Basic technique: make a nice torsade with 2 balloons. Allows to visually embellish some sculptures.  

The image of a playing card printed on the magician's business card materializes into the card freely chosen and signed by a spectator. A very commercial finale for an "Ambitious Card" routine. A subtle way to hand out your business card.  

The plot of "Coins through the Table" is one of the great families of effects in coin magic. Dominique Duvivier offers you his personal version to perform this wonderful routine.  

Any four cards are set aside, then a card is chosen from the deck. And then the madness begins! The random cards all turn into the chosen card! Then suddenly they become Aces! But that's not all: things get really complicated with the magician's pockets. A very subtle routine with many twists and turns. For those who like technique, it's pure happiness!  

The spectator shuffles the deck, picks a card, loses it by himself into the deck, and immediately shuffles the deck again. He performs all these actions while the magician's back is turned. Despite these extreme laboratory conditions, the magician not only finds the chosen card, but also shows that he had predicted it in advance. Easy to do.  

"Pinch/ear twist" technique

This very useful technique in balloon sculpture was described by Roger Siegel in Roger's Rubber Jungle, 1973

"Split pinch twist" technique

To add detail to the sculpturs

"Bird body" technique

Technique probably invented by Ralph Dewey.  

Gaetan Bloom: " This is also one of my favorite babies, my version of the card caught in the knot of a rope... I started with a complicated mechanism, to eliminate everything and come up with a rather Machiavellian simplicity... and watch out, no forced card, signed, no magnets, and the rope can be given out as a souvenir at the end... a true delight!"  

Michael Ammar welcomes you to his "New Frame of Mind". Here, he emphasizes the importance of these three key steps for mastering your techniques perfectly: 1- Know exactly what you would see if you weren’t cheating, 2- Understand the technique so well that you can visualize it perfectly in your mind, 3- Practice the fake move until it’s executed exactly like the real one.You can see other publications from this collection by Michael Ammar by searching for: “A new frame of mind”.  

This is an idea that came to me when I was watching people getting fleeced at the fair : they were pulling strings, and winning what was at the other end ; they always won some crap, and never the big prizes ! Here, everything is under control... you can win the big prize or not, but all the strings used are there... each one is really attached to a gift. I spent quite a bit of time designing this little thing full of mystery. Very cool, and you can perform it again and again...  

It's like the Inexhaustible Vase, but reduced to an everyday object, with many possibilities. It's a very visual running gag. You do a trick, you wipe your forehead with a sponge, and you wring it out in a bucket... the sponge is really full of liquid. You put the sponge back down, perform another trick, and take the sponge one more time to wipe your forehead. Bingo... it's full of water again. Finally, you can take the bucket full of all this water poured, and the liquid turns into confetti! Great if you're also doing a clown act. My dear James Hodges used it for one of his shows at the Maison de la Magie in Blois, France.  

A spectacular and visual card revelation technique! You cut the deck with one hand and the card emerges from the middle in an impossible way to be produced with skill and elegance.  

"More than a routine, it is a real theater play". It is a card trick without being a card trick. 12 minutes of complete routine; the narration is logical and sustained; Jean-Luc gives you everything: technique, anecdotes, tips, lots of humor and his incisive tone made in JLB! Set-up your notes, you are going to learn a routine from 20 years of magic (24, but we stopped counting).  

You are only judged on the first 5 seconds... Learn the real secrets of a great intro: The Opener. The one that Jean-Luc has built up over more than 20 years of experience for very large clients all over the world. You will learn how to approach a group, a table, how to attract attention, touch and transform your future audience in less than 5 seconds; and win them over for the rest of the evening. And to know how it works, see "Breakfast at Buenos Aires".  

A gag, just an emcee's gag, with a punchline, but also a magical appearance of cards, plucked from the hat... My friend Jeff McBride wanted to include it in his series on automatic sleight of hand... An honor!!!  

You are the magician of the evening, your spectators are sitting very tightly around the table and surround you... HARD FOR THE ANGLES OF VIEW! This coin routine is nice for this situation. You will produce several coins one at a time with a white, almost transparent silk. It's a great way to introduce yourself. As a bonus, Jean-Pierre explains how you can make the coins you have produced disappear with this same silk.  

Basic technique : to inflate a balloon backwards. Very useful for example to put a balloon inside another one.