Budd-Ha!

Budd-Ha!
By Paul Budd
Written By Jeff Stone

Everyone,

Meet Paul Budd. He’s a fellow magi, SCM Magazine (see what I did there… using the new name…) subscriber, and a darn clever copy writer. Most of the ad copy for any products I’ve sold in the past was written by Mr. Budd. Lately Paul has developed an interest… nay… an obsession with the old Buddha Mystery Papers.

For the uninitiated, the workings of Buddha Mystery Papers can be found in several places, however, the best place that I’ve seen is in The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Magic Tricks by Tom Ogden. It even traces the history back to 1584 in Reginald Scot’s Discoverie of Witchcraft. There’s even a version that uses ungimmicked Buddha Papers in Modern Coin Magic called “Buddha’s Coin.”

Having said that, I will leave it to the ambitious reader to do his/her homework and learn the effect. All of the places I’ve seen it used, a coin is used. Paul has come up with a slew of ideas to using Buddha Paper concept. Below is a list of just a few of these ideas.

We’ll leave it to you to come up with the best presentations and justification for using the papers that suit your personality. Remember, the purpose of this particular column is two-fold: 1) Get your juices flowing… get you thinking creatively, and 2) to give others (besides me) a voice. Many, many of you have great ideas that need to be shared. This is the place to do it, so if you have a clever idea or a subject, and you want a voice, shoot me an email.

So back to Buddha… Check out Paul’s ideas below. I think you will find some great value in what he’s offered. The real point here is not to convince you that you need to add Buddha Papers to your act, but rather to get you thinking about some of the classics. I mean this thing dates back to at least 1584. Think of how many old ideas like this are kickin’ around that you could resurrect and put your spin on.

While you’re digesting that… take a look at this:

Ideas for utilizing Buddha Mystery Papers
By Paul Budd

These are ideas…..and considering the mechanics of the Buddha Papers, any of these will, of course, work in reverse.

  • Change a piece of “play” money into a real bill.
  • Change a mis-made bill into a real bill.
  • Change salt into gold leaf (artificial gold leaf can be acquired at art supply houses).
  • Change a blank photo cut-out into a real photo cut out.
  • Change an empty candy wrapper into a new, wrapped piece of candy.
  • Change a washer (steel or rubber) into a quarter.
  • Change multiple pips out of a playing card (say, 4 diamonds from the 4 of diamonds)….load a real 4 of diamonds into the gimmick. Drop in the 4 pips (with appropriate patter) and change them into a real 4 of diamonds.
  • Change a mini card into a standard card.
  • Change a toy ring into a real ring.
  • Change a paper clip into a safety pin.
  • Change a piece of white yarn into a piece of colored yarn.
  • Using age-progression software, you can “age” a photo of a young woman to that of a very elderly woman. Think of the bizarre magic possibilities!
  • Change a clump of dirt and grass into a cluster of fresh flower petals.

Thoughts regarding the actual paper
By Jeff Stone

One of the things I thought of when reading Paul’s ideas was the interesting possibilities of the types of paper you might use. For example, for the salt to gold idea, you could use very old and aged looking paper that you can claim belonged to an alchemist who was an apprentice for Merlin… crazy, but interesting.

Maybe the rubber washer to quarter effect could use paper that looks like the directions to your BBQ grill and your presentation is along the lines of having an extra piece left over when you finished building it… so you took the washer back to the store and got your money (quarter) back.

The possibilities are endless. Thank you Paul for ressurecting Buddha and his mysterious papers!

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