Cerberus International with DVD by Todd Lassen, David Neighbors

Todd is clearly the Master Craftsman when it comes to coins. Many of the stunning photos of his coins were captured by the wonderful camera work of George Guerra, but these ones of Cerberus were actually by me 🙂

I feel like Gollum with “my precious” 🙂 From time to time I’ll take these coins out just to marvel at them.

I always know when I’m in the presence of greatness, when no matter how hard I try my photos just never do justice to the beauty of the effect. This set of coins created by the artist and master craftsman, Todd Lassen, in conjunction with his good friend David Neighbors is truly a revelation.

The gimmick, if that word can be applied here, is just awe inspiring. I know I’ll never get close to doing the amazing routines put together by David Neighbors (how does he think of so many ways to use the same set of coins?) but one day I’ll try.

Knowing my addiction for precisely these types of perfect objects I’m glad I’m not on a first name basis with Todd because I could easily see $10,000 going straight out of the window. After studying these coins there is no doubt that Todd Lassen produces, by far, the most unique and most beautiful gimmicked coins in the world.

Effect: The Cerberus gaff is the brainchild of David Neighbors and myself. We developed it years ago, and like Triple Threat, we kept it pretty quiet all this time. The gaff is entirely original and unique, and was developed solely by Dave and I….so don’t even think about knocking it off Jamie Schoolcraft and Dean Dill. Unlike Triple Threat, I hope they won’t come up with any shabby excuses to copy our gimmick. And changing the name of it to “3BS” or some crap doesn’t count either. I’d also like to mention that I have made many versions of this gaff and tried all sorts of variations, so if you add a piece of tape to it…or anything else, it’s still not yours, no matter what Brad Henderson might say or imply.

Ok, now that we have that nasty business aside, we’ll have a look at the gaff. Cerberus can be shown very cleanly and with close scrutiny as a silver dollar on both sides. When un-nested it can be shown as 3 different coins. A brass coin, a copper coin, and a silver dollar. Cerberus started out as a series of sun/moon coins to be used in matrix effects, giving you the power to be 2 coins ahead from the git-go. This was a gaff set with Dave Neighbors written all over it, so I asked Dave if he could come up with a couple routines for it. He flat out said NO. A week later 38 routines arrived on video to my doorstep along with a note explaining his disorder… I think 38 routines was the bare MINIMUM that he could come up with.

On the video was quite a variety of uses for this gaff set. There were a couple matrix effects that just totally smoked… one, starting with 4 different ungaffed coins, having them all arrive in one corner, immediately backfire, and then end completely clean. He had several color changes where you would show a copper coin, wipe it to a brass coin, wipe again to a silver dollar as you pick it up and show both sides…alot of cute little things like that. And that is just for starters, but it turns out that Dave broke the rules. He took apart the gaff set I had sent him and started arranging it in his own way …the nerve!! And soon, as you can imagine, he was saying stuff like…wouldn’t it be cool if you could do this and that. That was the last time I spoke to Dave, I stole all his ideas and took credit for them myself.

That’s a joke. What we came up with was Cerberus. Cerberus is a double shell gimmick, the first shell being the silver dollar, of course. The second shell is brass, and the last coin is copper. Actually this last coin is a c/s coin, allowing you to show both sides of the silver dollar when nested. The only small discrepency was the edge of the middle shell being visible from the reverse side of the unit when assembled. I originally solved the problem by polishing the brass edge. This made it invisible for all practical purposes…until it started to tarnish. So I was having to shine up the edge fairly often. I have since changed to silver plating the very edge of the rim of the shell, which looks exactly the way it should, and no more shining.

I am sure that you will agree that this is another “limited only by your imagination” type gaffs. And Dave has plenty of stuff…from getting you started to 109 complete routines. I know he has a number of routines on dvd… I think 10, available from him, but if you bothered him and tipped him enough, he might cut loose with the other 99. I think he did mention that after the first 50 routines, be prepared to pay a bundle. No doubt they will be entirely worth it. Contact Dave at WWW.COINJURER.COM

Cerberus comes with my absolutely utmost precision made gaffs, hallmarked with the Lassen logo, and the 3 matching ungaffed, pristine coins. I will be making the sets with a variety of these nice copper and brass crowns, which are of limited number.

I am not going to speculate on exactly how many sets I will be able to make, but I do have limited inventory of the coins and replacements are getting quite hard to come by in quantity. I use some of these same coins for alot of my other gaffs, so I am not going to deplete my entire stock on Cerberus alone. When I get down to a minimum, that I will set, Cerberus won’t be available again until, and IF, I can acquire more stock.

Routines On The DVD:

1) 3-Fly: A very clean international VCA, with the hands staying entirely separate for the first two phases. This features a really nice backfire-style kicker and flows smoothly into two subsequent routines, culminating in an unexpected transfer of all three coins to the performers pocket. Three hard-hitting tricks in one, and a good basic foundation in the use of the gaff.

2) Merlin the Alchemist: This is a really nice sequence, making excellent use of the Cerberus sets visual potential. It starts off with something of a Spellbound flavour, but then veers hard left with some beautiful transformation effects that occur instantly as the coin is lifted from the tabletop at the magicians fingertips.

3) Coins Through Table: Some very creative handling of the gaff here allows specific coins to pass individually. Theres a very pretty backfire ending and double-kicker to clean up.

4) International Matrix Routines: Three effects that work well individually, or flow together very smoothly into a single routine. The classic Matrix concept, performed with a decreasing number of cards and some backfire endings. A terrific lesson in routine structure and another well conceived application of the Cerberus set.

5) Succession Reverse: A different angle on the Matrix idea, with the twist that the Cerberus permits multiple coins to travel simultaneously. One coin joins another, both jump instantly to the third, then all three hop to join the last. Finally, all four coins leap back to their starting positions.

6) Succession Assembly: Again, multiple coins pass simultaneously, but the addition of a backfire into a purse brings a beautiful circularity to the effect.

The Cerberus allows the above effects to be performed without a lot of heavy lifting. A decent CP and FP are pretty much all that are required. All in all, Im really happy with the gaff and disc, and can offer a whole-hearted recommendation of both.

Text Source: forums.geniimagazine.com – click for details

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