Draven Reviews: Impale by SansMinds

 Title: Impale

Artist:  Jason Yu & Nicholas Lawrence

Producers: SansMinds Magic

Link: Available At Your Favorite Murphy’s Magic Dealer

Retail Price: $39.95 USD

Learning Difficulty: Easy

Length of DVD:  32 Minutes (Approx)

Includes:

• Instructional DVD
• Gaff Material

Features:

• Play All
• Menu
• SansMinds Products
• Credits

The preview for this trick had me hooked in a second.  A deck of cards is visually displayed.  A sharpie marker is touched to the back of the box, and like a hot knife through butter it melts clean through the deck.  Then cards are dumped out and the magic truly begins.  The deck box, deck, and marker are examinable.  My mind was impaled by the impossibility of this trick.

The gimmick for this trick (come on you knew there had to be one!) is pretty cleaverly constructed.  It should last a long time and it’s easy enough to use.  It’ll take you all of a few minutes to get everything set up and ready for use.  I would be mindful of your angles in situations where there is a high saturation of light because the mechanical aspect of the gimmick can (and will) flash.  This isn’t a huge concern though because I’ve played with this quite a lot in “natural” settings and it’s never been seen.  I’ve had to really work at it to get it to flash, but none the less it does so there ya go.  The trick is easy to learn and highly visual to perform making it an easy choice for any magician of any skill level.

Herman joins us on the DVD to discuss the handling and teaching of this trick which was created by two of SansMinds most creative in house talents: Jason Yu & Nicholas Lawrence.  The DVD is about thirty minute in length, give or take a minute or two, so it’s a fast study.

As an opener this is a wonderful opportunity to give someone a magical moment before they’re expecting it.  You can simply introduce yourself as a magician, pull out your sharpie, do a solid thru solid and then dump the cards out of the box and go on with whatever it was you wanted to show them. It’s a great off beat shocker perfect for close up, strolling, and street magic.  The only part about it that I think is overkill is the inclusion of a black art element to the gimmick which I’m not sure is needed.  I think if you want an overly open handling then the black art is a nice selling point, but that maybe over working it for some people.  This was the only aspect that had me sitting here scratching my head asking if it was really necessary?

Overall impression of this product is pretty darn good.  SansMinds has created a powerful close up illusion that’s going to become a reputation maker for you.  Check out Impale!  I’m sure you’re going to be pleasantly thrilled with it.  I know I was.

When I give my product scores below I am measuring them on a scale of 1 to 10. 1 Being absolute the worst score possible, and 10 being the absolute best, making a score of five average. The four points that I grade upon is Product Quality, Teaching Quality, Sound & Video Quality and Overall Quality.

Product Quality: 8

Price is perfect for a powerful close up illusion that is strong enough to stand on its own, but quite powerful to serve as an opener to your card routine.

Teaching Quality: 8

Herman is a good teacher.

Video & Sound Quality: 8

Great video and audio.

Overall Quality: 8

This is a solid product.  It’s going to be a worker for you for sure.

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