There’s a trick in Harry Lorayne’s book where you remove X number of cards from the deck (lets say 5 in this case), and you go through the cards and at the end you can tell which cards were removed from the deck of cards.
I read the book in Spanish so it’s slightly different from the English version.
I practice this every day, but only one time per day. I’m getting faster at keeping track of which cards were in the deck, but the issue is that if I try to do the same trick once again after a couple of minutes I’m slower and sometimes I get confused due to it being the X time trying it out in the same day.
Is it something I just need to overcome naturally by just practicing, or is there something else I can do?
If you remove the cards you might already know what those cards are, because you removed them . The problem with explaining a trick that you don’t know all the details of in terms of what the magician is supposed to do or not do is that those details make all the difference in the world.
Let’s take for example the possibility that the deck is arranged in a particular order and that the cards are marked by a letter, so that each card can basically be reduced to a letter that is part of a 52 letter sentence. Then you can just read the sentence and easily find the missing letters and thus the missing cards; you need to know what card matches with what letter (and position of that letter in the sentence, if the letter is used more than once in the sentence).
If you “simply” get a shuffled pack of normal cards with 5 cards missing (without knowing that), whatever you do then is not really a trick in my estimation.
You say:
and you go through the cards and at the end you can tell which cards were removed from the deck of cards.
Going through cards can mean just about anything and without giving for example a time estimate of the trick, it is all very vague. I can imagine that finding the missing cards might be easier then memorizing a deck of cards, since you don’t have card order to take in to consideration, but you probably are still ending up having to either count (like counting all the 4 different suits, to see what suits are missing and then repeating with card values per suits) or memorize (as in ticking a box kind of way) close to 50 card(values).
One thing to consider is that Harry Lorayne may be more of a magician then a memoriser/card counter in that even though he can tell you in theory how it can be done, in reality he might rely on actual card magic tricks.
Questions like the one you asked are often posted on magic forums, but unlike on this memory forum, the code of conduct on those forums appears to be that you are not allowed to actually share tricks, because the art and profession of magic largely depends on those secrets remaining secrets.
@Cloud, I did that trick back when the book first came out and impressed some people as well as myself. I found that, like reusing a set of pegs for a new set of stored values in a competition or when memorizing multiple card decks, it’s best to use a different set of pegs if you want to be doing the process within a short time. The visuals you make are meant to be memorable so having duplicates would be confusing.
Now, that isn’t a workable solution, I know, because who has the time to make two sets of 52 images for a deck of cards? So the generally recommended solution is just to let your mind forget the destroyed images and then try it again.
I have been toying with a possible solution to that by enhancing the card image with an elaboration say of a season like summer or winter. That way you would have two different versions of the same card images and be able to do the trick twice without interference. You might be able to think up other elaborations as well. Let me know if this works or what solution you eventually end up with. Good luck!
@erikfromholland, the trick is simple as explained by Lorayne in The Memory Book if I remember correctly. A person takes a card from the deck. You deal the cards face up one at a time and destroy the image of the card in your head by fire, explosion, ripping up, etc. At the end you walk through your images to find the one that has survived.
I demolished my card images at about one per second.
You must have an image for each card. Once the 5 cards are removed, you go through the deck and mentally mutilate each card. For example, you imagine the image as burned. My image for the four of hearts is HaRe. I picture the hare as charred, maybe one ear as crumbling ash.
Once you’ve mutilated each card, you go through the deck in your mind. I go by suits, ace – king. Any image that isn’t mutilated is the missing card.
You can repeat by mutilating the cards in a different way. Cut in two, sticking out of a pile of sand, covered in strawberry jelly, etc.
Harry says the more cards they remove, the easier it is, since you are mutilating fewer cards.
When using the link method to memorize a deck of cards you need to link the 1st card to something pre memorised and then the 2nd card to the 1st and the 3th card to the 2nd and so on, so basically 52 links. However when you only need to know what cards are missing from the deck you only need to link the 1st card to the 2nd and then the 3th card to the 4th card, so basically the amount of links is equal to the number of cardsdevided by2 (with an uneven number of cards you end up with a card that you can link to something pre memorised, in that case it is number of cards + 1devided by2). All the cards that are not linked are the ones you were missing. So for 50 or so remaining cards you only need to make about 25 memorable links.
Interesting, I’ll try using seasons. I also liked another comment about using different methods of discarding it. So I’m thinking of trying something out such as summer with the items being torn apart, on fire, and crumbling apart. Then same thing but with winter or even adding the effect of raining. Not sure how effective this might be, but if it works it could help to do the trick a few more times than before.
Thanks for the reply, adding different ways to mutilate the cards looks like a good way to repeat the trick. I’ll have to fix my mental images though, most are an image of them being cut in two, but a couple are a bit more unique were the action is falling down or something else since cutting it down looked a bit odd (hard to imagine)
Interesting approach, So I just have to go through the cards at the end and see which ones don’t have a pair. I could add this as one of the ways to repeat the trick
Today I did the same technique as Harry Lorayne cutting the image of the card to find the 5 cards I removed from the deck. Found all 5. Reviewed and found them fast.
Then, I tried the technique of linking every two cards, but slightly different. I used the image I have for the number 1 and connected it to each two cards (an image containing 3 links). I did this as a way of trying to repeat the same trick multiple times by increasing the number used. This took me way longer than Harry Lorayne’s technique, but it is also the first time I did it. I found all 5, but 1 extra card was missing in my mind. So not as accurate, but if I keep practicing that probably will get better.
Didnt have enough time to try it with #2, but I plan on doing that in another day
I tried the technique of linking every two cards with the corresponding number X (where X is the image I have for the X time I do the trick). I did it for #1 and #2. I’m still not used to having 3 images linked together. My accuracy was 3/5 on both tries. Of course this was after going through some duolingo Japanese sections.
Tomorrow I will try to see if I can use Harry Lorayne’s technique, but adding the image of number X to it. For example, for #1 I have a torch and for A of clubs I have a Foot. I would Imagine a foot on fire being cut in half. So pretty much everything in #1 will be on fire
For #2 I have Noah (I imagine the ark of Noah), so for A of clubs I would imagine a Giant foot on the ark being cut in half. In other words everything in #2 will be on top of the ark.
Not sure if this will work, but I’ll give it a shot.
Update:
So using Harry Lorayne’s technique and adding an image of your X number to it while you cut the card did work for me. Did it for 1 and 2 and got all 5/5. Of course slower than normal, but it might be a matter of practicing it with 5 numbers and just stop doing the trick after that . To be fair it could be any number that makes the image clear in your mind. So maybe for the 3rd try I might use a different image from my 1-99 peg list that gives a better image. As long as I know which one it is and keep it consistent everytime.
. The problem with explaining a trick that you don’t know all the details of in terms of what the magician is supposed to do or not do is that those details make all the difference in the world.