Price$20.00
Media TypeUtility Props
CategoryMentalism, Close Up
Date AddedJan 30, 2014
Wallet Weapon
Barnes, Lloyd
Enigma, Ltd.
(Based on 3 reviews)
The Wallet Weapon is a powerful, unique and dynamic utility device that you'll carry with you at all times.
Specifically designed to be built in to your wallet with materials you almost certainly have at home right now.
Switch playing cards, banknotes, predictions and even perform visual changes that leave you totally clean. The possibilities for this are only limited by your own imagination.
Easy to construct. One second reset. Perfect for walk around performers.
As with every Enigma Ltd product, this DVD comes in beautifully designed luxury packaging.
Run time: 59 mins.
Reviews
(Top ▲)
PROS
Audiences really love effects with cards to impossible locations. The card to wallet is a great effect. I really love creative card to wallet effects that use regular wallets. This effect is possibly one of the two best card to regular wallet effects available. The Other is the Wallet Transformer by Cameron Francis. I think both are very worthy purchases. What I like about this one is you have a folded card in one of the credit card slots that turns into their signed card. The method is very well thought out and the instruction is good. What I really like about this is that it is very self contained in your wallet. You set it up and it is good to go. All you need to do is do the routine, open the wallet and remove their signed card.
This is suitable for amateurs and pros. It would work well in close-up, walk-around, and parlor. I can’t see how it would be suitable for stage. It does involve a mercury card fold sleight, but the routine has huge cover and misdirection so you don’t even need to hide the move.
CONS
There are expensive wallets that will do card to wallet in impressive fashion. However, personally, I like to carry a regular wallet, not an expensive gimmick wallet. I personally like Cameron Francis’ Wallet Tranformer, but this one is really nice.
However, it just seemed to be a bit disjointed to me between the first card selection changing to a random card and the revelation of the original selection from the wallet. Good magic should always have logical flow. There should always be a “why” to each step. With my routine described below, you would just need to add a blank card to your deck of cards.
My twist on this is to hand them their selection and ask them to imagine the ink from their card rising off the card and swirling in the air. Then ask them to imagine the ink changing into a different card, any card, in mid air and falling back down on the blank card. When they open their hands, they will be surprised to see their card has gone blank. At this point, you talk about how their imagination was strong enough to remove the ink, but where did it go? Have them hand you the wallet and tell them that you keep a blank card in your wallet. Remove the folded card revealing the writing went to the card in the wallet. This routine bring a bit more theater and drama to the presentation, and it ties the two magic moments together more cleanly.
Happy magic trails to you.
Audiences really love effects with cards to impossible locations. The card to wallet is a great effect. I really love creative card to wallet effects that use regular wallets. This effect is possibly one of the two best card to regular wallet effects available. The Other is the Wallet Transformer by Cameron Francis. I think both are very worthy purchases. What I like about this one is you have a folded card in one of the credit card slots that turns into their signed card. The method is very well thought out and the instruction is good. What I really like about this is that it is very self contained in your wallet. You set it up and it is good to go. All you need to do is do the routine, open the wallet and remove their signed card.
This is suitable for amateurs and pros. It would work well in close-up, walk-around, and parlor. I can’t see how it would be suitable for stage. It does involve a mercury card fold sleight, but the routine has huge cover and misdirection so you don’t even need to hide the move.
CONS
There are expensive wallets that will do card to wallet in impressive fashion. However, personally, I like to carry a regular wallet, not an expensive gimmick wallet. I personally like Cameron Francis’ Wallet Tranformer, but this one is really nice.
Suggestions
I just love his routine! I think it is fabulous. In his routine, the participant first holds his wallet, and then selects and signs a card. He takes the card back, turns it over, and hands it to them to hold. He then causes their card to change to a different card in their hands. He then takes his wallet back, opens his wallet and removes their signed and now folded card from the wallet.However, it just seemed to be a bit disjointed to me between the first card selection changing to a random card and the revelation of the original selection from the wallet. Good magic should always have logical flow. There should always be a “why” to each step. With my routine described below, you would just need to add a blank card to your deck of cards.
My twist on this is to hand them their selection and ask them to imagine the ink from their card rising off the card and swirling in the air. Then ask them to imagine the ink changing into a different card, any card, in mid air and falling back down on the blank card. When they open their hands, they will be surprised to see their card has gone blank. At this point, you talk about how their imagination was strong enough to remove the ink, but where did it go? Have them hand you the wallet and tell them that you keep a blank card in your wallet. Remove the folded card revealing the writing went to the card in the wallet. This routine bring a bit more theater and drama to the presentation, and it ties the two magic moments together more cleanly.
Happy magic trails to you.
(Top ▲)
Before I start the review, a small rant about magic DVDs: I am so annoyed with magic DVDs that spend the first five to ten minutes showing me multiple performances of the same trick, and going on and on about how great the trick is. I've already bought the trick, why the need to continue to sell me on it? Also, when did this cooking show style of magic explanations happen? Why do I need to be told the items I need twice? I can just rewind!
All this aside, the effect looks really clean, the move is absolutely invisible, and the gimmick can be made into almost any hip pocket wallet. The preparation will take a little while, but once it's made, you are set to do over & over. And it doesn't get in the way of your normal, everyday wallet. The DVD does ramble on a bit and repeats itself, but the information, when we finally get it, is clear.
With a lot of options on the market for this kind of effect, this is an affordable, useable, natural option. If you are a beginner wanting to do a card to wallet effect without having to spend fifty to one hundred dollars, this is worth your attention.
I'm not a fan of the 'visual' changes taught on the DVD. It think this draws attention to the gimmick and the move, and will cause laypeople to want to examine the wallet. Even if they don't, the magic moment still happens at your crotch, which is not the ideal.
All this aside, I can't think of a cleaner card to wallet option for only twenty bucks. This is a great deal. If you don't do a card to wallet yet, this is a great place to start.
All this aside, the effect looks really clean, the move is absolutely invisible, and the gimmick can be made into almost any hip pocket wallet. The preparation will take a little while, but once it's made, you are set to do over & over. And it doesn't get in the way of your normal, everyday wallet. The DVD does ramble on a bit and repeats itself, but the information, when we finally get it, is clear.
With a lot of options on the market for this kind of effect, this is an affordable, useable, natural option. If you are a beginner wanting to do a card to wallet effect without having to spend fifty to one hundred dollars, this is worth your attention.
I'm not a fan of the 'visual' changes taught on the DVD. It think this draws attention to the gimmick and the move, and will cause laypeople to want to examine the wallet. Even if they don't, the magic moment still happens at your crotch, which is not the ideal.
All this aside, I can't think of a cleaner card to wallet option for only twenty bucks. This is a great deal. If you don't do a card to wallet yet, this is a great place to start.
(Top ▲)
Random I-Tunes Song of The Moment: Distant Early Warning by Rush
Lloyd Barnes: Wallet Weapon Review
One DVD, one DIY gimmick, 59 Minutes and $30 bucks. Is it gem or is it rubble? Stay tuned to find out.
Effect/Method
Signed card to wallet . . . or blank paper to money . . . or T&R card . . . or . . . or . . . or . . .
What you're getting is the instructions on how to create a utility device that can do (supposedly) the above effects and others. The device is designed to show a card (or other object) in your wallet. Then for that object to vanish secretly while you bring into view a duplicate object. It's a switching device, as I'm sure you've guessed.
However — this is a big fat "however" — after following the instructions exactly, the gimmick does not work as claimed. In fact, during the DVD, Lloyd Barnes constructs the gimmick and has exactly the same problem with the gimmick that I had when I created mine. He then tells you (not shows you) how to "fix" this problem. However, because he doesn't show you how to fix it, it's unclear exactly how to do what he says.
That, however, did not stop me from trying. All it did was make things worse. Without exposing too much, part of this gimmick relies on tension. If you don't get the tension just right, the gimmick will not work. Either it will cause part of the gimmick to pop out of your wallet, or it will prevent the card in the wallet from going to its proper secret location.
Creating the gimmick requires you to cut a hole inside of one of the pockets of your wallet. One of the fixes for the above problem that he suggests is to cut another hole in a second pocket in your wallet. I did not try that, and he said that he's never had to use that method ever. I did, however, cut the one hole in my wallet exactly as he taught on the video.
Based on the gimmick and how it works, I think the problem is that the location of the hole in the one pocket is in the wrong place. I can imagine placing the hole in a different specific place — he never discusses this; I just figured it out — possibly making the gimmick work more accurately. However, I'm not going to cut anymore holes in my wallet to find out.
The materials needed to construct this are readily available. If you have an old credit card/loyalty card, etc., a rubber band and a pair of scissors, you've got everything that you need. However, as mentioned above, the gimmick just doesn't quite come together like it should.
Ad Copy Integrity
Other than the fact that the gimmick doesn't work out the way it should, the ad copy is accurate. The reset is nearly instant. One thing that needs clarity is the claim that it's a utility device that can "Switch playing cards, banknotes, predictions and even perform visual changes that leave you totally clean." This is all true (assuming you can get the gimmick to work properly), however, it can only be set up to do one item in the list above.
In other words, you can't do a card switch at one table and a bill switch at the next. You have to modify the gimmick so that it's no longer a card switching gimmick, but a bill switching gimmick. This modification takes a minute or two.
Product Quality
Well . . . the DVD is easy to navigate. However, much of the footage is hard to watch due to the camera constantly refocusing. Some of the footage was "lost" because the camera was out of focus. The lighting seemed to fade in and out quite a bit as well. That aside, the teaching was pretty solid for the main gimmick. However, when it came to alternate ideas for the gimmick, there was little to no teaching.
He mentions that this could be used for bill switches, predictions, "confabulations," torn and restored card, color changes and more. He shows how to use it for a color change and for a bill switch. However, he merely explains how to use it for predictions. It was extremely confusing and vague at best. He gave no information on how to use it for "confabulations" as he called it. I can sort of imagine how I might do this, but again, nothing was explained.
Regarding the T&R card, I have no idea how this would work. The way the gimmick is made, there is no obvious way that I could conceive of that would allow you to use this for a T&R effect, and he does not explain how to at all.
Final Thoughts
The concept of this gimmick is simple enough, and it might possibly work better if I build it slightly differently from what he taught on the DVD. However, as it is, the instructions on the DVD do not work at all. The vanishing object — the one being switched out — ends up not hidden and right in plain view. If you're willing to take that risk, go for it.
However, from where I'm sitting, what you're getting is $30 worth of instructions that, when followed exactly, leave you a gimmick that does not work. Further, you also get a few ideas that range from, "I kind of see what he's talking about" to "I have no idea how that would work at all." Most of these are not explained at all. If I'm going to take a risk and punch a hole in my wallet, it had better be worth the risk. It wasn't. Now all I have is $30 coaster and a hole in my wallet.
Final Verdict:
1.5 Stars with a Stone Status of Rubble.