What kinds of magic tricks are are good for beginners?
Posted on August 20, 2009
Even as a total beginner in magic, there are still some magic tricks you can learn in about 5 minutes flat, which will totally baffle people when you perform them.
When you’re starting out with magic, the best tricks to start with are ones that don’t need complicated sleight of hand to be able to perform. There are some great card magic tricks that are good for beginners, that work because of the way the trick’s method has been constructed. Card magic is a good starting point for beginners to magic tricks.
Besides card magic, there are other tricks a beginner can learn to do easily. Here’s an example, which is a trick called ‘1089 Mind Reading’. This is an example of mind or prediction magic, and if performed well, it will definitely have your audience scratching their heads, and wondering how you did it (be sure never to tell them the secret)!
To start with, you’ll need a book, a slip of paper, and an envelope. In the book, go to page number 10, on this page go 8 lines down, and find the 9th word on this line. Hopefully this word is something other than ‘the’, ‘a’ or ‘and’ – if not, you might want to choose another book! Write this word down on the paper, put it in the envelope, and seal it.
In front of your audience, show them the sealed envelope, tell them you’ve made a prediction, then ask an audience member to guard the envelope. Say that you’re going to get the audience to help you choose a random number.
Pick someone from the audience, and ask them to think of a 3 digit number, e.g. 487. Get them to reverse this, and subtract the smaller from the larger, so, here 784 – 487 = 297. Secondly, request they reverse this result, and add together – so here 297 + 792 = 1089. It might be that at this point, they have 198 rather than 1089. If this is the case, just have another step, ask them to reverse & add again, so e.g. 198 + 981 = 1089. This is a curious mathematical fact, taking these steps with any 3 digit number will always give 1089.
Now it’s time to use that result. Hand the book to a member of the audience, and say that the first 2 digits should indicate the page to turn to – i.e. page 10. Then tell them to use the 3rd digit to find the line on that page – line 8, and the final digit represents the word on that line – word 9.
Finally, it’s time to reveal your prediction. Ask the audience member with the book to read that word aloud. Then ask the other audience member you had guard your envelope to open it and show what was written on the piece of paper. The result – a fantastic display of mental prediction!
You can have a lot of fun doing this trick, just remember to practice it through a few times before performing for an audience. One thing you could do to make it seem a bit more random is at the start, to throw a sponge ball, or ball of paper into the audience, and ask them to pick a single digit between 1 and 9. Then have them throw the paper in the air and get someone else to choose a second digit, and repeat this with another audience member for the final digit. This draws out the performance a little, and adds a bit more fun too. Remember you can only perform this trick once in front of the same audience!
So even if you’re a total beginner when it comes to magic, there are literally hundreds of tricks you can learn pretty quickly. Many online magic sites will have tricks just like the one above that you can learn. Very soon, you’ll have quite a repertoire of tricks, which you can use to really entertain your family and friends.
A magic trick for beginners
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