The 9 Types of Magic Tricks

All Types of Magic

Besides its power of amusing, conjuring affords an immense amount of instruction to its student. Magic is useful in inculcating coolness, precision, and an endless amount of resourcefulness.

Such character qualities will always stand one in good stead on this world's ever-changing stage.

CONTENTS

• Satisfying Your Audience

• Kinds of Magic Tricks

1. Productions

2. Vanishes

3. Transformations

4. Restorations

5. Teleportation

6. Transposition

7. Penetration

8. Levitation

9. Mentalism

• Conclusion

How Do Magicians Do Mind Blowing Magic Tricks?

The magician shows an empty box, or an empty hand, and then a ball appears. A magical Production is the opposite of Vanishing.

• The magician produces a dove out of thin air.

• Coin magic - The performer pulls a coin from a child's ear.

• Card magic - The performer makes a deck of cards appear in an empty box.

When people learn magic, the vanish is the first trick most people learn. Vanishing is the opposite of Production.

• The magician’s assistant enters a box, then the magician reveals the box is empty.

• The magician holds a cage with a bird inside; then he makes the bird disappear into thin air.

• The illusionist makes a bottle of water disappear.

In a transformation, the magician transforms an object from one state into another, such as changing an item weight, or turning water to wine. Usually, the magic performer achieves the transformation via a combination of Production and Vanishing.

• The performer runs a yellow scarf through his fist, and the scarf comes out of his fist a red scarf.

• One of the most shocking effects in all of magic is the color change. The “color change” is a card trick where a red card changes to black. There are a great deal of fun variations of the color change card trick, one being the Snap Change which is a card trick Blaine performed on his first TV special (requires sleight of hand).

• One coin magically changes to a different coin; e.g, a copper coin magically changes to a silver coin.

Restorations involve the magician destroying an object, then making it whole.

• The magician saws a lady in half, then puts her back together.

• The close up magician tears apart a playing card, then restores the card to its untorn condition (requires sleight of hand).

• The performer tears apart a newspaper, then heals it so it’s whole again.

• Easy magic tricks include pulling off thumb and putting it back on one hand.

• The coin magician bites a quarter in half and make it whole again, the quarter bite trick (not a coin trick for kids).

In teleportation magic tricks, the most familiar objects are made to vanish and reappear, as though they were disembodied and reinstated. This magic trick type encompasses two objects changing location with each other (double teleportation, which magicians call “transposition”).

• The assistant entered the cupboard. An instant later, she stands among the audience.

• The participant placed a playing card inside the deck of cards, and it’s now on top of the deck of cards.

• The coin vanishes from performer’s hand and appears in the magician’s pocket.

The transposition magic trick type is a child of the teleportation magic trick type. Two objects swap places in a magical manner.

• The spectator holds the king of spades, sandwiched in her hands. The magician waves an ace of spades over her hands. When the performer turns over his ace of spades, the audience can see it’s now the king of spades. When she opens her hands to look at her card, she finds the ace of spades. The two cards switched places. Magic!

Penetration optical illusions involve passing an object through another solid item.

• Linking Rings (solid steel rings link and unlink, like water)

• An escapologist can escape from a locked container.

• Sawing a lady in half. Usually, she’s restored, so this could also fall under Restoration. A non-magician can start sawing a lady in half sawing illusion, but the real trick is making her whole again.

• Thrust a pen or pencil (or cigarette) through the center of a quarter.

• A rubber band passes through a friend’s rubber band.

• Performer borrows a dollar, then shoves his pen through it like water. He slides the pen out and hands the healed twenty back to nervous friends.

Levitation magic effects involve the magician creating the illusion that a thing or the performer is floating.

• David Copperfield hovering over his audience (no other magician can fly like David Copperfield)

• Fun close-up magic:

  • Floating a coin, finger ring, or floating a dollar bill trick above your hand in thin air

  • Rising card or levitating card

  • Easy magic trick for beginners —magic floating match (great trick for older kids)

Mentalism tricks include telepathy, telekinesis, attention, influence, sudden insight, mathemagic, and predictions. Of all magic tricks, mind reading tricks are the strongest magic effects—predictions being the strongest mentalism effect of them all in terms of impossibility and impact. Some products are easy magic, others are challenging.

• Describing by insight a picture your participant has drawn

• Easy magic trick for beginners

• Knowing by insight the card your participant has chosen

Magic Books and Tutorial

Magic Tricks

There are plenty of magicians that specialize in one kind of magic trick over another skill. Still, many magicians, like David Copperfield. Exceptional at card magic, coin magic, crafts sleight of hand, and all art of deception—can merge the different magic effects in their acts to make the event entertaining.

Sure, Uri Geller was most famous for his ability to impress people by bending spoons with his mind. Still, in his performances, he also duplicated drawings unseen, read minds with insight, he stopped clocks with his mind and influenced an entire audience to select a precise picture, etc.

A school of thought contrary to that one is that you should display only one clearly defined ability, e.g., math genius, master of influence, telepathy, foresight at the event.

If your persona is that you are outstanding at influencing friends to think certain things and do certain things, then—no matter how cool you believe spoon-bending is—you should avoid bending spoons in your show, as that would be incongruent with your persona.

However, even the uninitiated can see that David Blaine, David Copperfield, or Derek Dingle from the Amazon is an excellent sleight of hand artist with playing cards. Then he "reads their minds," even using a deck of playing cards to do so.

And they believe he can read minds!

The Paper Clips Application Book of Playing Cards Impress

If we look at the most celebrated magic performers of the past century and breakdown by star, we’ll notice that though each kept the attention of spectators did indeed present a clear brand and persona, none of them adhered to it 100%.

Magicians like David Copperfield, Joseph Dunninger, David Berglas, Kreskin, and Derren Brown—all famous and commercially successful mentalists with 5 star rating, the public knew these magicians as mentalists who wouldn’t be caught dead saying abracadabra. But each of them did a magic trick with silk or coins or eligible items at every event—something which is incongruent to their professed mental ability.

For instance, they did quite a bit in the rubber band family of mental magic (a combination of mentalism and magic…such as when a spectator thinks of someone and that person’s name appears on a chalkboard).

Berglas did the floating table deception, as did Derren Brown. Kreskin performed (very poorly) the ambitious card trick (the ambitious card trick is a standard card trick that every magician knows, but few magicians perform well).

The Amazing Kreskin—known to the world as a mentalist—performed card tricks on national TV.