Just started doing shuffle-bored, practiced on a friend so he had to do the part of two spectators. With my back turned I gave him what I thought were explicit directions, but it didn't work. I'm pretty certain he did something wrong, so my question is: what do you do if, after a fairly long routine such as this, you miss due to a spec messing up?

Even with the clearest directions from the magician, I would think it'll still happen from time to time that one of the spectators will do something he wasn't supposed to do. How do you come back from such a failure? Is there some way to confirm that the spectators are doing it right, without having to look?

There are many ways to do Shuffle-Bored. Many magicians, including Lennart Green and Aldo Colombini don't turn their back while they're being shuffled (you've presumably already put out your prediction, why turn around?).

There's no real reason you can't watch them shuffle, and make sure they follow the proper procedure.

It isn't a matter of whether your back is turned or not; the spectators can mess it up even if you're watching their every move. I once had a spectator drop the cards on the floor.

(Serendipitously, I was able to collect them and arrange them properly; the effect still worked. Whew!)

Invisible Deck.

Here's the situation. You've got a bunch of face-up cards. Conceptually, you've eliminated half the deck. Use more procedures to eliminate those cards until you're down to one.

I think it's not necessary to turn your back when the spectator(s) shuffles the cards. This way, the performer can give them the instruction more accurately, and should be able to prevent any screw up. Or you can take John Bannon's approach that use blindfold if you just want to be sure they did right..

I don't do prediction shuffle board, just the standard version. But maybe I will just watch the specs, and turn away at any crucial moments where they might suspect I can see the amount of face up cards. Less chance they will screw up that way. Also, I like the blindfold idea.

Erlandish, I don't quite follow what you are saying.

I believe that he's suggesting that you contrive to get down to a single card - for example, by eliminating all the face-up cards, then doing more face-up/face-down shuffles, then eliminating the face-up cards, and so on - then use an invisible deck to show that you predicted the outcome.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I was suggesting.

This pretty much assumes that you've got a mess of cards on the table and your choice is between giving them SOMETHING or else saying, "And, as I predicted, there's a mess of cards on the table. Thanks folks! Try the veal!"

Todsky,

One thing that I found extremely helpful for me when learning, Shuffle-bored, Pre-deck-ability, Rain Man and the numberous "Shuffle-bored" shuffling sequences (such as the one offered by John Bannon in Dear Mr Fantasy), was to practice the shuffling sequence with two "half" piles of cards--a blue-backed 1/2 deck and a red-backed 1/2 deck. (hereinafter referred to as a "red-blue deck".) The red-backed cards were my shuffle-bored cards (if you know what I mean).

Not only could I clearly and easily "see" what was going on during each shuffle, but, if I screwed up it was a simple matter to re-sort out the cards back into red-backed cards and blue-backed cards and start the practice shuffling sequence over.

This red-blue shuffling (and turnovers) imprinted on my mind exactly what was happening at every step of the way and I was able to carry an "imprint" of this red-blue mixing sequence even when, for real, I was using a deck with a single colored back. This imprint was especially helpful to me in remembering if, on the last shuffle, the cards stay the way they are or if they have to be turned over one more time. (I hope this last point was clear.)

One other advantage to practicing with a red-blue deck is that you can experiment with different combinations of shufflings, turnovers, etc. and never "lose your place". And it is really easy to "undo" a practice move that didn't work out.

And, knowing what was happening (and what was supposed to be happening), allowed me to instantly "see" if a spectator was deviating from my instructions and I could make the appropriate correction (by a followup "correcting" instruction).

Hope this helps. And, I hope my explanation was clear.

Mike

Ah... okay, interesting idea. I do use the invisible deck, so this could work nicely, and now I see how an easy prediction could be achieved.
And Turk, I like your suggestion with red/blue half decks, makes the practice reset a heck of a lot easier!
Good subtle suggestions about a great effect!

And even if all this fails and you're hopelessly lost, look under the topic of the words we use, concerning what to say when things go wrong, posted elsewhere on the Café.

Sometimes I will do the shuffling myself if I am not sure about my specs, still a great effect !

You should do the mixing yourself for a while, till you get comfortable with it.
Once you are comfortable with it, you can get spectators to shuffle.

Oh and it happened to me too, I had someone accidentally turn over an extra card once, I just palmed one of the face up cards during "re-counting."

I always have an Invisible deck with me incase the spectator messes up a trick in some manner as described above. I put the deck on the table or in the open as an insurance policy. I love your idea erlandish to continue mixing face up with face down cards until you’re left with only one face down card on the table. I think this is an excellent out for this card illusion.

You could also have the cards placed by the spec. into a card-shuffler - I've used it in formal shows and it really strengthened the impossibility of the effect as well.

Just my 2 cents.

Cheers!

John

The Invisible deck has saved me more than once.