Pencil Tricks: The Spin
Take a long pencil and hold it carefully between your index finger, middle finger and thumb. Make sure that your middle finger and index finger are at least an inch apart and all the fingers should be pointing upwards. You should grip the pencil very lightly with your middle finger and also relax your wrist. Now extend your index finger and fold your middle finger so that it is resting on the inside of its last joint exactly on the thumb. Move your index and middle finger in back and forth motion and keep this momentum. At first it might be a little difficult to this pencil trick, but with a little practice you will be able to master it.
Pencil Tricks: The Twist
Fold your hands and place them in front of you so that your fingers are pointing upwards. Now place a pencil horizontally in the webbed space between your thumbs and index fingers. Hold the pencil firmly in between your thumb and middle finger, turn the fingertips of your right hand away from your body and the fingertips of your left hand towards you. Now move the right thumb in the space between the left thumb and index finger. As your hands turn, your right thumb will move across the back of your left thumb. Tilt your hands forward when the fingers of your left hand are pointing towards your body. The pencil will move to the starting position.
Pencil Tricks: The Finger Roll Read entire article.
Before we talk about easy balisong tricks, let us know something about its interesting history. Balisong is a popular and glamorized type of Filipino pocket knife. Also known as a ‘Butterfly Knife’ (due to its twin handles) and ‘Beinte Neuve’ (Spanish for Twenty Nine) in some parts of the world. Other popular names include ‘click clacks’ and ‘fan knives’. A typical balisong is made up from layers of aluminum or brass connected together with pins. The two handles between which the blade is sandwiched are often covered with scales of rosewood, horn or other materials.
The word balisong is supposed to have been derived from a word in the Tagalog language (an Austronesian language spoken in Philippines) called baling sungay (meaning ‘broken horn’). That is because the original balisong knife was made from broken horns of animals. The first use of balisong type knives can be traced back to province in Philippines called Batangas. These knives are handmade there locally by specialists.
If we go way back in history, the first mention of a balisong like weapon called a ‘butterfly knife’ was made in a French book called ‘Le Perret’ in 1710. It has a detailed description of this knife and says that it was developed as a utility type of knife in the 16th century. There are two conjectures about its origin in history. One is that the balisong is an invention of ancient Filipino natives and it dates back to 800 AD being an integral part of a ancient fighting system in Philippines called Eskrima.
The other theory is that this kind of knife was transported to Philippines by the Spanish people who ruled the country. The spread of this weapon to United States of America occurred during the second world war. American soldiers returning to US from the Pacific islands brought the balisong to US and popularized it there as a pocket or utility knife. It is also used as a fighting weapon by some people and for amusement in the form of flipping it as an art form. In the next section we will have a look at basic balisong tricks that anybody could learn.
How to Do Balisong Tricks?
Before we go ahead with basic balisong tricks, let me talk about some safety measures. Wear protective boots while practicing and make sure that you put thick tape over the sharp edge of the knife to prevent injury. Even with the tape practice carefully.
Partial Open Vertical Flip
Let us have a look at the most basic trick called the partial open flipping trick. There are many more ways to open this type of a knife, but this one’s the simplest one. Open the latch of the balisong which is normally on the handle that is other than the safety handle. Begin with the initial position. Hold only the safe handle of the balisong and let the other hang down in vertical fashion. From this position, the objective is to open the blade fully, without using hands. Make sure that your thumb is safely out of the way. Read entire article.
Lead researcher Tolga Ergin explained that the cloak is composed of a grouping of crystals with air spaces between them, similar to a pile of wood. As light passes through the crystals, it bends, hiding the bump in the layer of gold beneath. The bump was extremely tiny – only .00004″ high and .0005″ wide – and could be seen only with a magnifying lens. The team designed what Ergin called a “photonic metamaterial” that was able to influence the behavior of light rays. The design is based on a “carpet cloak” that was first suggested by Professor Sir John Pendry of Imperial College London. Pendry proposed the theory of having an object hidden beneath a bump, and then making the bump invisible. “It’s like a carpet mirror,” Ergin said. “If you hide an object under it, there is a bump, so you see a distortion in the reflected image. We put the carpet cloak on top of that bump and it bends the light so that the distortions disappear.”
Under this experiment, the reflective surface (carpet) appeared to be flat. The team used “laser writing” to create the cloak, using a tightly focused laser beam to “write” on light-sensitive material. Ergin explained, “Wherever you put the focus spot into the material, it will harden. It’s a similar process to photography – when you develop it, whatever hasn’t been exposed to the laser will be washed away.”
Invisibility cloaks use special materials to deflect light, radar, or other waves that flow around an object, similar to water flowing around a smooth pebble in a babbling brook. Invisibility is different from stealth technology, which is not designed to make an airplane invisible, but instead to reduce the cross-section image available to radar.
Professor Ortwin Hess, of the University of Surrey, called the study a “huge step forward” in demonstrating invisibility in three dimensions. He said this great achievement and the photonic materials developed by the team could be used in the future development of lenses, as well as in optical circuitry and light storage. Hess acknowledged that a true invisibility cloak is a long way off, but Ergin’s results showed a remarkable proof of the principle. Read more on Magic and Optical Illusions. Read entire article.
Jumping Rubber Band
In this magic trick, the rubber band mysteriously gets shifted from your little finger and ring finger, to the first and middle finger of the same hand and back again. You can use a normal rubber band or a hair band. To begin hold your hand up and wrap the rubber band around your little and ring finger. Make sure the rubber band is right at the base of the fingers, as the back of your hand faces the audience. With the other hand, stretch the rubber band and fold your first, little, ring and middle finger into the loop. Rest your fingers properly in the loop by folding them against your palm. Now quickly, open your palm, removing the little and ring finger first, so that the rubber band jumps to the other two fingers. With a little bit of practice, you will be able to master this rubber band magic trick. Read more on how to learn magic tricks.
Double Jumping Rubber Bands
This is a variation of the earlier mentioned trick. To do one of these interesting rubber band tricks, you will need two rubber bands of different colors. Once again you can use hair bands too. Hold up your palm with the back of the palm facing the audience. Wrap one rubber band around your little and ring finger and the other band around your middle and first finger. Make sure the rubber bands are resting at the base of your fingers. With your other finger, stretch the rubber band looped in your first and middle finger towards the other two fingers. Through the loop, get the second rubber band and stretch it. Place all the fingers in the loop. If you are performed the trick correctly, all the fingers will be trapped in two loops, but will look as one. Now quickly open your hands and see the rubber bands interchange themselves. If you are looking, for a more complex magic rubber band tricks read on learning magic tricks for kids.
Revised Version
To make this trick work, you will need two rubber bands of different colors. Hold up your palm, with its back facing the audience. Wrap the rubber band around your little finger and the ring finger and push it down to the base. Loop the second rubber band on top of your little finger. Keep looping (twisting) the second rubber and to loop the rest of the fingers, except the thumb. Now you have one rubber band in your little and ring finger and the other looped around all the other fingers. Set up the jumping rubber band, as mentioned in the first trick. Now once you open your palm, the rubber band would have jumped to the other two fingers! Read entire article.