Effect:

The mysterious bank-line-stander-inner is nimbly rolling his last silver dollar (about to be deposited) from knuckle to knuckle, hand to hand when suddenly he is accosted by a nearby observer. “You must be magic . . . show me something,” she says. Mr. Mystery quickly yet smoothly hands a lighter to Ms. Curious as he also removes a balled up piece of paper from his pocket. Mr. asks Ms. to light the paper on fire while Mr. pinches it between his left thumb and finger.

The paper bursts into flames! As the flash of fire appears, Mystery risks it all and plunges his right index finger into the fireball. The flame is gone, and nothing but a cut little origami hat on the tip of his right finger remains.

Ms. Curious faints but not before she coughs out one last statement . . . “you made magical origami with fire.” You nod knowingly and step over her limp body getting you once step closer to the bank teller and one step farther from your last silver dollar.

Method:

I guess I could have just said, “a piece of tissue paper magically origami’s itself in a flash of fire.” But where’s the fun in that. I’m guessing you’ve already figured out the method. You just need some tissue paper, flash paper, a lighter and the ability to make an origami hat. There’s a link at the end of this article to an excellent site that teaches various origami folds.

Other than that, the prep is simple. Make a small origami hat from a piece of tissue paper that’s roughly the size of the piece of flash paper you’ll be using. You want it to fit nicely on top of your index finger. Have a lighter and a balled up piece of flash paper in your pocket.

When the moment’s right, hand the lighter to the spectator. Reach into your pocket and secretly palm the hat as you bring out the balled up paper. Place the balled up flash paper on your open left palm to display it while secretly hiding the hat in your left hand (finger palm-ish). Reposition it at the finger and thumb tips of your left hand. Make sure the ball of paper has a little tail that you can hold like the image below.

Ask the spectator to strike and hold the lighter. As you warn her that you’re about to burn the paper at your finger tips, your right hand relaxes and maneuvers its hat into position. Then bring the balled up flash paper near the flame (making sure she extends her arm far from her body – the flame may panic her) to the lighter. As it burst into flames, plunge your right index finger in a pointing gesture right into the flame. Let the moment sink in.

Afterthoughts:

Obviously, a bank may not be the best place to create a fireball, so use good judgement. Also, if you think you’ll be in a position to do this a few times, simply have a bunch of balled up wads of flash paper in one pocket. Then have the lighter in another pocket that is full of mini hats (in case you want to give them away). You’ll have to change the handling slightly since the flash paper and hats are in two different pockets, but it’s easy enough to steal the hat when getting the lighter.

Further, keep in mind that this is simply a way to be ready to “show me something” on command in a setting where you’re out in public not really planning to do a show. Again, read this month’s article, K.I.S.S. for a better understanding of the situation you might use this. But, that doesn’t mean that you can’t do this in other settings and in other ways, so take a peek at the variations to follow.

Variation 1 – Phoenix

Rather than have the hat appear on your finger, it can be at your finger tips so that it looks like you reached into the flame and plucked out an origami creature. Keep in mind that you don’t have to do a hat. It could be anything. Consider making a bird. Then you’ve got some presentational possibilities centering around the “phoenix rising again.”

Start with an origami bird made from flash paper and introduce it as a Phoenix. Most people are familiar with the “Phoenix rising from the ashes” concept. If you’re not, Google it. Next, Squish the bird; crumple it up. Then as you burn it, you say that the Phoenix always rises from the ashes. You then pluck the revived bird from the ball of fire.

Further, you don’t have to pluck it from the flame. You could have one regular bird hidden behind the one your crumpled up. Then as you light it, the flash paper one vanishes leaving only the bird.

Finally, another option related to this would be closer to the original effect above. Have a pre-folded origami beast at the ready. Then rather than crumpling up a ball of flash paper, have one that you’ve previously crumbled up really tight, but then reopened. This allows you to have a piece of flash paper that’s basically opened flat (with a lot of crinkles in it). This helps the flash paper burn a little faster so you don’t burn yourself. An open piece of flash paper that has not been pre-crinkled might burn to slowly and/or burn you. You can then hide your secret origami beast behind the flash paper.

Holding the secret beast behind the paper, you appear to be holding a the corner of a piece of wrinkly tissue paper with your pinched index and thumb. Of course also pinched in the index and thumb is the secret beast. Thus when you light the paper, the flash paper vanishes, and the beast remains. It’s much more visual than some of the other techniques.

Variation 2 – Flash and Bones

When I ran this idea by Jay Sankey, he offered this fun idea. Keep in mind that this would not be for those “show me something” standing in line at the bank moments. This would be more of a show piece. It’s a combination of mentalism and magic.

You have prepared 10 or 12 flash cards with different origami animals on them. The spectator then thinks of one of the shapes, and you magically create it using any of the previously mentioned methods.

Obviously, you can simply force the shape you want. However if you want to allow a free choice, you could have a small origami index in your pocket to cover the outs. I highly recommend the INDEX-terity system by George Parker. You can purchase it at The Theory and Art of Magic Website.

Finally, if you’re going to have them think of one, you’ll have to secretly gain the information. There are many ways (CT, Peek, Fishing, Progressive Anagrams, etc.). That solution is for you to decide and certainly beyond the scope here.

Variation 3 – Cold Climate Birdies

This one involves one of my favorite things in the world, a Frixion Pen. Basically, you draw a picture of a bird on the back of your business card. You tell your spectator that this bird is different from most. He doesn’t fly south for the winter. He prefers the colder climates.

As you say this, place a balled up piece of flash paper on top of the drawing of the bird. You then light the flash paper and reach into the flame producing a real origami bird. You do this as you deliver a script along this line: “if the bird gets too hot, he comes out of hibernation and flies away.” The heat from the flash paper is enough to make the Frixion drawing vanish, so you’re left with a blank business card and a paper origami bird.

Here’s the best part, however. You tell the spectator to take the business card home and that if they put it in their freezer (a cooler climate), the bird will find it’s way home. Of course, the cold of the freezer causes the Frixion drawing to reappear. Beautiful. To take it a little bit further, start by writing a message like “Thank you for helping me find my way home” or something along those lines. Before you leave your house, write this message on your business card. Make sure you leave enough room to draw the bird.

Now vanish the ink with hit or the eraser that comes with the pen. Then draw the bird on the card with the Frixion pen, making sure to draw it so that it is not covering the place where the vanished message was written. Now you’re left with a secretly hidden message on the card and a bird drawn on the card. This is all done before you leave the house.

Once you’re ready to perform, do the routine as described earlier. However, when they put the business card in their freezer, not only will the bird reappear, but the previously hidden message will also appear. As you hand them the card explaining that the bird will come back if the card is placed in a cooler climate, leave them with this statement, “Call me if he comes back.” They will.

Finally, in this particular variation, you don’t actually have to use origami at all. You can use a very small toy bird. If it’s small enough, you can secretly wrap it in the flash paper ahead of time. Then when you place the wad of flash paper on top of the drawing of the bird and light it, the flash paper will vanish, and the little birdie will be standing there on the blank business card.

You then hand out the business card explaining the whole “colder climate” thing. You then put the bird in your pocket and tell them not to wait too long to put the card in the freezer because the bird will get too hot in my pocket. Once you put the card in the freezer, he’ll vanish from my pocket and reappear on the card and go back to hibernating.

One last thing . . . you could also openly vanish the bird after you hand out the blank business card. Tell them that the bird flew away seeking a colder climate. Hopefully you (the spectator) will get the card in the freezer before he finds some other cold climate to settle down in.

Resources:

• Excellent site for learning simple origami
• Review of INDEX-terity
• Purchase INDEX-terity
• Everything You Need to Know About Frixion Pen Magic
• Related Article: K.I.S.S.

The Basic Concept

Frankly, I would expect that most of the material found in this article will mostly be nothing new. However, I’m hoping that you’ll find value in a having a few resources and ideas all in one place. You’ve heard it before . . . use your business card in a magic effect. Involve their business card as well. Involved your business card in the effect in such a way that requires the spectator to hold or handle your business card.

Simple and Basic Ideas

1. Use your business cards for billets (assuming they have a blank side)
2. When using business cards, refer to parts of the card (e.g., Joan, just sign your name right there next to my web address . . .)
3. Have force cards/dates/etc. printed on your business card
4. Use them to write your predictions
5. Use them to perform a three card monte routine by drawing a black X on two of the cards, and a red X
6. Use them for spirit writing . . . having the message appear on the back of your card
7. Do a rising card effect with a signed business card

Think through your repertoire . . . what effects could easily incorporate a business card or two?

There are several resources available to inspire ideas:

• In my DVD, Stone Frixion Fire almost every effect uses a business card. Plus there’s fire!
• Michael Ammar’s Easy To Master Business Card Miracles is also an excellent resource.
• Jay Sankey has a couple of DVDs that focus on Business Card Magic:
  • Business Card Miracles is entirely focused on business cards
  • The Real Work on Restaurants & Bars has some cool ideas with business cards
  • Supernatural also has some excellent business card ideas
• Many, many, many others have contributed . . . to name them all would be impossible.

Finally, I highly recommend you read Jeff McBride’s article in his latest book, The Show Doctor entitled Memory Loss (Chapter 14).

Until Next Month . . .

Gems and Rubble Gone For Good

A couple of issues ago, I announced the death of the Gems and Rubble column at the same time as the birth of my new site, Magic Reviewed. Let’s just say that my inbox got a little hot from all the flames I got. I shouldn’t say that.

They were all nice emails, but they were expressing their concern about the disappearance of the column. So I left it in place for a while. Then I watched the traffic . . . and it was weak at best. Just not a lot of people reading it.

However, the traffic at Magic Reviewed skyrocketed and has continued to climb the whole time, so I finally severed the ties. All of the reviews have been completely removed from Stone Cold Magic Magazine. All of my reviews are now found at Magic Reviewed.

Let’s all bow our heads in a moment of silence as we mourn the loss and celebrate the reincarnation of Gems and Rubble in the form of Magic Reviewed.

Sankey Magic and Stone Cold Magic Team Up

If you’re a fan of either of us (Jay or Me) – I now you’re out there – then you’re gonna love this. Jay and I collaborated on a really cool gimmick that is an excellent gimmick for restaurant workers. Jay says it all in the YouTube Video below.

Check it out. Then go to his site and order a copy of it:

Infiltrator by Jay Sankey & Jeff Stone

Enjoy the June 2012 issue . . .

Brain Dump

Currently the working title on my latest book project is Brain Dump. It’s a fitting title certainly and was suggested to me by my friend and fellow magi when I told him that this book was basically a brain dump of all of my mentalism, mind, psychology ideas in my journals. He replied with, “that’s a good name for the book.”

He’s probably right. However, if you’ve got a better title, I’m all ears. Post your titles suggestions in the comment box below. If I use your title you’ll get a free copy of the book when it’s done. It’s coming along nicely. I’ve got a ton of writing done. The hope is to release the book mid to late fall. Right now, the only plans are to release it as an e-book.

Other Projects

Likely, “Brain Dump” will be the only other release (besides Tarot Below Zero) this year. However, I’ve got a few things in the works for next year. I’ll keep you posted as things progress. I’ve got a couple of other non-magic books that I’m co-authoring as well. One is sort of magic related . . . it’s a magic-centric novel. Additionally I’m working on a co-author quasi-religious series of books and a solo authoring of another quasi-religious book. Those three non-magic projects will take me into next year for sure.

Reviews

Many of you visit this site strictly for the reviews. I’ve developed quite the reputation out there of not being afraid to speak the truth no matter whose feelings I hurt. I should just point out, briefly, that my intentions are not to hurt feelings, only give the truth. If my rhetoric has been insulting I truly am sorry. I’m just seeking the truth and offering you loyal readers some guidance on where you spend your hard-earned money. More recently I’ve been very careful attempting to be more diplomatic toward the creator (not the creation). I’ve adopted the love the sinner, not the sin kind of attitude.

If any of you out there are creators, and would like your material reviewed on the site I’ll happily add you to the stack of stuff, and because you’re a loyal reader, I’ll bump your products to the top of the list . . . and it’s a darn big list by the way, so if you’ve recently released something and want a review relatively quickly, let me know.

You can mail the product here:

Stone Cold Magic Magazine Reviews
3367 South 6400 West
Salt Lake City, Utah
84128

For virtual products, you can email them to me here:
Product Reviews Email

Writers

Stone Cold Magic Magazine has been publishing monthly ever single month (sometimes a little late) since July of 2007 . . . That’s over 4 years! Over the years we’ve had some excellent guest columnists:

• Jay Sankey
• David Acer
• Harry Lorayne
• Danny Archer
• Don Theo III
• Geoff Williams
• Oliver Meech
• “Grandpa” Chet Cox
• Cameron Francis
• Dan Paulus
• Brad “Scarnecky” Gordon
• Donny Orbit
• Diamond Jim “The Cardslinger” Davis

Just to name a few. If you’d like to add your name to this prestigious list, send me a brief email explaining what column you’re most interested in contributing to:
Guest Columnist Email

Tarot Below Zero

Tarot Below Zero/Spectral Chill was written up in the August Issue of Magicseen Magazine . . . The one with Richard Sanders on the cover. You can subscribe to Magicseen at Lybrary.

Testimonials

Finally, you may have noticed that in the top right navigation is a new link for Testimonials. You’ll find a small sample of some of the happy customers, friends and reviewers of Stone Cold Magic products. I’ll keep updating this so make sure you check it out on a regular basis.

Notes:

Most stationary stores carry business card paper that you can use to create business cards on your computer. You can use Avery template 8371 as one example.

Go to Avery’s website and you can actually use their online templates to print out your own business cards.

I don’t recommend making your personal business cards this way. However, making Joe Slick the Tire Salesman’s business card is just fine (see presentation below).

You can make it simple and just put “Apply Heat” on the one side, or you can go all out and print his name, phone number, etc. Finally, hand-draw the car on the back of the card.

Fix a Flat Presentation

I recently ran into a tire salesman. He gave me this business card.

Show the “Apply Heat” side of the card.

He claims that they have a new kind of tire that can heal itself, if it ever becomes flat, by simply applying heat.

Show the other side of the card that has the picture of the car and flat tire on it.
He said that this card was proof of his outrageous claim.

Turn the card face down and show the “Apply Heat” side face-up. Then directly apply the flame of a lighter to the car picture. Then turn it over to “see if it worked.”

I don’t believe it. It worked!

Dead Thieves

I’ve got my Google account set up to send me alerts whenever certain key words are indexed. Usually I’m looking for key words like my name, my product names, etc so I can see when Google indexes other magic shops or reviews, etc. Well imagine my surprise, when I followed a link to a site that was selling my Stone Frixion Fire e-book. Of course he had no permission to do so, and when I spoke with him, he claimed that since it was copyrighted for 2005, he could do whatever he wanted with it because it’s been over 5 years.

First of all . . . retard . . . the book didn’t even exist in 2005. It was copyrighted, originally, in 2009. Secondly, even if 2005 were correct, copyrights don’t expire in 5 years, and finally, even if they did, that doesn’t mean that someone can just commandeer my ebook.

He said he would take down my book, but he never did; then suddenly, one day, his site no longer exists. The copyright gods are smiling down on Stone Cold Magic.

Infections

Finally, I got way behind on everything . . . including the April 2011 issue of the magazine. I was out of commission for a few days last week. I had a big ugly spider bite on my right hand that required an I.V. treatment which basically disabled my left hand (the I.V. catheter was in my left wrist) for three days. Anyway, I couldn’t use my computer for a few days . . . no hands = no typing.

Magical

I told you . . . all the stuff in April was magical. The miracle and magic of birth blessed our home. The miracle and magic of the death of a thief’s site and the miracle and magic of antibiotics made me whole again. Enjoy the Real Magic in life and don’t confuse it with the Magic you read about in April’s Issue of Stone Cold Magic Magazine.

Method:
This is just a variation on the Evanescence effects found in the Stone Frixion Fire DVD and e-book. Rather than the object being wrapped up in the flash paper, you have a mini Rubik’s Cube finger-palmed, and you drop it as the flash paper goes up in flames. The three photos below should help clarify.

Setup:
You’ll want a key-chain cube for this effect. Take the key chain off. As for drawing the cube, refer back to Rubik’s Cubin’ (an earlier effect in the book).The difference is that every color needs to be done with Frixion® ink. Start by drawing the squares with a black Frixion® pen. Next, fill in the squares with different colors.

You only need to use 3 colors. You can use a fourth color if you’d like, but a drawing like the one above in the middle communicates “mixed up cube.” Unlike Rubik’s Cubin’ (From Stone Frixion Fire), in this effect the cubes don’t have to be fully colored in. The drawing just needs to be colorful and look mixed up.

I would suggest having several cards made up and ready to go in your shirt pocket. Have the cube in your left pants pocket. You could also use the highlighters here, but I find that the pens work just fine.

Handling:
Show the card with the cube drawing on it. You can use the presentational angle (what do you think of when I say “1980’s”) from Rubik’s Cubin’ for this trick.As you hand out a piece of flash paper to the spectator, secretly steal the cube out of your pocket into finger palm. Next, hold the card between your two hands as in the middle photo on the previous page.

Ask the spectator to place the “magic paper” on the drawing of the cube. Just before you have her light it, ask someone else to cup his/her hands together beneath yours. As a spectator lights the paper, the flame will provide enough misdirection to simply open and close your right fingers allowing the cube to appear in the spectator’s hand.