Magic Trick - How does it work?

[Messerve]

So I was looking at random things on eBay and I came across this very expensive thing called a ghost writer's box.

I was reading the instructions, but it never says how the trick works. It seems as if it even expects the magician himself to be fooled...?

Anyone have any idea how this trick is done? It would be fun to try it on someone.

 

[Messerve]

So I was looking at random things on eBay and I came across this very expensive thing called a ghost writer's box.

I was reading the instructions, but it never says how the trick works. It seems as if it even expects the magician himself to be fooled...?

Anyone have any idea how this trick is done? It would be fun to try it on someone.

By the way, this is not support anything that is occult. I don't believe in ghosts or anything. I assume this is an innocent trick.

 

[GodsGrace101]

These tricks are not easy to do.
So the guy selling the instructions will make some money...
and lose the respect of the community of magicians.

The fun of magic is NOT knowing how it's done.
It mentions a "removal" tool that might be important.

 

[Messerve]

These tricks are not easy to do.
So the guy selling the instructions will make some money...
and lose the respect of the community of magicians.

The fun of magic is NOT knowing how it's done.
It mentions a "removal" tool that might be important.

I realized the actual instructions are on the back of this paper. If I reverse it I can read a bit of it. Not enough to know how to do the trick, though...

The seller is selling the whole thing not just the instructions. If I had 650 dollars to throw away I'd be interested.

 

[jayem]

It could be a variation of a trick I saw in Las Vegas some time ago. The magician calls for an audience member to come on stage and assist him. He asks the usual "have you ever met me" questions. He hands the volunteer a audio tape cassette. The magician says he recorded it earlier today. He asks the volunteer to confirm it's just a regular tape cassette and to hold it for him. Then the magician goes back to the audience, picks 3 people at random. He asks them to write a number (like from 0 to 100. Or some range like that) on small slips of paper he hands them. Then he says to fold the papers in half so he can't see it. He collects them, while bantering with the audience. Who can see that he never looks at the papers. He then goes back on stage, hands the papers to his volunteer assistant, asks him to add up the numbers, and announce the total. We'll say it's 209. He then produces a tape player which the volunteer inspects and confirms it's a regular cassette player. He asks the volunteer to load the prerecorded cassette and play it. The audience can hear the magician's voice saying , "the total is 209."

It's a very simple illusion. The magician did prerecord a number on the tape. But he also wrote numbers on 3 slips of paper which total that number. He keeps these hidden in his sleeve, but accessible. After collecting the papers from the audience, he uses his sleight-of-hand skill to substitute his numbers for those the audience wrote. And he's distracting them with his banter. The volunteer on stage has no way of knowing those are not the numbers written by the audience. And the magician chooses audience members sitting widely apart from each other to write their numbers. So each one cannot know his number has been substituted.

Most all of these tricks--where the magician appears to accurately produce a result from a seemingly unknowable random process--work this way. It's some variety of substitution with audience distraction, and sleight-of-hand. Or in the OP trick, a specially prepared prop.

 

[Lost4words]

All just tricks.

My daughter did a trick with me which i thought was AMAZING!

She then explained how it was done. Lol

 

[GodsGrace101]

I realized the actual instructions are on the back of this paper. If I reverse it I can read a bit of it. Not enough to know how to do the trick, though...

The seller is selling the whole thing not just the instructions. If I had 650 dollars to throw away I'd be interested.

650!!!
Now that's a magic trick!
Getting strangers to send you a big amount of money for NOTHING!

Does anyone here remember the Amazing Kreskin?

Watch him on YouTube...
FOR FREE.

 

[keith99]

Having no sleight of hand skills but a devious mind I'll point out one way to accomplish this. Though one that is easily caught.

First the deck is rigged, 52 of the same card. My dad was into some simple stuff and I've seen a stripped deck where that is the case. You can show 52 different cards, but when turned and one card is selected it is always the same card and one the magician knows because the trick deck is specific to that card.

Again having absolutely no skill I'd have to go with something writing the name is a reflective medium and then having the right colored light (likely polarized) shine on the 'blank' paper revealing what was written there all along.

But that is just me. I'd bet Penn and Teller could give a half dozen or more ways that would work very nicely.

 

[Messerve]

According to what I could read, there's something involving a flap on the box which is held up by strong magnets. The removal tool releases that flap or something. That's all I could see.