[quote]On 2004-09-05 12:36, MerlH wrote:
Milton Bradley sold an electronic toy version of this this and it is great, the eyes flash and the guradian talks. The trick was in a series called the Magic Works. When they were wholesaled out I bought over 2 dozen and sold them to magician friends of mine. Would not see it for any price now!

/quote]

There were 3 different effects in that Magic Works series and all of them were very good.
(Yep, I still have a few stockpiled, too!)

I have the Wellington version, it is very nice indeed. The coffin does all of the talking and a crystal with the "gaurdian" is etched on it, the spectator puts this on any card to start with. There is some neat modifications to this version that the Milton Bradley toy does not have. I like this effect a lot for a small group for a close-up session.

Bloody Jack, I like your idea as well. Please contact me when more are completed, I may be interested in purchasing one. I also build and collect many different types of electronic magic effects, check it out at: http://caputocollection.tripod.com/

Cheers,

Chuck

One of the more interesting events surrounding the Punx version occurred when he came to visit me in Houston about 1986. I had a copy of an East German magic magazine, and in it was a routine by Herbert M. Paufler called "Guru," in which a talking head, quite reminiscent of Senor Wences' head in the box (All Right!) moved its jaws as the script was read.

The irony was this. Paufler had built the props for Punx's original routine. Paufler quoted Punx's routine almost verbatim, without credit or permission, in the magazine. Punx was really ticked about this!

I have a new one of these still in a sealed box. If anyone is interested, please PM me. (I have the other two electronic pieces still in sealed boxes available, too!)

I have a new web site up and a smaller version coming out that does a TA Walters effect with similar props.
Check my new web site out you can get to it by clicking on my picture and the address is in my information.
It seems inappropriate to post the web site here.

Why not? It's a great site and a cool product! What is the size of Zarra?
Julie..I'll PM you.

Hey Slim
Julie is talking about the Milton Bradley toy.
I have not put anything out yet or taken anyones money.
I did not buy that eye of the idol because it looks like
a hong kong rip off of a Tenyo product.

I didn't realize that it was a ripoff. Now looking at the box it says FADA XIEDA. The one I got from Switzerland is at work so I can't check it...but it 's packaging looks much different. It won't bother me to tear it( the Hong Kong one) appart and make something else....The Fist of the Pharoah...Ha Ha.

Where may one obtain a cassette tape of Animal Safari? Somehow I have misplaced my copy.
bill
wmbrooks@aol.com

Good luck finding one. That has been out of issue for at least 30 years!

Thanks for the reply, Bill. Somewhere in this world there must be a cassette floating around.
bill

Wasn't that put out by George Schindler? If it was, he may have a copy of it.

After you have 50 posts, put an ad in the tricks for sale or trade.

I bought a cassette tape that had the "voice from another world" that talked about the planets... but I was not able to reconstruct the set up of the planets in which order. Does anyone out there know the set up. Thanks much...

Get the Punx book Once Upon a Time. Set up the board as given in the routine "Kismet." Then substitute a planet for each of the nine objects. As a finale, you could have Pluto as the last of the planets. Then reveal that Pluto could never be taken, because Pluto is no longer a planet.

Old thread, but for the sake of completeness...

The original Gardner item was published in the August 1960 Scientific American, and then republished in the 1966 book "New Mathematical Diversions," ch. 9, pgs. 103 - 112 It was also republished in "Martin Gardner Presents," pgs. 149 - 153, where several spin-off versions are referenced, including "Voice from Another World," and "Room for Doubt," among others.

Sorry for resurrecting an old thread, but I'm trying to design a routine based off the Martin Garden concept [that was largely expanded on in the David Copperfield Murder on the Orient express TV bit he did], but not with a square/rectangular grid, and more participants.

I'm comfortable with the mathematics and general algorithm, though the Tony Spina 'Room For Doubt' trick apparently has an extra aspect in it in also divulging which selected murder weapon was involved as well. This bit intrigues me - is there anywhere to read the instructions or watch at least a performance of the trick? My Google Fu has been failing me

Here is a listing for the mini version of Madam Zara, Bloodyjack put out in 2004 as his photo no longer works :-(

andy

Another impressive version of Martin Gardner's 3-by-3 Martix is the Feather of Horus by Alexander Roemer.

andy

Guardian of the Grave Milton Bradley electronic talking toy Magic Works

About 25 years ago my presentation:
A 3x3 matrix of 9 playing cards ie: ace through 9 (hodgepodge of suits) is placed face up on the table. The magician secretly manipulates a spectator to verbally select either the three of diamonds, five of hearts, or seven of spades. The magician shows an electronic talking toy named the Guardian and asks the spectator what other card to place the guardian on as a starting point. The magician activates the talking guardian toy and it then gives the spectator instructions of free choices of movement and tells the spectators to remove cards one by one until only the spectators selected card remains!

On a table from a magician's point of view starting at the left place an ace, a two, a three on the first row.
Then on the second row which will be above the first row place a four, a five, a six (of course these can be any suits i.e spades hearts clubs diamonds).
On the third row which will be above the other two rows place a seven, an eight, a nine.

It will look like this (magicians view ie: the Ace, two, three are closest to the magician's body):

7 8 9
4 5 6
A 2 3

Previously the magician must have forced a spectator to pick the 3 or 5 or 7 as their selected card.

And previously a spectator has a total free choice of where the starting position will be and has so stated.

The guardian toy is secretly programmed in front of the spectators so that it knows whether the force card was the three or the five or the seven. Here is how:
Magician pushes the big diamond button once to wake the guardian toy up and a rushing wind sound "whish whish" will occur meaning it is ready for further programming.
Now the magician pushes the little round button:
Once if the three is the selected card
Twice if the five is the selected card
Three times if the seven is the selected card

Note that the eyes will blink for each successful push of the round button and then the eyes will blink continuously waiting for the magician to program the starting position as being odd or even and this is done by the magician pushing the round button once to indicate the starting position is on an odd numbered card. The magician pushes the round button twice to indicate the starting position is on and even numbered card. The guardian toy will give an evil laugh and then say "welcome".

The spectator puts the guardian toy back on the starting card which had previously been designated by the spectator.

Spectator steps:
Step 1: The spectator pushes the big diamond. The guardian toy says "I'm not on XXX take it away".
The spectator or the magician removes the stated card.

Step 2: The spectator pushes the big diamond and the guardian toy then says "move XXX spaces".

The spectator physically moves the guardian toy on the available cards (never diagonally) and can retrace steps if wanted or if necessary.

The above Step one and step two is repeated eight more times thus removing 8 cards so the guardian toy ends up sitting on the final selected card!

Note that after the eighth card is removed there will be a pause (do not push any buttons) and the guardian toy says "I'm on XXX I'm alive whish whish" and goes to sleep.

Back in the mid to late 1990s I came up with a visual forcing method to get to the number 3 or the number 5 or the number 7. The way I did it was at the top of a white foam board I had the following numbers written:
1321543217
"As I run my finger across pointing to these single digits just say stop anywhere and wherever you stop I will then count forward that number to land on a final number that way we get a totally random selection".
Example if they stop me on the number five then I count forward five more landing on the seven as the final selection. I then point out one or two other scenarios that would have landed on a different final number.

I believe my method was a little more exotic than the above but it was similar to that. The above will work to arrive at a three or five or seven.

I had glued a little hook on the back at the top of the head of the guardian toy. Also the white foam board was made into a big stand with three horizontal rails one rail above each row where the spectator could quickly hook/unhook the guardian toy and move it as the guardian toy directed. This allowed a much larger audience to view the presentation. I had the nine playing cards positioned on three rows on the rails (of course I needed a very bottom rail for the first row of cards to sit on so in total there were four horizontal rails). Note that rails two and three did double duty ie: let three playing cards sit on them and also allow the guardian to be hooked onto the rail whereas the top rail did not have any playing cards but was there to allow the guardian toy to be hooked on top of the seven, the eight, the nine as necessary.

The very first rail was just to keep the ace, the two, the three held in place. Note that rails one, two, three kept the playing cards from falling off the board and allowed the audience to nicely see all the cards and see a guardian toy and also allowed the easy removal of a playing card when the guardian toy directed.

I varied the color and suit of the nine cards to make the presentation more colorful.
Below is roughly what the white foam board looked like with the dashes representing the four rails. On the back of the white foam board there were two big folding triangular supports.

132154321
Above is random number generator
---------
7S 8D 9H
---------
4C 5H 6C
---------
AH 2S 3D
---------

Another way to force the three, or five, or seven is to have a duplicate set of nine playing cards and have them arranged as follows:
4936852A7
Notice the three, five, seven is every third card.
Fan these cards so the spectators can see they are random and then tell a spectator to deal these cards into three piles. Then have them select the top card from any one of the three piles. It is the selected card that the guardian toy will have to reveal from amongst it's nine cards.

Well, I dug out my foam board stand and Guardian from storage and had forgotten that I had made nine big (about 8 inch by 4 inch) white cards each with a picture of a planet and its corresponding number (back in 2002 Pluto was still a planet so it was number nine).

My flip up random number generator along the top of the foam board is:
7 1 5 4 6 2 0 3 9 8
Spectator names a number then counts forward that many and will be 3 or 5 or 7 so the magician can now program the Guardian appropriately.