas Ironhorn who I can assure you does
07:04 a very good Elmsley Count.
07:06 So you can see that the King's on the top, Five's are on the bottom.
07:10 Ask how many cards there are, they would say four and I can show that there are the four
07:15 cards and now when everything's squared up you can see that the cards are in position
07:20 to go straight into the double lift.
07:23 I'll do that for you slowly so you can see what I'm doing, it's very, very simple.
07:27 Turn the cards over and as I spread them I'm going to take the bottom card and the second
07:32 card into my left hand and the top card and the third card into my right hand.
07:39 Now depending on which hand you hold the cards in to do your double lifts and all your moves
07:44 you may want to switch those over.
07:46 But for me it's the bottom card, my thumb contacts the second card and I slide that
07:53 out and I'm just going to smear the cards like this just to show there are the four
07:59 cards and now if I put everything back we're in position.
08:05 I'll do that again once more at speed.
08:08 So the cards are in Kings and Fives.
08:11 How many cards are there?
08:12 I say four, I can show that there are just the four cards and now you're in position
08:17 to go straight into the first double lift.
08:20 So after the Elmsley Counts the order of the cards should be the King of Clubs, Five of
08:30 Diamonds, King of Hearts, Five of Spades.
08:33 I've got a little finger break just above the top two cards and now we come to the second
08:38 question which is what is the suit of the red five?
08:44 Is it Diamond or Heart?
08:46 And most people will say Diamonds, they'll get it right.
08:48 Some people might get it wrong.
08:50 But whatever they say I do a double turnover to show the Five of Diamonds.
08:55 I can then turn over, so this is actually two cards, I turn them back over and I put
09:00 down what is apparently the Five of Diamonds but in reality is the King of Clubs.
09:06 Now we're on to the second question, or actually the third question of what suit is the black
09:11 five?
09:12 Is it a Spade or a Club?
09:13 And again some may get it right, some may get it wrong but now I'm going to do a double
09:17 from the bottom which it sounds a little bit more complicated than it is.
09:23 I'm taking the two cards from the bottom and turning them over as one card.
09:27 But if you like don't think of it about taking two cards from the bottom, think about it
09:31 as taking one card off the top and then turning the bottom two cards over.
09:36 So at speed the black five, is it a Spade or a Club?
09:42 And they'll say Spades.
09:43 I can turn it over to show it's a Spade.
09:46 Again do a turn those two cards face down, thumb off what is apparently the Five of Spades,
09:52 it's actually the King of Hearts.
09:58 And now I'll show what appears to be the two Kings in my hand even though I'm holding the
10:02 two Fives.
10:04 And for this I will turn the bottom card face up, it's the Five of Diamonds, turn it face
10:08 up and put it face to face with the gimmicked Five of Spades.
10:12 Now this looks to be a pretty bold move but it's covered by the next question which is
10:19 the two cards in my hand, are they Jacks, Queens or Kings?
10:24 So by asking the question people are thinking about that and my hands just relax as I do
10:30 what is literally like a half pass with a single card.
10:34 And that's set up to be able to show the two Kings.
10:38 Now what I'm going to do is separate out the Five of Spades, King of Hearts, Double Facer
10:42 from the King of Clubs.
10:44 And in order to do this I'm holding both cards and my thumb comes over and I'm going to drag
10:51 the card this way diagonally and my index finger is going to push away, my thumb is
10:56 going to pull back so I'm literally smearing the King of Clubs off of the King of Hearts.
11:03 The Double Facer is kept squared up with the Five of Diamonds so I can pull this off and
11:09 I can show both cards like this, keeping this all nice and square.
11:15 I close it up like a book like this and what I will do is just square up the sides to make
11:20 sure that the gimmick is all lined up and I'll just squeeze the middle but that looks
11:26 a very unnatural action so what I will do is I'll squeeze the middle as I will turn
11:30 it round so that just disguises a little bit of an unnatural action.
11:36 When they say that I'm actually holding the two Kings I can then point out that I would
11:41 be unless the hand is quicker than the eye and then I can reveal the two Fives in my
11:46 hand.
11:47 The reason I like to do that is it's sort of a variation on Boris Wilde's Kiss Count
11:52 in the fact that I'm going to push the top card forward a little bit to show the Five
11:56 of Diamonds, revolve so my hand is palm up, this hand comes palm down and I revolve it
12:01 round so that this goes palm up and that exposes the Five of Spades.
12:06 The hand that's palm up goes palm down so I can just revolve and show the two cards
12:11 and very cleanly show that I've now got the two Fives in my hand and over here is where
12:16 I've got what they thought were the two Fives are the two Kings and that is double back.
12:24 So I'll just go through a couple of the subtleties that I employ when I do double back for real
12:32 people and I have a real person here.
12:35 I will show the cards and it's very important with the presentation to say that the hand
12:39 isn't quicker than the eye and there's no distraction, I don't call it misdirection
12:43 I call it distraction, to be very fair and clean and show that there are only the four
12:49 cards but I very slowly show them the cards, remember the values and suits of the cards,
12:54 I'll square them up and as I'm going to be doing the Elmsley Count I want to make eye
12:58 contact so that's when I'll ask you some questions, firstly how many cards?
13:06 Four.
13:07 Four and I'm doing the Elmsley Count and I'll comment on the fact that if you don't get
13:10 the first question right the rest of the questions are going to be quite difficult.
13:15 So I've kept the little finger break here, now I get to the first question about the
13:20 suits and values so say the red Five is it a diamond or a heart?
13:24 Diamond.
13:25 It's a diamond and I can show that it's a diamond.
13:27 Now if we're in this sort of cocktail reception standing type of performance there will be
13:33 no table so I need to borrow a hand and luckily I have someone who has hands so if I can just
13:39 borrow your hand, now I will place that on your hand, now normally it's very risky to
13:45 place a card that is apparently one card, actually it's another card, onto someone's
13:50 hand but I don't make a big deal about it, I don't say okay that's the Five of Diamonds,
13:55 place it here, put your thumb on it, make sure I can't get to it at all because for
13:59 me that is just too much emphasis on this card.
14:03 So what I do is very casually say yep that's the Five of Diamonds if I can borrow your
14:07 hand thanks very much indeed and I move swiftly on to the next question because all I need
14:13 is a rubbish bin effectively to put the cards that we've asked questions about somewhere
14:19 whilst I discuss the rest of the cards.
14:23 So that's the only reason I need to borrow someone's hand is to put a discarded card
14:28 somewhere.
14:29 So now we come on to the next question, the black Five is it a spade or a club?
14:32 Spade.
14:33 Again try and make eye contact just before I turn it over, so that's the Five of Spades,
14:38 again goes into the rubbish pile.
14:41 The two picture cards are they the Jacks, the Queens or the Kings?
14:45 The Kings.
14:46 Just a little point here is there may be a little bit of sound whilst the gimmick disengages
14:53 because there is the glue there so what I will do is I will try and time it so that
14:58 when the person hopefully says Kings, when they say Kings that's the moment that I separate
15:04 out the cards.
15:06 So the two cards in my hand are they the Jacks, Queens or Kings?
15:08 Kings.
15:09 Kings, absolutely right, show the backs and the fronts, put them together so if I've got
15:13 the Kings you've got the?
15:15 Fives.
15:16 Fives and this is the first time now that I refer back to the cards in the hand, beforehand
15:21 all the attention was on these cards and it's only now am I putting any attention on these
15:25 cards so those are the two?
15:27 Fives.
15:28 Fives.
15:29 Unless of course I'm holding on to two Fives up here and very, very fairly I'll show both
15:34 sides and I'll throw the gimmick card onto the Five of Diamonds again just showing it's
15:39 just a single card and over here very fairly show that these are the two Kings.
15:45 So that's just a few little subtleties for performing double back.
15:54 One small tip about separating out the gimmick is you don't want to lift up the top card
16:01 because if you do you will get that little bit of sort of clicky noises as the glue separates
16:08 which I don't know if you can hear but it is noisy, hang on, there we go.
16:14 But you will get some sort of noise if you just lift up the card straight away.
16:18 So what I do is I just smear it back so it runs along the King of Hearts.
16:26 Also if you have been storing this card for a while or when you first get it you'll find
16:32 that the cards are actually stuck quite fast.
16:34 So what I will do is always before I perform I will just separate out the cards like this
16:40 and then just stick it gently so that it's not quite so sticky and won't make so much
16:46 noise.
16:52 Now this may sound strange but I don't treat double back as a packet trick because I don't
16:59 keep these four cards sort of separate.
17:01 I've got the packet cards and then say I'd like to show you a trick and bring out four
17:06 cards.
17:07 For me that is a true packet trick.
17:11 What I have with double back is the cards are, or those four cards they're in the pack,
17:16 bring the cards out and just say I'd like to show you something.
17:21 Whenever people see magicians they say it's the quickness of the hand that sees the eye.
17:25 Magicians are trying to distract them.
17:27 So just go to show that that isn't the case.
17:29 And then I go into showing double back.
17:31 So what this really is is it's just using some cards from the pack and trying to prove
17:37 that it's not the hand that is quicker than the eye.
17:40 And I think that this is the sort of thing that people don't think they'll see unless
17:44 they're watching magic on television.
17:46 So it's a sort of great trick to start with because it's very simple to do but it is extremely,
17:53 extremely powerful.
17:55 So that is double back.
18:02 Thank you very much for buying double back.
18:04 If you go out and perform it you'll see just the sort of great reactions that you can get
18:08 with it.
18:09 I try and do double back at every opportunity I can.
18:12 It is a great trick for people to see.
18:15 It's very magical.
18:16 It's very simple to follow.
18:18 And I absolutely love doing this whether it's for two people, for a table of ten.
18:23 I just love doing it.
18:24 So I hope you'll go out, perform it and get the same sort of reactions as I get.
18:28 So thanks very much again.
18:29 Thank you.
18:39 Bye.
18:42 [MUSIC]