As with previous decks, the talented Sam Hayles is responsible for the design. It is a highly stylised design which plays with the idea of ‘double exposure’ in a striking black and white design. There’s a lot of white space around the edges of the design which doesn’t make for the most interesting spreads and fans – so not a deck for cardistry perhaps.

The tuckcase suitably showcases the design and retains the prominent Bicycle branding of which we obviously approve!

One disappointment for me was the small number of faces which have been specially designed for the deck.  So, as is traditional, the Ace of Spades gets a superb treatment featuring the femme fatal of the title and the cityscape which blends in (like the image on the front of the tuck case).

The jokers, too, get a redesign, again featuring the lady and cityscape – though here you can hide or display either aspect depending on how you arrange them.  I like both Joker designs, but for magic use it is sometimes helpful if they are indistinguishable.

Otherwise, the rest of the cards have standard ‘Bicycle’ pips and faces.  I would have like to see more work on these if possible.

Usefully, the deck also includes a double-backer and a blank faced card.  These both have many applications for magicians – and the latter, in conjunction with the white space on the back design already mentioned – enable to the impression of a fully blank deck.

There’s not much more to say here.  Printed on decent quality USPCC stock, the Karnival Fatal deck is a joy to handle, straight out of the box.  Fans and spreads and sleights all easy to perform if you’re used to the airflow finish.

For us this is a nice deck, but not a ground-breaking one.  But a must for all you collectors and Karnival nuts out there.

You can pick up a Karnival Deck from the Merchant of Magic for £7.99 (at the time of writing).

There are a few more pictures below. (With thanks to BigBlindMedia who kindly provided the review copy).

Bicycle Karnival Fatal Playing Cards – review

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• Design
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The post Bicycle Karnival Fatal Playing Cards – review appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

In fact, for the sake of nostalgia, here’s all the Karnival Decks we’ve seen since then (I’ve omitted a couple of BBM releases that don’t quite fall into the Karnival category) – you can click on it to see it in all its glory…

So, cutting back to the chase, what is the Gold Edition Deck?  Well the original Karnival Deck has long been out of print and so this is a limited edition re-run, but (you’d never have guessed this) with GOLD ink for the back design and tuck case.

Here’s an Original and a Gold side by side to give you the idea…

Unlike some other Karnival releases (e.g. the Karnival Ryujin for example, it is only the back (and the case) which use the gold ink.  The faces of the cards are almost exclusively your standard Bicycle Faces (the Ryujin used gold ink for the red pips you may remember).  The only custom faces are on the Jokers and the Ace of spades – and again these are the same as the original Karnival Deck (apologies for the background on this pic – I should have used a close up mat).
Compared to all the custom faces you see on so many new decks these days, you may think this is rather under-stated.  But more positively, if you are actually using these for performing, they are much easier to read and much less ‘suspicious’ for spectators than all the custom stuff.

Other unusual points to note are the absence of a deck seal and the inclusion of a useful blank card to match the deck (plus the obligatory advertising card).  There is a nice subtle card reveal on the Joker (as pictured above) and also a barcode reveal on the tuck case.

The cards feel just ever so slightly thin to me – so I don’t know if USPCC used a different stock.  But as ever the air-flow finish makes fans and spreads and the like very easy.  This is likely to become quite collectable since the print run is only 4000.  So head on over and buy one now before they run out.

Available direct from BBM.

(PS watch this space for a chance to win one in our summer competition!)

The post Karnival Gold Edition Review appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

The latest in the Karnival range of cards from BBM is the Karnival Death Heads (Armour Edition). In a radical change from form, they are printed by Fournier on plastic playing card stock – as used on the World Poker Tour.

And first impressions are good. Once you’ve taken off the outer cellophane, and the inner cellophane (this double layer of cellophane will come as a shock to anyone more familiar with Bicycle Cards!), you will find a surprisingly versatile deck.
The Fournier syle large-pip index is bold and very clear – you will read these from a mile off!

The Jokers? Skulls, blood, the usual sort of Karnival style. And do I detect some extra hair in the ‘scroll’ pattern – a subtle tribute to their hairy artist?! There’s a bar code reveal on the case, and an extra advertising card is also included.

So they’re made of plastic – that means they are very hard to tear or crease by accident. They wipe clean etc. etc. But do they handle like ‘normal’ cards?

Well I couldn’t do a perfect FARO with them… but then I couldn’t do that beforehand But they do fan and handle extremely well. A quick run through some of the standard sleights didn’t expose any obvious problems – they just feel a bit funny! But you would get used to that. And they really ought to last a long time – no need to replace them as often as normal Bicycle Cards.

You’re paying a bit more for the privilege of plastic – £11.99 for a pack. But if they last 3 times as long then you’re quids in!

Available exclusively from BBM – get them while they have them…

The post Karnival Death Heads – Review appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

But I’m conflicted.
Let me come clean about a few things. I have had this nagging suspicion with some of the other Karnival decks that they might not appeal to every audience. This is probably a sign that I’m not cool enough – and I guess with any special design like this you are going to find some people who won’t like it. But the dragon design on the Ryujins seems to me a bit more classy and more widely appealing.

On the other hand, the rather tastefully designed new Joker is not going to suit some people. It is elegantly done, and in no sense explicit, but it does feature nudity. So that will put some people off. Although it must be said that most of the magic I do with cards could be done without any Jokers in the pack – so you could always remove them if you were bothered by this.

The ace of spades is very striking with intertwined dragons and the rather classy gold ink used for the back design. You also get the apparently obligatory ‘prediction’ card (‘you will choose the 5 of diamonds’) – which I feel is rather spoiled by the advertising on the back of it. Rather nicer is the 9 of hearts ‘spiked’ under the sword of one of the Jokers. There’s also a barcode reveal on the tuck case if you like that kind of thing. A matching blank-faced card is also supplied which is always useful.

The Ryujins are printed on regular USPCC stock and so handle as well as you would expect them to. There does seem to be quite a lot of ‘border’ on the back design, and on my deck these are slightly unbalanced leaving a pronounced ‘one way’ effect. I am not sure if this is intentional or is just a USPCC printing problem – you see it on normal Bicycle Decks from time to time. However, I don’t think a layperson would notice.
Ed note: having checked with BBM – there is a subtle one-way effect in the actual design; the off-centre printing is a bonus!

Bottom line – this is a nice and visually striking deck which handles well. But pick your audience carefully…

BBM are still doing their pre-order deal (buy 3 or more decks and get a free Renegade chucked in) – head over to their pre-order page for more details.

The post Bicycle Karnival Ryujin – First Impressions! appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

If you loved the Karnival Deck, then you better get yourself over to BBM quickly before their limited edition Uncut Karnival Sheets sell out. Apparently only 100 being sold. Yours for £25 + P&P.

The post Uncut Karnival Deck Sheet appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

When is a Bicycle Card not a Bicycle Card? There is not a Bicycle in sight on this deck! But of course they are printed by USPCC on classic Bicycle stock, so they handle well and familiarly.

The design is certainly striking. The wife’s verdict is ‘a bit morbid’ so maybe not a design for the ladies. I’m intrigued by the way the design drifts into ‘specks’ and overruns the borders – somehow giving a slightly ‘aged’ feel to the cards.

As the pre-advertising has said, there are some reveals on the cards – see pic for zoom on 3 of Hearts reveal on one of the Jokers. There is also a barcode reveal (seven of spades) on the box. The double-backed gimmick will be useful for many effects, and the advertising card – well, its an advertising card.

If you’ve got to have every new deck, you’ll want one. If you like to perform slightly more unusual (darker?) magic, you’ll probably want one too. Maybe you just want a change. They’re here in time for Haloween (just) which is probably no co-incidence.

And did I mention they’re only available from www.bigblindmedia.com.

The post Bicycle Karnival Deck – first impressions appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

The post Karnival Deck officially released… almost appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

The folks at BBM are trickling out info about this new deck. Completely new artwork (so is it still a Bicycle Deck?) on high grade USPCC stock. Includes a free double backer, and there are two card reveals built in to the card case and one of t he jokers respectively.

Launch date now looks like late October. But as usual, if you sign up for the BBM mailing list there are likely to be special offers and more information as it is available. We’ll let you know what we think when we get are hands on a deck.

The post More on the Karnival Deck – the new look Bicycle Deck appeared first on Bicycle Cards.

You can see a teaser video at: http://www.bigblindmedia.com/karnival.htm

Expected Autumn 2008 – I’ll let you know if we hear any more details…

The post Bicycle Karnival Deck appeared first on Bicycle Cards.