Cardiography - magic trick | clown ministry

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Cardiographic is an excellent magic trick for both clowns and magicians. As a general rule, I don’t care for clowns doing card tricks—it simply seems out of character. Cardiographic is a definite exception to that rule, however, for several good reasons. It’s a very visual effect, with a wonderful opportunity for the “magician in trouble” syndrome, as David Ginn talks about in Clown Magic, where the clown or magician (seemingly) gets into trouble when a trick doesn’t work ... only to turn the tables and make the magic happen.

You can see how a magician would use this prop in the following clip from YouTube:

But how would a clown use this? As always, the clown plays the buffoon—unlike the magician, magic happens to the clown, not by the clown. Imagine a skit with two clowns, where the first clown tries to do the magic trick, the second clown as the ‘audience’. When the first clown ‘fails’ in his prediction, the second clown could take the pad, turn the drawing from a card into a deck, where the card ‘floats up’—“How did you do that?” “I dunno!”

In the same way, there are numerous other ways you could use this prop.

Product description of Cardiology

A spectator selects a card. The magician begins to draw what he believes will be the selected card on a sketch pad. He reveals his sketch only to be told by the spectator that it is incorrect. He then adds a few lines to the picture and tells the audience that it is a drawing of a full deck of cards. Suddenly the selected card rises from the drawing of the deck. The drawing is then ripped off the pad and given as a souvenir.