5 A.M. (5 Amazing Miracles*) Harapan Ong *not realy, it's just some card tricks Sea iSome guys have all the luck. Thanks for purchasing this set of lecture notes. | presume you were at the lecture itself and did not pirate it from someone. If you did, | want to know who actually found my tricks worthy of pirating. lve always wanted to lecture for magicians. In my mind, | thought that lecturing was a sign that you’ve “made it” in the magic world. In other words, you have magic that’s good enough to arouse interest amongst magicians. So, I’ve always wondered when I'd be good enough to lecture in Singapore, which is funny because I’ve actually had the chance to lecture in the UK and Sweden before lecturing here in my homeland, Singapore. Speaking of chances, | sometimes wonder if | actually deserve these amazing opportunities that I've had: meeting amazing magicians, publishing a'book, performing at The Magic Circle in London. Just a few years ago, |-was just some kid practising card tricks in an army camp guardroom, trying to invent my own tricks and wondering if | would ever get to meet great magicians that I’ve read and heard of. And now, in some small way, | have achieved some of those childhood goals. | do hope that this lucky streak will continue for me, and hopefully it will happen for those of you reading this that have the same dream as | do. As long as you do what you love, and do what you love well, people will notice you, and before you know it, you'll be the magician you've always wanted to be. Enjoy the tricks in these lecture notes. See you later. Harapan OngKing’s Overture Effect: The magician displays four Kings, and cleanly places the black Kings face-up between the face-down red Kings. With a gentle shake of the packet, the black Kings are seen to have transformed into the red Kings, and now the red Kings are between the black Kings. And yet, with the cards still in a fan, the magician gives the cards a gentle shake and the red Kings visually change back into the black Kings, concluding an extremely visual transposition. Background: The very first trick in Phil Goldstein’s* book Focus is titled “Overture” — apparently, the publisher Stephen Minch really hates that trick. And if you have that book, you can see why for yourself. It’s a really unimpressive transposition at its core, where the transposing items are literally next to each other. However, personally | liked the trick because the handling of it is just so elegant and compact: Although I've never performed it, I’ve always practised it sort of absentmindedly during my practice sessions. This trick offered here is an extra visual phase I’ve tagged on at the end that uses a Ben Harris move called Fandango. Method: You need a double-facer. WAIT DON’T GO, IT’S WORTH IT Get a double-facer of Kings of opposite colours — for explanation purposes, | will assume the double-facer is the Kings of Hearts and Clubs. You also need three other normal Kings, and in this case we will use the Kings of Hearts, Diamonds and Spades. Arrange the 4 cards so that from the face, they are: double-facer with King of Clubs face-up, King of Hearts, King of Diamonds and King of Spades. * Also known as Max Maven — yeah, he used to do card tricks before he went to the dark side. 2To begin, spread the packet face-up to show the faces of the four Kings. Explain that the two red Kings are in between the black Kings, as you remove the two red Kings in the middle together, flip them face down and re-insert them between the black Kings. Position check: from the face, you have the double-facer, face-down King of Diamonds, face-down King of Hearts, face-up King of Spades. Square up the packet and turn everything face-down in your left hand. Emphasize the position of the Kings as you execute a Jordan Count, effectively displaying the red Kings between two face-down cards, while hiding the double-facer. Explain you will cause the red and black Kings to change places. You will now need to turn over the packet secretly — you may wish to use Vernon's Through the Fist Flourish, Marlo’s In Lieu of Through the Fist Flourish (also known as the Twirl Change to Sankey fans) or Squist by Bob Farmer (my personal favourite). Once the packet is turned over, execute an Elmsley Count to show that now, you have the two black Kings between two face-down cards. In fact, after the Elmsley Count, you can spread the four cards to show that you have the black Kings between two face-down red Kings. So far, what you’ve been doing is exactly the same handling as what you would find in Phil Goldstein’s original “Overture” routine. Now, here comes the extra ending provided to you by the double-facer. Offer to perform this miraculous feat again, even though no one asked for a repeat performance. Hold the four cards in a spread condition, pinched between your right thumb and forefinger, thumb above and finger below. You are now going to execute Ben Harris’sFandango move (published in his booklet Fandango from 1986), which flips the bottom three cards over. The Fandango move is as follows: Your right middle finger curls up towards the palm, and reaches above the fan of cards pinched in the thumb and index finger. The back of the middle finger contacts the bottom edge of the second King from the top (i.e., the face-up King of Spades). It then pushes down on the lower three cards, causing them to rotate towards your body around your index fingertip. As this happens, your right thumb should be clamping the topmost card (which is not being rotated) onto your index finger. Continue applying pressure until the three cards clear the inner edge of the top card and have rotated 180 degrees. Finally, remove your index finger from below the top card and reposition it back under the now face-down spread. This Fandango move looks complicated, but it can be done in a flash. This should leave you with the red Kings face up between two face-down cards. Re-grip the packet in both hands. In the act of displaying the cards, casually exchange the positions of the red Kings. Square up the packet, catching a break below the top two cards. Execute a Double Turnover to apparently turn over the top card, revealing a black King. Finally, turn the bottom card face up to reveal the second black King. Final word: This may not be the most impressive card trick, but | want you to try this trick and to notice how elegant the handling is. There is little to no wasted motions; each phase smoothly transitions from one to another (notice how after the Elmsley Count, it transitions immediately into the Fandango move). Plus the trick instantly resets. How cool is that? Try looking out for elegant handlings in your own tricks next time. It’s the best thing ever.Poker Player’s Picnic Plus” Effect: The magician proceeds to do the most boring trick ever from Royal Road. Magicians watching it will begin to roll their eyes in unison, until the surprise ending hits them like a sack of potatoes. Background: Of course, this is based on “Poker Player’s Picnic”, a trick that can be found in Royal Road to Card Magic. If you don’t remember which one this is, it’s the trick that the Masked Magician messed up on television. Check it out on YouTube. If you live under a rock and don’t have access to the Internet, it’s the one where you have the deck cut into four piles, and with each pile you move three cards from the top to the bottom, followed by dealing one card on top of the other three piles. The trick ends by revealing that on top of each pile is an Ace. I’ve simply added an extra surprise at the end for magicians. As you might have expected, this trick is designed specifically for magicians. Perform for laymen at your own risk: Method: Some preparation is necessary. Secretly have the four Aces on top of the deck. You will also need to hold a pinky break about % of the way from the bottom of the deck. Arrange the deck so that below the pinky break, you have two indifferent cards, followed by the four Kings. To begin, ask your magician audience for a favour: you need help with remembering how a beginner’s trick is done. As you say this, transfer the deck into right-hand Biddle Grip, transferring the left pinky break into a right thumb break. Begin cutting the deck into four * Warning: This trick is a “magiclan-fooler”.piles on the table, from left to right. Form the first pile by letting the cards below the right thumb break fall onto the table. This is followed by cutting the rest of the deck into three piles. Hence, you should now have four piles of cards on the table. The extreme left pile should have the four Kings below two indifferent cards, while the extreme right pile should have the four Aces on top. Explain to the magicians watching that in this trick, you remember that it’s about cutting the deck into four piles, and having to perform this specific sequence of actions for each pile. Pick up the leftmost pile. Count off three cards singly from the top of the pile (without reversing them) and place them on the bottom. Then, deal a card on top of the other three piles on the table. This action should leave you with a King on the bottom of the packet in your hand, and a King on top of each of the other tabled piles. As you do this, most magicians would begin to catch on to the fact that this is a beginner's trick they have learnt a long time ago. Some may even mention the name to sound well-read. Continue by placing down the first packet and picking up the second pile. Perform the exact same actions, except when placing three cards from the top to the bottom, count off the cards singly, REVERSING their order this time so that the King will end up on the bottom of the pile. This is, of course, followed by dealing one card on top of the other three piles. With the third packet, when taking three cards to the bottom, start by counting off two cards into your right hand without reversing their order, followed by the third card on top of those two in the right hand. This way, when those three cards are transferred to thebottom, once again the King will be on the bottom. You can cover this anomalous action by asking your spectators if the trick always involves taking three cards to the bottom, and if two cards are alright. They will usually comment that it is always three cards. This helps cover the action of dealing off two cards, followed by adding another card on top before transferring them to the bottom. Of course, this is followed by dealing a card on top of each of the tabled piles. Finally, pick up the last (rightmost) pile. If you have followed the instructions carefully so far, this pile from the top should have 2 indifferent cards, followed by a King and four Aces. Finish off by counting off three cards from the top (without reversing the order) and transferring them to the bottom, and dealing one card on top of the other three piles. Set the packet down and reveal that there is an Ace on top of each pile, as expected by every magician watching. Follow this by saying, “Now, to be honest, | do remember that there will be four Aces on top of each pile, but what | don’t remember is the fact that there are four Kings on the bottom!” Turn over each packet to reveal the Kings on the bottom of each pile for the final kicker. Final word: Of course you could do this effect for lay people; simply present it as a normal trick of producing Aces and Kings, instead of the magician-fooling presentation I've given. This trick was first published in Joshua Jay’s Talk about Tricks column in MAGIC Magazine (December 2012), under the confusing and completely random name of “Double Slip Production”. The funny thing is | submitted the trick to Josh as “Poker Player’s Picnic Plus”, and for some reason the name got altered. | will never forgive him.Dude, you’re not even trying! Effect: The magician proposes a little competition between himself and the spectator. The deck is shuffled face-up into face-down, and each contestant gets half the deck. The objective is to turn all the cards face-down, and the first person to do that wins the competition. However, once the competition begins, the magician is distracted by his smartphone and starts reading his Facebook updates while the spectator goes ahead and turns all the cards face- down, thus winning the competition. Or does he? Background: My good friend Kevin Ho showed me this gag for magicians involving a gimmicked deck of cards and an Out of This World plot. | liked the trick, but what | liked better was a line he used in the trick, which was at the end when he exclaimed, “Dude, you’re not even trying!” Based on that premise, | came up with this trick. Method: You need a Cheek-to-Cheek deck. Basically, it consists of 26 normal playing cards and 26 double-backers. If you are not familiar with it, the nice property it has is that if you shuffle the 26 normal cards face up into the double-backers, one side will show a mixed state and the other side will show them all to be face-down. (Cue all the Triumph ideas popping into your head now.) Start with the deck all face-down, the normal cards below the double-backers. Propose a competition, and as you do s0, flip the deck face-up and casually spread the top half of the deck to show face-up cards, taking care not to reveal the double-backers. Square the deck up and turn it face-down.As you explain the rules of the competition, split the deck in half (i.e., between the double-backers and normal cards). Flip the normal cards face up and shuffle them into the face-down (?) double- backers. Spread out the deck to show its messy condition, explaining that the objective of the competition is to turn all the cards face down. Roughly split the deck in half and hand them either half. Explain that in order to have a fair competition, the cards must be sorted out ina specific way. Explain that both of you will start dealing cards one-by- one into a single pile on the table, and every time you come to a face-up card, simply turn it face down and place it onto the tabled pile. The first person to have all the cards face down on the table wins the competition! “Ready... Set... Go!” Once you start’the competition, put on your best acting face and pretend that your smartphone has just notified you of a message or a Facebook update, whatever you fancy. As you reach for your phone in your pocket, simply turn your packet over and table it. This means that now, when you spread your packet, they will all be face down. Ask your spectator to continue with the card sorting, telling him that you'll catch up once you've replied to your friend. Your spectator, of course, will be gloating at his imminent victory as you succumb to social media. Once they have dealt the last face-down card onto the table, put your phone back and pretend that you're done as well. (Try not to laugh at their incredulity.) |Now comes the fun part! Explain that to rake sure none of you made any mistakes under pressure, each contestant has to check the other contestant’s packet for any remaining face up cards. Slide your packet (now all face down, thanks to the gimmick) to your spectator, as you pick up their packet with your left hand, palm down. Under the misdirection of asking them to spread your packet on the table, simply turn your left hand palm up, therefore secretly turning over their packet. This results in their packet becoming mixed again! When they spread your cards out, they will all be facing down, which should come as a surprise to everyone. However, when you spread their cards out, their smiles will fade when they see their packet still completely mixed. Shout in their face, “DUDE, YOU’RE NOT EVEN TRYING!” Final word: Kevin told me later that the line actually belonged to Tony Chang. That genius. What | also like about this routine is the incorporation of a rather modern premise, which is the magician being distracted by their smartphone in the middle of a trick. One of the hardest things (for me at least) is to create tricks that have a strong, coherent premise that feels fresh and enjoyable for everyone, including the performer and the audience. When coming up with a premise for a trick, try looking around your own life. What are you interested in? What are people around you interested in? Use those things as a basis for your tricks, instead of the outdated presentations you find in books.Sudden Surprise Sandwich (A trick | sent to Joshua Jay and he showed it to Simon Aronson and they both hated it.) Effect: Two cards are selected by two spectators, simply by naming any card they see in a face-up spread. The deck is tabled, and without any funny moves, the deck is immediately spread out to reveal that the four Aces have magically turned face up, and have also sandwiched two cards in two different parts of the deck. Of course, those two cards are completely irrelevant, indifferent cards. Of course, I’m kidding. Those two cards are the selected cards. Background: This is a really nice double-sandwich routine, where the sandwich cards appear when you least expect them (the Aces are not introduced at the start). At least, | think it’s nice. AND ONLY MY OPINION MATTERS WHO CARES ABOUT WHAT SIMON ARONSON THINKS WHAT, DOES HE KNOW ANYWAY Speaking of Simon “no-one-uses-the-tricks-built-in-my-stack” Aronson, this trick uses his Head Over Heels move in a pretty interesting fashion, published in Try the Impossible (2004). Method: The setup is kind of awkward to get into. From top down, the setup is: face-down red Ace, face-down indifferent card, two face-up black Aces, rest of face-down deck, face-up red Ace on the bottom of the deck. Begin by spreading off the top third of the deck into your right hand, taking care not to reveal the reversed cards. Turn the top third of the deck face up onto the deck. Begin spreading the face-up block, uwasking the first spectator to name any card she sees in the face-up spread. Once she has named the first selection, execute a Spread Cull and cull the named selection into the right hand. Continue spreading the face-up cards slowly until you reach the end of the face-up block, the culled selection riding along at the bottom of the spread. As you turn to the second spectator, your left thumb pushes off the face-down card directly below the face-up cards (a black Ace) and the culled selection is secretly inserted below the face-down card. This secretly inserts the selection between the black Aces. Tell the second spectator that you’re going to give her a second block of cards from which to choose. Once the first selection has been inserted in place, your left thumb does a block Pushover and spreads over a block of face-down cards just below the face-up cards (about 20 face down cards), taking care not to reveal any of the reversed cards. Break the spread at that point and turn over the entire upper portion of the deck (consisting of the face-up block and the 20 face- down cards below them). This will cause the original face up block to turn face down and the 20-odd face-down cards to turn face up. This is, of course, a minor variation of the Head Over Heels move by Simon “I-hate-Mnemonica” Aronson. Do the same selection procedure for the second spectator, spreading the new face-up block and culling the named selection. Once again, spread till the end of the face-up block and your left thumb pushes over the first face-down card, allowing you to insert the culled selection below the face-down card. You are now going to execute the Head Over Heels move by squaring up the cards above the inserted selection, catching a break between the two sections. 2Position check: from top down, you should have a block of face-up cards, face-down red Ace, face up second selection, pinky break, face-down indifferent card, face-up black Ace, face-down first selection, face-up black Ace, rest of face-down deck. Cut the deck at the break and flip the top portion over, completing the Head Over Heels move. Finally, to complete the sandwiches, give the deck a straight cut by cutting off about 40 cards (a large top Portion) and completing the cut. This sandwiches the second selection between the red Aces. Finally, snap your fingers and spread the deck, revealing the sudden appearance of the four Aces sandwiching two face-down cards in two separate areas of the deck. Reveal the selections and accept the standing ovation that ensues. Final word: Despite the slightly awkward setup of the Aces, | like the consistency of .actions in the selection procedure. Each card is selected and controlled in a very similar fashion, and the appearance of the Aces should be quite surprising since the spreading of the cards during the selection procedure enforces the idea that there are No reversed Aces in the deck to begin with. Sometimes, you'll see magicians (especially those that have only learnt a bunch of moves) using drastically different controls to control multiple selections to the top of the deck. I’ve actually seen someone who did a Pass, a Double Undercut and a Cherry Control, just to control three cards to the top of the deck. Not only is this uneconomical, there’s no consistency of actions. It only makes your actions seem suspicious and over “fiddly”. Try thinking about this when you're putting together your own tricks next time. 3Countdown Packet Effect: The magician shows a packet of four cards — they consist of the four Fours. One of them is removed, and the remaining three cards have magically transformed into three Threes! One more card is removed, only to be left with two Twos. One final elimination of a card from the packet, and the remaining card is now an Ace. Background: This was an attempt at inventing a new plot in card magic, which believe me, is pretty damned difficult. Classic plots like Triumph, Twisting the Aces, Collectors, Open Prediction... plots that stand the test of time need to have the ability to inspire others to spawn variations off of the original. | won’t be surprised if the plot offered here has already been invented by Marlo or someone, but my idea was to have a progressive packet trick. Each time a card is taken away, the remaining cards change to suit the number of cards, Method: A five-card setup is required. From the top of the deck, the setup is: Two, Three, Ace, Two, Three. The suits of these five cards do not matter; however, the Twos and Threes should be of opposite colour (i.e., use a red Two and a black Two, and a red Three and a black Three). Also, openly remove the four Fours and hold them face down in your right hand to begin with. The deck starts in your left hand with a pinky break below the top five cards, Spread out the four cards in your right hand. Show that those four cards are the four Fours, explaining that the values of the cards happen to coincide with the number of cards in your hand. As you do this, you Square the packet face down and hold the packet sidejogged to the right on top of the deck with your left thumb. Your right hand peels off the top Four, turns it face up and places it back 4 boflush on top of the four-card packet. Explain that even if you don’t physically count the number of cards in the packet, just by looking at one of Fours, you know that there are four cards. You are now going to apparently peel off the face-up Four onto the top of the deck, but actually execute a packet switch between the four-card packet and the five-card setup above your pinky break. Your right hand grips the Four packet in right-hand Biddle Grip and approaches the top of the deck in your left hand. Your left thumb is going to apparently peel off the face-up Four onto the top of the deck, but in reality, you are going to execute a Swing-Cut-esque motion, where in reality, all four Fours are “peeled” on top of the deck, while your right hand Brips the five-card setup below the Fours and pulls them to the right. This should look like you’ve simply peeled only the face-up Four onto the deck, leaving the three other Fours in your right-hand Biddle Grip ~ in reality, the five-card setup is in your right hand. Use the edge of the packet in your right hand to help lever the face- up Four face down on top of the deck. Table the deck and place the packet of cards into your left hand, explaining that since you've removed a Four, there should be three cards left in your hand. You are now going to display the cards as three Threes. Execute a Double Turnover to show a Three. Turn it face down and thumb off the top card into your right hand. Now, execute a Hamman Bottom Multiple Lift as follows. Your left index finger contacts the outer right corner of the packet as your left thumb angle jogs the top card to the left, exposing the right edges of the bottommost three cards. Your right fingers (still holding on to its card) grab the three cards and flip them as one face up on top of the packet in the left hand. Essentially, you're doing a Triple Turnover of the bottom three cards of the left 15 PRhand. This displays the second Three. Flip the Triple face down with your right hand. Now, either by a Pinky Pulldown or a Buckle, get a break below the top two cards of the left hand and transfer the top two cards (as one) to your right hand, holding the double such that it is sidejogged in a fan display below the card originally in the right hand. Finally, turn your left hand palm down and display the double as the final Three. Explain that you will now eliminate one of the Threes. Place the double in your left hand (in reality both Threes) on top of the tabled deck. Immediately turn your right hand palm down, displaying the faces of the two (?) cards as two Twos. Turn the cards face down and square them up in your left hand. Grip the three-card packet in right hand Biddle Grip as your left thumb peels off the top card into left- hand Mechanic’s Grip. Your left thumb levers the card face up to display a Two, while your right hand executes a Stuart Gordon Double Lift to display the second Two. Finally, place the double below the card in your left hand, and turn overthe entire packet. Grip the packet again in right-hand Biddle Grip as your left thumb ‘once again peels off the top card into the left hand (an Ace). Turn your right hand palm up to display a Two, followed by dropping it on top of the deck, as you explain that you are getting rid of a Two. This leaves you with only one card, which you turn over to reveal it’s an Ace, matching the number of cards in your hand. Final word: Packet tricks get a bad rap for being hokey and gimmicky, but | honestly think that because of their inherent limitation of using only a few cards, inventing a packet trick is a very useful creative exercise. Try it for yourself. ~ 16“Rules” of Creativity Once in a while, someone will ask me about how | come up with my tricks, and wonder if | have tips on creativity. Of course, it is very flattering that they think | have something to say about “creativity” when most of the time, when creating tricks, | look like this: aT De I'M DOING Regardless, here are some simple things to think about when inventing your own tricks. | shall call them rules of creativity because that sounds more important and official. 1, Don’t stop A lot of people tell me it’s hard to invent stuff because they never have a good idea. For me, | take a pretty pragmatic stance towards creativity. | think it’s an issue of quantity over quality. In other words, you shouldn't aim for that one revolutionary idea to appear in your mind — because that’s not going to happen. instead, just keep banging your head against the wall and just invent anything, even wvterrible tricks. The first attempts at inventing tricks will always be bad, and believe me, | have had my fair share of terrible tricks. So, let’s say you start inventing trick after trick after trick, and you have amassed 50 tricks. Let’s say 45 of them are terrible and will make Vernon roll in his grave. Well, you do have 5 tricks left, right? And out of those 5 tricks, maybe 3 of them are pretty good, whereas 2 of them are really, really original and creative. There we go, you now have 5 tricks, 3 of them to publish as instant downloads and 2 of them as single-trick DVDs’. Suddenly, you've become a creative guru in everyone's eyes, and they begin to wonder how you managed to come up with 5 ideas. Of course, they are unaware of the 45 terrible tricks, and that shall be your little secret. Magicians I’ve spoken to who like inventing tricks all say the same thing: they have a ton of tricks in their notebooks that will never see the light of day, because they are absolutely terrible. So remember, don’t stop just because the idea you have isn’t good. Keep going at it and eventually you’ll have something. And speaking of notebooks... 2. Write stuff down Self-explanatory. If you don’t write it down, it never happened. Carry a notebook around with you everywhere to write any idea that pops into your head. Remember, notebooks don’t run on batteries, so you can access them anytime, anywhere. If you don’t have your notebook with you, quickly type your idea down in your smartphone. Or send a text to yourself. You have no excuse. Don’t lose precious ideas just because you think “you can remember it later”. Trust me, you can’t. “Lam not advocating single-trick DVDs or downloads. 183. Expand your arsenal Some people tell me that in order to come up with an original idea, you cannot learn too much magic, because your mind will then be unable to think outside the box. Nonsense. If you want to come up with a breakthrough theory in physics, you don’t go, “Oh, let’s not learn any physics, because then | can truly think of revolutionary ideas about the Universe”, If you want to reinvent modern art, you don’t go, “Hmm, | won’t bother learning how to paint because then | can really come up with an original movement in art”. 'am of the opinion that you should learn as much stuff as possible, and from a wide variety of fields in magic. You never know when the | little false transfer you learnt in coin magic will help you in your stage manipulation routine, or that stage prop you played with can be miniaturized inta,a gimmick for your card magic. Make sure you have a big toolbox‘, and make it as diverse as possible. Don’t just stick to one type of magic; learn to cross-pollinate between different genres of magic. Then take a step back, see what others are doing and ask yourself, “What is something that no one else is doing, and is something that | would want to do?” That’s a good starting point for inventing your own magic. 4. Have fun This is an important point. It sounds like some hokey advice from self-help books, but seriously, hear me out. “if you know what | mean, [ 19Nowadays, there’s a huge creative explosion amongst the online community of magicians, especially amongst young magicians. And there are a few magicians who've managed to achieve a lot of fame from the tricks they've published on popular magic websites, and these “idol magicians” have garnered huge numbers of followers on the Internet who all wish to be like them; inventing tricks, releasing a download or a DVD, and achieving what they believe to be overnight success and fame. Except that’s not the case. | know and have personally spoken to a few of these “idol magicians”, and you know what? They're just like me. They like inventing stuff for the fun of it. And this so-called overnight fame they've achieved is because they've gone through a lot of terrible tricks they've invented, come up with a series of really good tricks and managed to know enough important people to get them out there on the Internet. They are genuinely passionate about magic because of the art and not the fame — the fame arose because they are good at what they do. However, that’s not what their followers see. They only see this guy who suddenly broke out on the magic scene with an amazing trick and being hyped up as a “revolutionary genius” in a flashy trailer, and they think that’s how fame works. And what you end up with is an entire generation of young magicians taking the very first trick they've come up with and trying to make a name for themselves with that trick by filming a download with it. And with the introduction of new platforms to submit and publish tricks on these popular magic sites, it becomes even easier to achieve that superficial level of fame they're hankering after. , 20 LL.And when they don’t receive the same attention that their idols get, they lose interest in creating magic, and they lose interest in magic as a whole. And they move on with their lives. Invent stuff because it’s fun, not because it can make you famous. Creating magic is a very fulfilling and enriching process. It requires problem-solving skills, critical thinking and logic when you're thinking of methods. It requires knowledge of theatre, storytelling and psychology when piecing together a coherent presentation and premise for the trick. It requires patience to polish a trick to its final form. And then you realize a trick is never fully polished, so you keep working on it. Forever and ever. And that’s fun, ' hope you've gained something from this set of lecture notes, whether it’s a tritk, an idea for a new trick or some inspiration from the essay I just wrote. Thank you, and | wish you all the best in your magic journey. Harapan Ong P.S. And also, set your own standards for your magic, and set them high. Don’t let someone else set those standards for you. Only then will you genuinely become the magician you've always wanted to be, and not just a clone of someone you idolized. 21