Marble Sight: Devin Knight

MARBLE SIGHT #13 In The Psychic Sight Series

See What Can’t Be Seen

DEVIN KNIGHT

Marble Sight Copyright © 2018 Devin Knight Magic No part of this PDF can be copied or duplicated without express written permission from the author.

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MARBLE SIGHT SEE WHAT CAN’T BE SEEN To do these effects, you will two sets of marbles, different colors. These can also be the flat glass pebbles sold for use in vases for decorations. These are available in all colors, but I prefer the blue pebbles and white pebbles. These are usually sold in bags of 500. You can buy these in craft stores, toy stores, or off Amazon. You will need one bag of each color. Also you will need a big opaque drawstring bag or pouch to hold the marbles or pebbles needed for the effect. You can buy these off of Amazon.com. The bag has to be big enough for a person to put his hand into and remove marbles. See Photo 1.

PHOTO 1

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Finally, you will need three small cereal bowls. If I am using the blue and white marbles, I will use a blue bowl, white bowl and a clear bowl. If you can’t find matching color bowls, then it is alright to just use three identical bowls of the same color. All these effects are variations of Stewart James’ Miraskill found in Jinx #24. Some mentalists may wish to perform these routines as a demonstration of remote viewing. This is my preferred presentation. The effects are basically self-working and very baffling to an audience. This was a feature in Jason Michael’s psychic act. AN UNCANNY PREDICTION - FIRST EFFECT The audience is told that on a table in the next room is a drawstring pouch full of glass marbles, both blue and white plus three small bowls on the table. A person is chosen from the audience (no stooge) to go into the next room and reach into the pouch and blindly remove two marbles. If both marbles are blue in color, he is to put them into the blue bowl. If both marbles are white, then he places both of them in the white bowl. If the two marbles are both blue and white, then they go into the clear bowl. This is repeated until all the marbles have been transferred into each of the three bowls. Your spectator is cautioned to pick the marbles at random and not choose which ones to pick, but to ensure the marbles are removed at random.

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In the meantime, the mentalist is sitting in an apparent trance as he remote views what is happening in the other room; he writes a prediction on a slip of paper and leaves it in full view. When the spectator is done, he is to bring the three bowls back into the main room. I like to have the three bowls and the drawstring bag on a tray for ease in doing this. Once the spectator is back in the room, the performer reads his prediction: You will have two more blue marbles in the blue bowl, than the white marbles in the white bowl. The spectator counts the marbles in both bowls and it is seen that the mentalist is 100% correct. The performer doesn’t touch the bowls or marbles before the spectator counts them. This eliminates the possibility of the mentalist using sleight of hand. The marbles are placed back into the pouch and the effect may be immediately repeated with different results with a second spectator! Positively no skill or tricky counting, the spectator does everything in a fair manner. This looks like real remote viewing! If you prefer, you can have a prediction in full view of the audience that predicts the results beforehand instead of apparent remote viewing. No secret writing of any kind and nothing is gimmicked!

METHOD You start with 30 marbles in the pouch; you don’t tell the audience how many marbles in the bag, just refer to it as a bag full of blue and white marbles. 16 are blue marbles and 14 are white marbles, making 30 marbles all mixed. From now one, the method is self-working, believe it or not. 5

The spectator will always end with two more blue marbles in the blue bowl than white marbles in the second bowl. It’s a mathematical principle. The mixed colors in the clear bowl are ignored.

REPEATING THE EFFECT For the second effect, all the marbles are placed back into the pouch and the performer secretly adds 4 white marbles to the bag, bringing the total of marbles to 34. This is done under the misdirection of bringing up a second spectator. This effect is a repetition of the first effect, except that the mentalist writes that the second person will end up with two more white marbles than blue marbles. Again the method is self-working, because there are now 34 skulls in the bag, 16 blue and 18 white. The audience will never notice that there are now four more marbles in play. Try this and you will see how well it plays, it appears impossible unless the mentalist had the power of remote viewing. REVEALING THE NUMBER OF BLUE MARBLES HIDDEN IN A PAPER BAG. Here is a stand-alone effect that can be extremely baffling. In my opinion it is the gem of this release and will fool magicians. Start with your pouch or bag containing 18 blue and 18 white marbles for a total of 36 marbles. Don’t tell the audience how many marbles are in the bag; just refer to bag as containing a mixture of blue and white marbles. A spectator is given a paper bag and is told to go into the next room and take two marbles at one time out of the pouch and place them into the paper bag. He is told NOT to look at the colors of the marbles he 6

puts into the paper bag. It could be a combination of blue/blue, white/white or blue/white as long has he takes two marbles at a time. He must do this several times, say about four or eight times, and he is to remember how many times he dipped his hand into the marble pouch to remove two marbles. This is important! The spectator is then told to return to the main room, bringing both his paper bag and the pouch containing the marbles. He is then asked to tell the audience what he did and how many times he dipped his hand into the marble pouch. The mentalist then asks, “Do you know how many blue marbles are in the paper bag.” The spectator should answer, “No”, provided that he didn’t look inside the paper bag before entering the room. “I do!” says the mentalist, “I know the results of what you did.” The mentalist concentrates for a few seconds and then says, “You will have four less blue marbles in your paper bag, then there are white marbles in the marble pouch.” Another way to put it is, “You have left four more white marbles in the marble pouch than you have blue marbles in your paper bag.” The spectator with the paper bag is told to count the blue marbles inside the bag while someone else count the white marbles left inside the marble pouch. It turns out the mentalist is 100% correct. This is done without the mentalist touching either of the two bags. METHOD The key number is 18 (half of 36, the total number of marbles) when the spectator tells how many times his hand was dipped into the 7

marble pouch, say 4, the mentalist doubles that number to make it 8 and subtracts 8 from 18 to arrive at 10, which is the number of how many more white marbles are the pouch than there are blue marbles in the paper bag. Another example, say the person dipped his hand into the pouch 7 times, the mentalist doubles that number to make 14 and subtracts 14 from 18 to arrive at 4, which is the number of how many more white marbles in the pouch than there are blue marbles in the paper bag. There are also 4 more blue marbles in the pouch than there are white marbles in the paper bag. It works both ways. The important thing in this presentation is to instruct the spectator to place only one hand into the marble pouch and to only take two marbles at a time and place them into the paper bag with noticing the colors.

TO DIVINE THE NUMBER OF COLORED MARBLES TAKEN BY 3 PEOPLE Here is a clever version using a two-way change bag with just two compartments. Try to use a plain change bag that doesn’t look like a magic prop. In other words, don’t use one with a tassel on the bottom of the bag. The plainer looking the bag, the better. You can use a standard change bag or one of the flat bags often used by mentalists. The change bag must be opaque. Inside the first compartment of the change bag, place 7 blue marbles and 5 white marbles. These are both in the same compartment. The flap is pushed over revealing the empty compartment. 8

Into this compartment place 24 marbles, 13 blue and 11 white. These figures 13 and 11 must be memorized by the mentalist. Place the change bag on the table and you are set to perform. You will also need two regular small lunch paper bags. The mentalist states that he will try a very difficult test, as will be seen. He picks up the change bag and shakes it so that the audience hears the marbles inside. Reaching into the compartment with the 24 marbles he grabs a handful of marbles and lets them dribble back into the change bag, this is repeated two or three times as the mentalist tells the audience this bag is full of blue and white marbles. The mentalist invites two spectators to come forward. The performer invites the first spectator to put his hand into the change bag and take three handfuls of marbles and place them inside one of the lunch bags. The mentalist cautions him to not let him see how many marbles he has taken. The mentalist looks away while the spectator is doing this. The mentalist may invite this person to take more marbles, if he wishes. The mentalist states, “I do not know how many marbles have been taken. I will now take a few for myself and place them inside this bowl.” The performer removes all the remaining marbles from the compartment that held the 24 marbles and places them in a small glass bowl. Again, these are taken from the same side. The first 9

change bag compartment is now empty. He shakes the change bag so the audience can hear there are still marbles inside. The mentalist now switches the compartments revealing the 12 marbles in the 2nd compartment. (5 white and 7 blue) He dumps the entire contents of the change bag into the paper bag held by the second spectator. “I am going to tell each of you exactly how many marbles each of you have and also how many white marbles and blue marbles each of you have.” A seemingly impossible feat; unless you really had the powers of second-sight. The performer then counts his marbles and subtracts that total from 24. Assume the performer has 7 marbles, he then tells the first spectator that he has 17 marbles. If the performer has the spectator take three handfuls of marbles from the change bag, then he the performer will only have a small amount of marbles left to count. It is easy with a little practice to glance at the glass bowl, especially if it is clear and quickly count the number of marbles in the bowl without having to physically remove them. In other words this is a visual count. With a little practice, you will see how easy this is! The mentalist next informs the second person that he received 12 marbles, 5 white and 7 blue. This was a previously

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known amount since you placed them beforehand in the second compartment. The mentalist now VISIBLY counts the number of white marbles in his bowl. Assume there are 4 white marbles. The mentalist subtracts 4 from 13 (the high number of the two he memorized and gets 9 which is the number of white marbles the first spectator has in his paper bag. Subtract 9 from the total the total of marbles (17) and you get the number of blue marbles (8). The mentalist need only count his white marbles in the bowl and disregard the blue ones. NOTE: You may wish to use the Nelson Paper change bag as described in his: Miracles in Mentalism. This bag is used to hold the 24 marbles instead of a standard change bag.

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