5witch by Ben Williams video DOWNLOAD – Download

“Seamless, natural, wonderful!”
– Richard Sanders

5WITCH is my exploration into natural card switches with folded cards.

Over 5 years ago I began playing with the concept of switching folded cards, I have always been a massive fan of Jay Sankey’s Paperclipped, it is a superb effect, direct and perplexing, I must have performed it over a thousand times. But I always wanted to get rid of the paperclip. I wanted to be able to perform this type of effect without any gimmicked box or clip and for it to seem completely natural.

So, I started with ‘how do you naturally fold and unfold a playing card’ I simply studied what it looked like grabbing a folded card and unfolding it, that was my baseline. I then looked at the hand position, placement and movements of this natural motion and replicated it as closely as I could whilst also performing a switch of the card.

So that’s what this project is, a dive into natural card switches so you can be ready at a moment’s notice to perform paradoxical routines like the Mystery Card and really upset even the most beady eyed spectator!

“So Good!”
– Christian Grace (Switch One, Enigma, Level One)

So here is a rundown of what you will learn in 5WITCH:

SWITCHES

• Switch A – My most used switch, this is a simple, VERY easy to do switch that looks completely natural, no frills, open a folded card and switch it at the same time.
• Switch B – this was the first switch I played with and used to replace Paperclipped, I still love it and it has some really nice features that play out during the switch that give it a really nice empty hand feel.
• Switch C – This is the switchless switch, I LOVE this approach, you switch a card WITHOUT it leaving your hand, so no transfers. Oh, it’s not a difficult one-handed switch either, it is something else!
• Switch D – This is a switch I use when isolating a card that can help me if I want to get ‘one ahead’ of my spectators.
• Switch T – This is a super fooling table switch, simply by sliding a cared towards your spectator you switch it, super clean and 99% self-working.

“Anytime Ben puts out a new project, I sit up and listen. The beauty of 5witch is in its comprehensiveness of the instruction and simplicity of the moves. If I was a betting man, I’d wager that you’ll end up using at LEAST one sleight off of this project. Highly recommended!”
– Kyle Purnell

ROUTINES

• The Mystery Card – Obviously this HAS to be on the project, perform a Mystery Card effect without a strange box or prop. I include a standard handling a different colored back handling and a nice presentational hook for your Mystery Card effect.
• The Impossible Location – I talk about how to use these switches in order to have an impossible location effect. Want to have a practical and easy card through window or card in impossible location then this is for you.
• Which Hand – This is a super fun way to perform an un-gimmicked Which Hand effect where at the end of the effect, no matter how it good or bad they think you are, you show you have predicted their every move.
• Coin Toss – Accurately predict a coin toss three times in a row, no gimmick coins and no rigged coin tossing or coin spinning techniques, the spectator can flip or spin their own coin if you want.
• Imagination Game – Casually holding one card in your hand you entice your spectator to imagine that, for the moment, they are the magician. They make decisions themselves to whittle a deck down to one playing card out of 52, it just happens to be the playing card you have been holding in your hand the whole time. This is my story-based equivoque that, when combined with the techniques taught here, not only makes perfect sense for a spectator, but it is easy to follow and easy to remember so your performance is a breeze.
• Billet Look – This is a full routine that begins with your spectator writing down something secretly. This is placed folded up into a glass. You remove some blank business cards from your pocket to write down your thoughts. You write something on the back of a business card and place it down, you unfold the card they wrote on that has been in full view the whole time and see that they wrote ‘Mercedes’, you turn over your business card and it also says, ‘Mercedes’. The routine teaches you a full card ‘look’ that you can have as much time as you want to see their information. This is not a fast peek or a peek where you have to worry about lighting, and it certainly isn’t a peek that uses a special pen or pad, heck it’s not even a peek, it is a full-blown look at the information, right in front of the spectator, in a completely innocent way.
• Forcing – This is an exploration into using the switch techniques as a force. This is a perfect addition to a mental epic routine as you can use this force for the final piece of information, but their choice is a free choice, unlike most forces that mean they must choose a certain card or number.
• 50/50 – This is one of my ABSOLUTE favorite applications for these switches. I will teach you my 100% foolproof method of giving your spectator a 50/50 choice between two things and ALWAYS getting the outcome you desire. A simple effect for this would be if you place £50 on the table and if they choose between two business cards, one says WINNER the other says LOSER. If they choose the winner card, they win the £50. Guess what? They NEVER choose the WINNER card! (More ideas for this are discussed on the project).
• Parlour Box – Parlour magicians and stage mentalists have been using switching boxes to perform mind reading and prediction routines since, well I don’t know for sure but for a LONG time! With Parlour Box I teach you my way of performing a Parlour routine where your spectators write items on a business card, and these are placed into a CLEAR un-gimmicked box. The spectator chooses a folded card from the box, and it is always what you want them to choose. This is great as a standalone effect and a perfect back up method should you use a switching box but for some reason don’t have it for a performance, maybe your luggage was lost, or you had a mechanical issue with your prop.

So, these are the routines on this 5WITCH project, but there is other tuition as well!

How to fix your Mercury Card Fold – This section teaches why your Mercury Card Fold goes wrong and how to fix it easily (don’t worry though, you don’t need to Mercury Card Fold for 75% of these routines). I have analyzed this problem over nearly two decades of teaching and tutoring people and have realized 1 common mistake that makes 90% of the difference to your Mercury Card Fold.

I also show you how to make a very simple gimmick that sits in your pocket and helps some of these routines work, you will undoubtably be able to use this for other routines that have a similar premise as well.