Easy Card Trick

you've probably seen a beginner version of this trick where the cards are not shuffled before the trick starts and they definitely don't show you that the cards are mixed up from the front before starting the trick Now you'll ask a spectator to just select a card at random Really is a free choice Let's say they pick this card Now I'm really going to look away and I'm going to show you that card I have no idea what card is there but place it back somewhere in the center of the pack or square the cards up Then they can cut a few times We can even turn them face up and cut them We really want this card to be lost somewhere in the deck where no one can know where it is No one knows what card it is They just know it's lost somewhere in there And now I'm going to just start dealing cards And I want them to just just think really hard about their card And as I deal I'm going to try to get a feel for where I think their co where the I think this is their card Here's your card The two of clubs The secret to this trick is really simple Now there is a setup to this trick but it's different than the beginner version So what we do is we set these cards up in order for the first 13 cards So you notice it's ace 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Jack queen king Now the main difference is when you learn this trick for the first time as a beginner they're going to tell you to take all the same cards from one suit So these would all be hearts for example And that works because these are your kind of marker cards so you can find the card later But the problem with that is you can't just show the cards right so I couldn't spread them out If these were all hearts it'd be very obvious what I did So instead I picked a random set of 13 cards and I put tiny little marks on each one of these Now you'll notice you're not seeing those marks right now I'm positive of it right but if you look closely you'll see that just below the pip on each side of the card I put a tiny little dot just small enough for me to see it but no one's ever going to notice that Now these aren't marked cards per se right because it's on the front of the card It's not the back So no one's ever going to even looking at that or expecting that Now I used a black marker on even the red cards cuz no one's going to notice it But if you're concerned that someone might notice the marks you can use a red Sharpie for the red cards and a black Sharpie for the black cards and that tiny dot will go unnoticed every single time Now you'll put these cards in order ace through king right at the bottom of the deck and you're ready to start the trick Now the shuffle that I did was really just an overhand shuffle making sure that I didn't lose the bottom portion of the deck So I throw a few cards off the top I throw a few more cards off the top a few more and then I put the entire chunk on top and I keep my index finger in here to pick that whole chunk up I just put those cards right back at the bottom And I can complete the shuffle on top of those and I haven't disrupted the bottom 13 cards Now you can even show them mixed up No one's going to notice that these are in order because the suits are different and you're not given enough time to really think about it It just looks like a mixed up deck of cards Now as you show these cards you'll just kind of start from the top and say "Pick a card at random." You're going slowly because you want them to pick one of these top cards before you get to the bottom 13 But if they do pick one of those bottom 13 I'll explain what to do in a minute Whatever card they get in this case let's say it's the four of clubs You're going to hold the cards in your hand You're going to cut them placing their card on top of the deck and then finish the cut by placing the ace on top of their card Now that should just feel like you randomly lost their cards somewhere in the deck Now you can cut the cards as many times as you want You won't disturb the order You'll just change the starting point And then at some point you have to flip the cards over and say "Look you could even cut these face up to really see that they're mixed up." And as I'm cutting these cards I'm just looking for any card with a dot And I see one here right now That's that's one of the dot cards So I can stop cutting now And four is the answer So their card is going to be fourth from the top of the deck Because these cards are in order and that's the fourth card I know that if I count one two three four cards that's where the card's going to be Had I cut a few cards deeper let's say to here when we saw the seven I would know the card is seventh from the top because I added three more cards So 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 That's going to be their card Once I know which position their card's at I can use many methods to reveal it But I like to just act like I'm just dealing randomly but I'm really counting I know that's four five in my head six And I'm going to throw this card but then I'll pause Hold on I think I think yeah this this is your card and you flip it up Now what do you do if your spectator is not playing along you're going slow and they're waiting and waiting and waiting You get all the way to the end They take one of these cards Well it's pretty simple because you know what these cards are already So let's say they pick this card I know it's the two because this is the ace That's got to be the two If they take any of these first few cards I can just count them as they're taking it Oh that's the four I know it's the four before we do anything So now I can do some other trick where I just reveal it without even touching the cards I know which card they picked Let's say they go a little bit higher into the stack and I don't know exactly which one of those cards it is I know that's one of the mark cards I just don't know which one It's fine because I can place that back in the deck anywhere It doesn't matter And now as I spread the cards out all I have to do is look at the numbers 1 2 3 4 5 6 eight I know they had to have taken the seven It's the one that's missing from the stack