Simplex Out Of This World

Here is an incredibly simple way to do Out of This World that is still very fooling. It uses any borrowed, shuffled deck and requires no real sleights.

There’s nothing clever here presentationally. I have a lot of different OOTW-esque effects that I do that are somewhat significant variations on the traditional OOTW theme. But this isn’t one of them. This is just an very easy way to do the traditional presentation.

Step 1: Take a well-mixed deck of cards (your own or borrowed). And give it a few overhand shuffles. When you’re done, spread the cards face-up in front of the participant and ask them to give the cards a look over for a few seconds. Then close the spread and hand them the deck face-up.

Step 2: Pull out your phone and open the timer app. Ask them to separate the deck into two piles, red cards and black cards. They are doing this face-up. You are going to time them as they do. Have them deal though the deck into two piles and then have them note how long it takes them to do this.

Step 3: Say something like, “38 seconds. Okay, that’s our baseline. That’s how long it took you to separate the cards.”

Step 4: Place one pile on top of the other and turn the deck face down. Give the deck multiple Red/Black Shuffles (also known as an Ireland Shuffle). The is a genuine overhand shuffle, but you run the cards singly near the middle of the deck. So all that happens is the top color becomes the bottom color after each shuffle. Do a few of these. As you do, say something like, “This is kind of an asshole thing to do since I just asked you to separate the cards, but I want to try that again in a slightly different way and see if you can beat your time.” The implication that you’re a bit of an “asshole” (or whatever word you want to use) because you’re shuffling the deck right after you had them separate the cards is going to reinforce the idea that the cards are actually being mixed. (Which they are, but not really.)

Step 5: Spread the cards toward you. Mumble, “They could be better mixed.” And give it another Red/Black shuffle. Again spread the cards toward you, make sure nothing got messed up during the shuffle. Say, “That’s good.” And close the spread.

Step 6: “This time you’re going to do the same thing. But you’re going to do it face-down. Don’t even bother thinking about the colors. Just deal the cards into two piles. Going by instinct. Keep them about equal. That’s all. I’m going to pause you part way through, so be prepared for that.”

Step 7: Have your friend deal the cards into two piles. Dealing on instinct. Time them again. Encourage them to go quickly and to try and deal faster than they did previously. This should be easy because they’re just dealing randomly.

Step 8: Once they’ve dealt about half the cards, tell them to stop and pause the timer. “I want to try something here. I want you to get this next card wrong. Whatever that means to you. So whichever pile you’re inclined to put it on, I want you to put it on the opposite one.” Let them make that decision and remember what pile they put it on.

Step 9: Re-start the timer and have them deal out the rest of the cards. Stop the timer when they’re done. 

Step 10: Point out that they separated the cards by color in however many seconds when they were looking at them. Now, when they weren’t looking at them it took them however many seconds less. 

Step 11: Pick up the pile that they dealt the card onto in step 8. And start dealing the cards face up in an arc, leading up to the second pile. All the cards will be the same color. “Somehow, just relying on instinct, you seem to have placed all the black cards in this pile.” 

Step 12: At some point, about halfway through, you will hit a card of the opposite color. It seems like something has gone wrong, because people don’t immediately remember step 8. “Ah… a red card. I know that seems like a mistake. But remember I asked you to deal a single card against your instinct halfway through? This is kind of like a ‘control’ in science. We get to see what would happen if you denied your instincts in that case. And if I had to guess…”

Step 13: Pick up the other pile (which is in the way of the arc you’re creating) and put it on top of the cards in your hand. Turn everything over and continue to spread all the cards along the arc you had started. When you’re done, break the spread at the divide between the halves. “Yes… just as I thought. The one card I made you move was the only mistake in the entire deck.”

This handling at the end is essentially Paul Harris’ Galaxy handling, but with one huge improvement. The problem with the handling in Paul’s effect is that the change in the process came out of the blue. It was completely unmotivated. You’re dealing cards face up, and then to “save time” or something, you put the halves together and spread them. It never felt right. At least not to me.

With this version the dealing of cards is already disrupted by the appearance of the opposite colored card. There is then a break in the dealing which is fully justified as you remind them that you asked them to make a single mistake. Then, because you want to quickly answer the unverbalized question, “Was this the only mistake?” You spread the rest of the cards to show that it was.

I also believe having the mistake show up in the middle of the face down packet, and then it remains as the one “mistake” in the face up packet at the end, add some continuity to that packet. We know the cards that comprise that packet have changed. But this one card in the middle of the face-down and face-up packet, suggests it’s the same grouping of cards.

As I mentioned, this is a pretty straightforward presentation. All the decisions I made when putting this together were to make it as simple as possible. There’s no set-up. There’s no false-shuffles (the shuffle is real, it just doesn’t do what the spectator thinks it does). There are no leader cards. You don’t have to count how many cards are dealt. You don’t have to reverse the piles. You can do it with an incomplete deck in any condition. 

It’s not my favorite OOTW presentation. But it’s the simplest, and a good one to have in your back pocket, because there’s so little to remember. 

If I was going to enhance the effect in some way it would be in the Imp I used to create their ability to separate the reds from the blacks. Perhaps you have them look at something unusual, or listen to something strange, or you apply some pressure to one of their chi meridians or something. Then, as a “control” during their dealing procedure, you remove the Imp for a period of time (which causes the “mistake” that is witnessed during the reveal).

The idea of letting the spectator set up OOTW for you is something I first explored in this post. You might not think the Red/Black shuffle is convincing enough to “destroy” the set-up in their mind. But it is. I’ve tested it overtly (specifically asking about the fairness of the shuffle) and covertly in the past. The procedure that makes the Red/Black shuffle work is not something people can unravel, unless they’ve paid close attention to the mechanics of an overhand shuffle at some point in their life, which most people haven’t. Of course you can add in more false shuffles if you’re so inclined, but then this wouldn’t be the easiest OOTW I know of.