 Hey everybody, welcome back to Magic Orthodoxy. My name is David and this is how to look after your playing cards All right, so how do you take care of your playing cards? You maybe have started your new deck collection or You've had a deck collection for a really long time and you want to know well How do I take care of my cards the best way like I want my cards to last I want them to be around for generations I want to pass them on to my grandchildren. David tell me how to do that. All right, so listen up cards made out of paper Okay, cards are made out of paper Usually it's three different layers So you have the back and the front and they're held together with glue Okay, and that's why you can ding the corner and then peel them apart So there's three different layers to each card, but like I said, it's just paper It's just paper and so you have paper cards in a paper box And so the same rules that would apply to taking care of any paper product or preserving paper goods Is going to apply to cards like I also collect comic books All right, and you learn how to take care of your comic books when you collect Comics or maybe you used to collect sports cards when you're younger like maybe you collect the football cards or baseball cards There's rules, right? There's like you don't just take loose football cards and wrap over a band around them That's not the best way to keep them preserved. So I just want to go over a couple of tips I'll help you get the most out of your cards. All right first off temperature is huge Temperature is huge. Okay, so don't leave them in the car All right, and don't leave them in your garage Don't leave them outside. Don't leave them outside overnight. Okay? That is a sure-fire way to come back and find your cards warped All right, just be really wary of temperature and that goes along with how you store them or where you keep them Okay, I don't store my comic books in the garage. I don't store them in the attic You shouldn't store your cards in the garage. Okay, your cards should be In a cool dry place I put mine in their boxes and then I keep them in a card box That kind of pushes them all together so they stay flat against one another in other words They're not loose going around, you know, they're they're tight in their box And then I stack all the boxes next to each other and those boxes also keep themselves tight So that kind of keeps the cards in their Format, you know, it keeps them in their position. It keeps them looking like decks They're not just all scattered and loose and wobbly and back and forth. It's paper again Okay, how would you treat paper if you wanted to keep it all straight and all perfect? You keep it in a cool dry place. You keep it nice and tight. I keep my card boxes in more Cardboard so like it's also paper. It's paper in paper. Okay, and that makes sure that the all the cards can breathe Okay, and that they stay cool and they're they're low to the ground I don't keep my cards high up on the top shelf where the air conditioning turns really hot I keep them down low at the ground where it's the coolest in the house Okay, so my my cards are in cardboard boxes in long boxes same kind of boxes You would put baseball cards in or football cards and I keep them at the bottom of my closet really low to the ground Second keep your cards clean. Okay paper gets dirty paper gets dirty really fast Okay, especially if you just ate food or you just woke up or you know, whatever it is So wash your hands and clean your hands keep your nails trimmed Be careful of your hands. Okay, your hands are coming into contact with your cards more than anything else You want to have clean hands? You want to have your nails trimmed down? Okay? Because you know when you're doing flourishing you're gonna poke and stab your card So that's gonna make little dents and all those little dents are gonna prevent the cards from gliding and moving The way you want them to want to keep all the dirt even if I know you're thinking my hands aren't dirty It's microscopic. Okay. It's so microscopic. You can't even see it the tiniest little flakes of dirt and Things that just rub off your hands are gonna attract themselves and stick to the paper It's gonna slow the process down They're gonna grind against each other and then they're gonna start clumping up Okay, and you've seen decks that clump up decks that clump up are dirty Or they've been exposed to some sort of weird temperature Okay, so you want to keep your hands clean as well another thing that gets your cards dirty is when you drop them Okay, even if you drop them on the carpet you can drop them outside in the dirt That's okay, but even if you drop them on the carpet and the carpets just been vacuumed. It doesn't matter Those few seconds that they were down there in the carpet. They were attracting lint cat hair Old pieces of granola like you know, it's down there. Okay, and that it's gonna stick to the paper So let's say you dropped your cards Okay, and you pick them up very carefully don't jam them Okay, pick them up very carefully because probably dirt stuck in there and just just spring them Okay, you can spring them and blow out the dirt spring them in front of your fan a couple times Just get all those loose particles out the better you can spring them far apart get them all wide apart Okay, run air through them and shove all those dirt particles out another thing you can do is just recycle your decks Okay, if you have one favorite deck that you go to over and over and over again That deck is never gonna relax paper needs to relax. Okay in order for it to retain its shape So you should have five or seven decks of cards that are your favorite and just run through them in rotation Have a Sunday deck a Monday deck a Tuesday deck like that and just it'll make them last longer It'll keep them cleaner the longer you can keep them in their box in a cool dry place The more they'll be able to spring back and relax and take their shape again Okay, if you use the same deck over and over and over again, it's just gonna wear out faster and you'll be Going through cards quickly. So that said, what kind of cards should you use? Okay, people always ask me What's the best deck of cards for magic? That's not even a question. Is it what's the best deck of cards for magic? What are you doing? Like they're just it's just paper. Okay, every deck of cards is good for magic every deck of cards It's good for magic. All right Flourishing a flourishing the little different because flourishing and cardistry you kind of rely on color and you want Decks that are beautiful and pretty to look at and also it's nice to have the deck that have the smoother edges in the more rounded corners I think flourishers and cardistry people they kind of look for that But magic you can do magic with the cheapest nick of cards with the most expensive deck of cards It doesn't matter. It's not you're not driving a car. Okay, you're not comparing Ferraris to Toyotas and thing Which card goes faster? They're cards. They're made out of paper. Okay use any deck of cards for magic, but my Advice would just be use bicycle use bicycle wider backs off the shelf people always ask What's the best deck of cards to you? What do I use? I use red bikes because they're readily available You can get them anywhere and they're cheap These are again. These are paper products. Okay, so they're gonna wear out over time eventually They're gonna crumble apart and and fail you and they're gonna be you're gonna throw them throw them away So what do you want to do and practice with a deck that's $12 or a deck that's $3? Okay, they're made by the same company. They're made on the same paper So they use designer decks for magic or to use designer decks to practice with it doesn't make as much sense You should really practice On decks that are affordable. Okay, because you're gonna go through them quicker the same with cardistry You should practice on affordable decks I say get bicycle cards get whatever's readily available at your local grocery store You know the bottom line is the more cards get used the more they get thrashed So no matter how well you take care of them. They're gonna get thrashed Springs shuffles those break down the paper every single time you do it Even though it looks like it snaps back and it handles great You're still breaking the paper down every single time you do a shuffle or a spring Okay, you just are you're breaking them down Microscopically, but they're being broken down over time. Well, that means you'll just need to replace your cards more often And if you're going through decks of cards, and they're $12 $15 a piece It just makes so much more sense to go through decks of cards that are $3 a piece. All right, it just does it's just It's just common sense Plus whenever you go to show somebody a magic trick and you have a designer deck as opposed to a $3 writer-back deck you just don't want to have people be suspicious of your deck Okay, you want people to look at it and say yep, that has a normal deck of cards that I could buy in any store Okay, so that's just my two cents on what's the best deck of cards for magic. All right, so keep your decks in a cool dry place okay, clean your hands cut your fingernails and Always use cards that are affordable Okay, use cards that are cheap and then you can buy again and again and again So that you can get better and better and better and so you don't wear out and destroy your good cards All right. All right, so as always recommend that you like this video Just so other people can find it faster We also recommend that you subscribe to this channel just to see up to date on the latest in cards and card magic You want to follow me on social media? You can I'm at facebook.com slash magic orthodoxy twitter.com slash magic orthodoxy instagram.com slash magic underscore orthodoxy And if you need more content, you can always find it at magic orthodoxy.com. Thanks. Bye