(electronic music)
- So are you done with your videos for the year, I am.
Yo.
(laughing)
- What's up guys, welcome back.
Chris Ramsay here, and Merry Christmas to you.
I will not let you down, I got you covered with
another tutorial, whether or not you're watching this on
Christmas Day, or not, you should probably be spending
time with your family right now, so, go do that.
Before we begin this video, just like to let you know that,
below in the description, uh,
you can currently get 50% off of Voodoo.
Voodoo is a close up slight of hand,
sort of magic effect, that uses cards.
Uh, check out the link, I left the link to the video below.
But, that is now 50% off, so five dollars for that download,
uh, throughout next week, if you want to
check it out, uh, be my guest.
And also, if you live this video and you like this content,
and you wanna support this channel, go ahead and like
that video, and subscribe if you're new here.
This is the Burcham change, now Ross Burcham,
was a slight of hand, close up magician.
An incredible pioneer in card magic, especially,
did a lot of gambling demonstrations mostly,
and was a close friend of Dai Vernon's, and just one,
just a legend in uh, in card magic.
And, he put out a book called, Ross Burcham on
slight of hand, which incorporates coins, cards,
and all sorts of close up magic stuff.
It's a really good read by the way, I always, I haven't,
as with most magic books, you can't just digest
the entire book in one sitting.
I go back to this book, every now and then,
when I'm looking for something interesting to learn,
and I keep finding uh, gems in here.
You've got a lot of really clever routine,
some of them don't work as well as they depict,
but some of them are actually really good, and some of them,
uh, used my magicians all over the world currently,
like the one I'm going to teach you today.
The Burcham change, is a color change that
happens in the hands, away from the deck.
You can either, have the deck with you, but it's always
better to just have these two cards loose, where you
change one card with a wave, into another card.
Very clean, very good, there are a lot of people who put out
some really good work on the Burcham change,
and having it change into multiple different cards,
and that type of thing.
By all means, go check out all those downloads,
if you'd like.
Today, I'm just gonna show you the
basics of the Burcham change.
As we just covered the Tenkai palm, in I think,
last week's tutorial, so this is a good add on to that,
once you're familiar with the Tenkai palm.
Ross, did a whole bunch of work on the Tenkai palms,
a lot of his card stuff is based on Tenkai.
So, enough ranting, let's get into the Burcham change.
Alright, so first things first.
You need to grab two playing cards, and uh, obviously a
prerequisite is to have two cards that are contrasting,
so that are a lot different, cause if you change it from an
ace of spades, to an ace of clubs, it's not going to be
as visual, as if you do it with two
really contrasting cards.
First thing uh, is a little touch that I like to do,
this is from the Jones change.
Basically it looks like this, it's a bit of a convincer,
that one card, is two.
There are a lot of convincers out there, this is just one
that I like to use, that I've been going to for a long time.
So, to do that, to do this convincer, first of all,
we'll get into that, is you want to hold the card like this.
Thumb, and your middle finger are like that.
You're going to use your index to completely rotate
both cards, and then you're going to use the knuckle
on your index, to basically, rotate it back,
until it's here like this.
You're here, rotate, and back, and now you hold it
like this, between your middle finger,
and that little part of your hand right there.
The card should not split at this point.
You then want your thumb to be down here, and your index
on the other side, and you're gonna use your middle finger
to sort of, spin it around, as your index and thumb
holds it, now it split because I did it slowly.
Here, you want to hold it face up,
spin, come back, hold it here.
Right into palm, now you're in this position where,
card still looks like one card, but actually, you have two.
Now, what's great about this, is that you're left in
a position, perfectly ready to extract that bottom card,
cause that's exactly what you're going to do here.
You're going to extract that bottom card, into Tenkai.
Once you've done this move here,
you're left in this position.
Your left hand is gonna grab that corner here, and sort of
straighten out the card, so it's,
so it's on a horizontal plane.
Uh, your right hand is then going to pinch,
with your middle finger and thumb, and using your index
to sort of hide everything, keep your hands closed here
at this point, and you're going to extract that card.
Now, as soon as that card gets extracted,
it's going right into Tenkai.
So again, you're here,
you just rotate this, and extract it into Tenkai, okay?
It's gonna take some practice, if you hold the card
like this, it's fine too, you don't need to do
that first move, you can just hold it here.
You need to reach on that top corner, where that pip is,
rotate the card like that, so you can extract it out, okay?
From the back, this is what's happening.
Okay?
And that, once you're in Tenkai from here,
will not be visible.
Angles are always very important.
Uh, practice in front of a camera if you want,
these are bad angles, good angels.
But, just a little bit off to the side,
where this hand is going to shield what's happening.
So as you're here, you can do this,
and now you're in Tenkai.
Once you're in Tenkai, you're holding this card like so,
your hand's going to reach over, and you're going to slip
this part of the card, under your thumb, alright?
So once that's slipped under your thumb, so you're here,
you slip it under your thumb, and you're going to use
your middle finger, and your thumb, to sort of line it up,
as these two fingers line it up vertically,
your middle finger and thumb are going to
line it up on the sides, okay?
So again, you extract in Tenkai,
come over, slip it under your thumb, now as I said,
the thumb here is going to adjust vertically, and you're
constantly squaring up these two cards, in this action.
Alright, and there you go.
And I like to do this little thing, where I'm left here,
between the middle finger and the thumb, and just kinda
spin it around one last time.
You can also do a little Stuart Gordon double lift, like so,
to just place it in your hand, make it look like one.
Whatever convincer you want to use.
Now, there are a lot of different ways, you can go ahead
and wave that card over, if you'd like.
Um, you can have it more visually,
so if your hands are closed here, you can open up
your fingers, and sort of, visually put it back.
Uh, but that's, that's up to you, just do what
feels comfortable, and just practice that over and over.
So again, from the top, we're here, we have these two cards.
I'm gonna come in, and I'm gonna grab that top card,
extract it, as this card gets held like so,
hold it in Tenkai, place it on.
Now again, Tenkai palm is when the card is placed like so,
between the thumb, and the palm of the hand.
We have a card.
I'm gonna take this card,
and here, come over, square it up, and there you go.
and that is basically the Burcham change in a nutshell.
Um, if you guys are having difficulty, I think one of the
hardest things you're gonna have to learn, is your angles,
and how to extract without all your fingers doing this.
You kinda want to make sure you extract that, with like,
the tips of your fingers.
So, it's like I'm holding a single card, this happens here,
like there's barely any movement, and that's the important
part of doing this change, is that you don't want
to have a lot of fidgety things.
For instance, if I'm, if I'm here, and I'm doing this,
and then I'm coming over, and I'm changing it,
like it looks super clunky and weird.
Light fingers are key, if you can keep those light fingers,
it'll look a lot smoother, okay?
So light fingers, try to use the end of your fingers,
but keep your fingers closed here, so that,
when you're here, it looks like my hands didn't do anything,
they didn't move, and then I can open my fingers, sort of,
very cleanly, as it comes over, and then go to square up.
So practice that, practice this little move if you'd like.
It's a fun little move to do, but it's not necessary,
you can do uh, you can literally, take this card off
of the deck, hold it here, and just straight from here,
if you hold it on the bottom with your left hand,
reach over the top, extract it really quickly,
and then do the change from there.
So that's up to you, how you want to get into it, uh,
I think probably, just doing it straight off,
you don't need the convincer, I think it's fine.
I just like doing the convincer cause it looks
good on camera, to be honest.
And if you can pull this off in real life, it looks kinda
nice as well, it really convinces the eye
that it was a single card.
Alright guys, that was my work on the Burcham change,
so hope you guys enjoyed it.
Practice that over the holidays, and uh,
let's roll the outro.
Alright guys, well that about wraps it up for today's video.
I hope you enjoyed that, thank you so much for tuning in,
even though as this is Christmas,
you should probably be elsewhere.
But, I wish you guys happy holidays, spend time with
your loved ones, and uh, I got a few videos coming up
during the week, so be prepared for that, and we will
see you guys on the next video, peace.
(electronic music)