• last year
Transcript
00:00 (mystical music)
00:02 - All right, this is Ring Heist.
00:13 This is an illusion I've been working on
00:15 for over 10 years now.
00:17 Had a lot of fun with it, and I know you will too.
00:19 Let's check it out.
00:20 This is a borrowed finger ring
00:23 tied on one strand of rubber band.
00:26 We actually need two bands.
00:29 And the idea is to try to make this ring
00:32 jump from one band to the other.
00:35 Looks something like this.
00:38 Look, we actually get that ring to jump to the other band,
00:44 and I can actually scoop it up,
00:46 put it back on the band as well,
00:47 back and forth, just like that.
00:50 And so I put it on a different rubber band,
00:53 and I can actually hand you that band
00:55 with a ring on it.
00:58 And you can keep that as a souvenir.
01:00 And that is Ring Heist.
01:02 All right, this is Ring Heist.
01:05 In 2001, I was playing with an illusion
01:09 that I saw Dan Harlan perform on his tape,
01:12 Magic Rubber Bands.
01:14 Yeah, it was on tape.
01:15 Yeah, it was back in the day,
01:16 that's what I'm talking about, it was on tape.
01:17 I got the mixed tape, all right, check it out.
01:19 But here's the illusion.
01:21 Actually looks like there are two bands here,
01:24 like that.
01:27 It's actually just one rubber band,
01:28 it's just the way that the band,
01:30 the orientation of the band, actually.
01:33 And so I actually changed the orientation,
01:35 and I changed it this way.
01:37 I thought, okay, that's pretty cool.
01:39 And I was just sitting in my car,
01:40 just playing with this over and over again,
01:41 going back and forth, and I had a crazy idea.
01:43 I was like, well, I just wanna see what it would look like
01:46 if you actually put something on the band
01:48 and still did that, okay?
01:49 I had no idea what was gonna happen,
01:51 but when I did, when I tried it out,
01:54 I saw that the ring actually looked like
01:57 it was jumping from one band to the other.
02:00 And at that moment, I started freaking out.
02:02 I was like, because I knew I was onto something,
02:04 I knew I had something right there.
02:06 You know that feeling when you discover something,
02:08 and it's like, oh man, this is gonna be something.
02:10 So I kept doing that over and over again,
02:11 just like that, back and forth, back and forth,
02:13 and I kept playing with it back and forth like that.
02:15 So then I started to change the orientation
02:18 of the bands this way and that way
02:20 to get a little more freedom of the bands,
02:24 a little more separation of the ring and band like that.
02:27 Now I then showed this to Daniel Garcia,
02:30 and he actually included it in his lecture notes,
02:34 and he actually made a little brief cameo
02:36 on his Daniel Garcia projects,
02:38 I believe it was one through, sorry,
02:40 yeah, one through three, he made a cameo in there.
02:43 So shout out to Daniel Garcia, thank you very much.
02:45 I've also discovered a magician called Russell Leeds,
02:48 who has a similar looking illusion,
02:50 which may have been independently inspired
02:52 by the same illusion, so if you're interested,
02:56 you can check him out as well.
02:57 But this is my take, and this is called Ring Heist.
03:01 All right, so let's get into Ring Heist.
03:04 What you're gonna need is a borrowed finger ring.
03:07 Of course, I recommend having one of your own
03:10 to practice with.
03:11 Once again, all rings are not created equal.
03:13 Different sizes, different designs
03:16 are going to create different situations,
03:18 so I want you to be able to at least practice
03:20 with one ring on your own,
03:21 and then the more and more you do this for people,
03:23 the more you'll see how weight does play a factor into it.
03:26 You also need a rubber band.
03:30 Now, I usually do this back to back with slingshot.
03:33 I do slingshot first, which makes the ring
03:36 tied on the rubber band like that.
03:42 It ends up tied on like that.
03:43 And that is the beginning of Ring Heist.
03:49 So you just tie it on, and you put your finger
03:53 in your thumb.
03:55 Your first finger in your thumb will be right hand
03:56 in the bands, having the ring on the bottom.
03:58 You don't want it on top like that.
04:02 That is no, this is yay.
04:05 Okay?
04:06 You wanna have that on the bottom, just like that.
04:10 You don't want it in the middle.
04:12 You want it closer to your thumb.
04:16 Not in the middle, closer to your thumb.
04:18 Not pressed against your thumb, like that.
04:22 Just a little bit away from the thumb.
04:23 Very, very important.
04:25 Okay?
04:26 All right.
04:27 So we're gonna get into just the band itself,
04:31 and then we're gonna show you how to add a second band.
04:34 Okay, so from here, what you're gonna do,
04:36 the palm is toward the audience, okay?
04:39 Right now.
04:40 You're gonna reach in with your left hand palm down.
04:46 You're gonna extend your middle finger up,
04:50 and your first finger down, okay?
04:53 That's how you're gonna reach in for the grip, okay?
04:56 So you're gonna reach in,
04:58 and that bottom strand closest to your finger,
05:00 you wanna get close to your finger,
05:02 is gonna clip it down like this.
05:04 You're clipping the bottom strand,
05:08 and you're gonna rotate your hand palm up, okay?
05:15 Now when you do, this thumb
05:16 is gonna be right next to your finger, your first finger.
05:21 Okay, so you're coming up, you're clipping it,
05:24 and as you twist, you're gonna have your thumb just join in.
05:27 All right?
05:28 Thumb joins in the party.
05:29 Goes like that.
05:31 And you're gonna bring it forward like this.
05:36 Now what's gonna happen
05:38 is you're going to get that thumb in that hole.
05:43 So basically you're twisting,
05:45 creating a second hole right there.
05:49 That's what you're really doing.
05:51 Since your thumb is already there,
05:53 you're going to allow that to expand like this.
05:57 Once again, the fingers are gonna create a hole,
06:01 and that thumb is gonna go in there.
06:03 So you do it like this, clip down,
06:06 your thumb joins in as you create that hole.
06:11 You open up your first finger and your thumb.
06:13 You can take out your middle finger,
06:15 and you have this crazy design right here.
06:17 All right?
06:17 That's not the design we want.
06:19 To complete the illusion,
06:19 you want to put your fingers together like that, okay?
06:24 So that is the illusion
06:27 that we're trying to create right there.
06:28 All right?
06:29 So from here, clip, your thumb comes in,
06:34 forming that, but remember,
06:37 you gotta keep your fingers together.
06:40 All right?
06:41 So that's the illusion that we created.
06:42 Up to speed looks like this, like that.
06:45 It's really simple, really fast.
06:47 Just keep practicing that and you'll get it, okay?
06:50 So we have it like that.
06:51 Now, if you just switch positions,
06:53 if you just take your fingers off
06:55 and then touch your thumbs together,
06:57 you see it's just that one strand that's moving.
07:02 That's all that's moving is that one strand.
07:04 You're giving the illusion that it's jumping
07:06 from one band to the other.
07:08 Of course, if you do it this slow,
07:10 they can see the illusion, the illusion is lost.
07:11 So you want to kind of throw the ring on.
07:15 It's nice to just go like that, it's fine,
07:17 but the idea is to kind of throw the ring on it.
07:20 You want to throw it like that.
07:22 So kind of pick it up, throw it on there.
07:25 Pick it up, you know, so it's up, you know?
07:29 You're kind of throwing it on there like that.
07:31 What you're gonna do now is,
07:34 since now you know exactly how it works,
07:38 what you're gonna do is you're going to
07:40 cross the bands like that, okay?
07:44 This completes two different illusions.
07:45 So it makes it look like there's one band going that way
07:47 and a second band going this way, opposite directions, okay?
07:50 So it doesn't look like there's one band.
07:52 Looks like there's two bands there, okay?
07:54 Same thing with the first finger.
07:57 When you have the first finger like that,
07:58 twist it like that.
08:00 Don't keep it aligned because the two lines together
08:03 will kind of blend everything together.
08:04 You don't want to blend everything together.
08:05 You want to show clearly two different rubber bands,
08:09 two separate rubber bands, okay?
08:11 That's the illusion that you want.
08:12 That's the illusion that you want, okay?
08:14 That, like that.
08:16 Not straight up and down, but sideways like that, okay?
08:20 So now, now we know how to do it.
08:24 Here's how you play with it.
08:25 Here we go.
08:26 You have it on there,
08:27 and you don't immediately go down like this
08:29 and make a switchover.
08:31 What you want to do is you show that the ring
08:33 is on one strand of the band,
08:36 and you go down.
08:38 You go straight down.
08:39 You don't go on top of the band.
08:40 You go down like that
08:42 so they can still see that it's on one band like that.
08:46 That kind of throws people off
08:48 who may know this illusion, all right?
08:50 So it's still staying on that one band.
08:54 Now when you're ready,
08:55 you can go on top, which switches over,
08:58 and you do the same thing that way.
09:00 You go to show that it really is on that one strand, okay?
09:05 Once it's on the thumb, you're going to scoop it up.
09:08 You don't just go on top and just flip it over.
09:10 You kind of scoop it up
09:11 like you're taking it off of the band, okay?
09:15 You can do that one more time.
09:16 And really, you're trying to do this
09:18 over and over and over again.
09:19 You really want to just have it like this.
09:24 So you have it, boom, down, and go like that.
09:27 Scoop it up and down.
09:30 Up, down, scoop up, down.
09:34 Okay, that's all you do.
09:36 You don't have to go like this over and over and over again.
09:38 You don't have to go like this over and over and over again.
09:40 Just scoop up, down, put on, down like that, okay?
09:45 Once your thumbs are touching,
09:49 you're going to rotate your palms up, okay?
09:53 Rotate your palms up.
09:54 That's gonna put this thumb into that loop right there.
09:59 So you're actually going like this.
10:01 You're feeding that thumb right into that top band like that.
10:06 Keep going, let go of that thumb now,
10:15 and then put your left pinky in that hole right there.
10:21 That's gonna complete the illusion again
10:22 of this band is one band, and this band is a second band.
10:29 Okay?
10:30 It's really easy.
10:32 And you stop right there,
10:33 because the illusion right now is done.
10:35 You see, now it has actually jumped
10:36 from one band to the other.
10:38 It's now in the second band, okay?
10:39 To clean up, what you're gonna do is
10:42 you're going to put your fingers in,
10:44 all right, that this strand right here,
10:50 this band right here, and you're going to open it up
10:53 and put your whole hand inside, okay?
10:57 So from here, your hand goes in.
11:00 You're gonna put your whole hand inside,
11:04 back to the wrist.
11:06 Now, everything is completely covered here,
11:08 and you really want that to happen.
11:10 So they get the illusion that you're taking one band
11:13 and putting it on the wrist.
11:15 Just let it go there.
11:16 Here's what's really going on.
11:17 There's a lot going on back there,
11:18 but that is hidden, just like this.
11:20 So you put that band on the wrist.
11:22 Now you're gonna turn toward them,
11:24 and it's still covered.
11:26 You're gonna grab the ring,
11:28 and you're gonna pull the rubber band off,
11:31 and you're really pulling that same band
11:32 that you just put on.
11:33 So basically, this is what's happening.
11:34 You're putting it on like that.
11:36 You come back, it's still undercover.
11:37 You're gonna grab the ring and pull everything off, okay?
11:42 So it looks like this.
11:44 Go a little bit faster.
11:48 Like that.
11:51 You're gonna grab that, put it over your wrist,
11:56 and as you come up, grab the ring,
11:58 and pull it right off like that, okay?
12:02 So it looks like there's two different bands.
12:04 You put one on your wrist,
12:05 and then you gave them the one that it's on.
12:07 And up to speed, it looks like this.
12:10 You take the band on your wrist,
12:13 and you give them the ring and the rubber band to hold.
12:17 You have it as a souvenir, and there you go.
12:21 Now we're gonna go over adding that second band
12:25 at the very, very beginning, all right?
12:28 And I went through many variations.
12:30 You'll see people doing,
12:31 whenever they wanna add a second band,
12:35 a lot of people will do something like this,
12:37 and then just go into a move,
12:39 whatever trick they're doing to add a band.
12:41 But what I've discovered is that
12:43 you can actually just double wrap a band like that,
12:49 so you don't get this weird illusion that,
12:52 I'm not sure if anything came off,
12:54 so you're actually going to take something
12:55 off of your wrist, okay?
12:57 That's why I like to do the double wrap.
12:59 You're at this moment right here.
13:02 Right before you do the move, you say,
13:03 "Oh wait, I need another band."
13:06 And you grab that second band,
13:08 and they can see that it's clearly coming off of your hand.
13:10 Something is coming off of your hand at this point.
13:12 This is what's going on underneath.
13:14 Okay?
13:17 They can clearly see something's coming off of your hand,
13:20 and you're using that with your middle finger
13:21 of the right hand.
13:22 So it comes off,
13:23 and you're just going to let it go.
13:27 You're going to let it go as you do the move,
13:29 like that.
13:34 So it looks like you're taking something off.
13:37 They can clearly see something is coming off of the wrist.
13:40 So once again, you say, "Oh, I need another band."
13:44 You just get that under your right middle finger,
13:47 pull forward.
13:50 Once it clears, let it go as you get into the move,
13:55 like that.
13:56 All right?
13:58 A little bit of misdirection helps here as well.
14:01 And then you go from there.
14:02 You just do the same things, the same things here.
14:04 Get it on.
14:11 Put that back on your wrist.
14:13 Give them the ring, or the rubber band.
14:18 They can have that as a souvenir.
14:20 And that is Ring Heist.
14:22 All right, so here's a couple notes on Ring Heist.
14:28 Now, there is going to be a tendency,
14:32 when you first start performing this,
14:34 you're really going to try to rush this movement right here.
14:36 You know, you really want to get this over with.
14:38 It's like, "Uh, hurry up and get there."
14:40 Okay?
14:41 And also the same thing about taking one of the bands off
14:46 all at once.
14:47 You know, you may do it great by yourself
14:49 in front of a mirror,
14:50 but when you start doing this for people,
14:52 you're going to find out that this move,
14:53 you want to hurry up and try to get there to this moment.
14:56 You know, it's all just nerves.
14:58 And the more you perform, and the more prepared you are,
15:01 the easier it is to kind of get over that hump.
15:03 Okay?
15:04 But you do have to perform in order to get those nerves out.
15:06 Okay?
15:07 So, what I found is that you really don't have
15:11 to rush it at all.
15:12 Okay?
15:13 And you may not be rushing it by yourself,
15:14 but when you get in front of people,
15:15 you found that you are.
15:16 And just remember that.
15:17 You don't have to rush it.
15:18 Okay?
15:19 Because here's what's happening.
15:20 They clearly see that there's a ring on one rubber band.
15:26 Okay?
15:27 And even if I just did this,
15:29 I mean, it looks like, you know,
15:32 there's a second rubber band, you know?
15:34 And that illusion by itself is going to sell the whole thing.
15:38 So, by just taking this off,
15:40 at this moment,
15:42 you can look at them casually,
15:43 because they see you taking something off.
15:45 As soon as you get here,
15:47 look back at your hands,
15:48 it's already done.
15:48 And it may look fishy for a second,
15:52 but they're not going to question you at all on it
15:54 because they clearly see the two rubber bands
15:56 and this illusion of you showing it like this
15:59 is going to sell that.
16:00 Okay?
16:00 And that is something so small
16:03 because as soon as you pop that on the next rubber band,
16:06 they're not even thinking about the whole setup.
16:07 It is over.
16:08 Okay?
16:09 Right now, they're in the illusion.
16:10 It's too late for them to kind of backtrack.
16:12 Okay?
16:13 And by cleaning up, it's the same thing.
16:15 In the cleanup,
16:16 they're still reeling off of what just happened
16:19 with their ring.
16:20 As soon as you put it here,
16:22 you say, "Here, I'm going to give this to you as a souvenir."
16:24 And you can just pop it right off to them.
16:26 You know, it's not,
16:28 you don't have to really rush that either.
16:29 The illusion is over.
16:31 And they saw you putting something on your wrist
16:33 and you're giving them the rubber band to examine.
16:35 So, really just kind of take your time.
16:38 I know when you first start doing this,
16:40 you're going to want to rush
16:42 and just let it happen.
16:45 It's going to be a great illusion.
16:46 You're going to have a lot of fun with this, I know.
16:48 And that is Ring Heist.
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