LotusinHand is a cardistry brand based in Taiwan, China. They produced playing cards specifically for cardistry, as well as creating performance videos and instruction tutorials on how to do cardsitry. The brand is founded by three cardists: Daniel Lin, Kurtis Lin, and Harry Kuo. Allan is the brand's main cameraman - photographing the decks and videographing the cardistry performance of the team members and other special guests. Sometimes, Daniel's wife would helped a bit in terms of promoting their cards to the Chinese cardists. Significantly, designer Bailiang Huang designed the graphic art for the cards produced by this brand. LotusinHand brand is a low poly style of a lotus flower.
On 2019, LotusinHand collaborates with Art of Play brand to produced a deck designed specifically for cardistry as well as to explore the mysterious yet beautiful art of optical illusion - FLUX. Two years later, on 2021, LotusinHand collaborates with the founder of Art of Play, the Buck Twins Dan and Dave Buck, to create a reimagining of Smoke and Mirror by LotusinHand - the result of the collaboration is a holographic foiled cards designed like Echo deck series, compiled as a set in a display box. On 2023, LotusinHand collaborates with cardist Shivraj Morzaria (aka Decknosis) to produce a special edition of Echo Playing Cards - blood red variant with customized indices.
Series by LiH
Most of the cards by LotusinHand are printed in Taiwan by Dex Playing Cards Company [Dex for short], except for a few decks which are printed by United States Playing Cards Company. Decks released by LotusinHand can be distinguished into series, based on their names and designs. Each series have specific design elements that enhances certain moves in cardistry routines. Here are the list of the series available by LiH:
- Ventus - The card back design features an artwork of a vortex that appears to be spinning. It is a semi-borderless back that appears to be melting towards the center, like the vortex is sucking in the colors, creating continuous lines during fanning of the back side of the deck. The faces have colorful stripes that helps with the stunning look on fanning the front side of the deck. The Ace of Spades pip featured vortex design on the big pip. The artwork design for this deck series helps to enhance spins and fanning for cardistry. The cards are packed in a tuckbox made of premium matte paper with embossing and foiling. The tuckbox featured a quarter part of the vortex with the title Ventus on top. Having four of the same decks would create a connecting artwork of half side of a vortex, ergo doing the connecting artwork on top of a mirror will create the full circle of the vortex. One of the color variant is an extreme rare edition that can only be obtained if you are a VIP OR if you are as fast as Flash.
- Echo - The card back design simply features circles on a full background color. The faces of the cards are having a bold change for the outlook of the deck. All of the pips for numbered cards and the artworks for the courts are all gone, replaced with the same circles as found on the back of the cards, but the indices are retained throughout. The design for this deck series helps to enhance with packet cuts and packet spins wihint the 3 Dimensional Spaces. The cards are packed in a tuckbox made of premium matte paper with embossing and foilling. The front and back of the tuckbox features foiled circles in a ripple effect, like an echo. The sides features the name of the deck.
- Flux - A collaboration deck between LotusinHand with Art of Play brand. It is a deck designed specifically for cardistry as well as an exploration of the mystreious yet beautiful art of optical illusion. The deck incorporate the art of scanimation by Rufus Butler Seder, a state-of-the-art six-phase animation process that combines the “persistence of vision” principle with a striped acetate overlay to give the illusion of movement. The card back and Ace of Spades design features abstact yet consistent formation of curved lines. Within the deck, there are two plastic cards of black lines: one horizontal and one vertical. Having that plastic card moved on top of the card backs and Ace of Spades will create a moving motion of lines. The cards are packed in a sturdy plastic tuckbox. The box can animate the cards as it tucked in or pulled out. The front side will animate the name of the deck, flashing the four letter to spell "FLUX".
- Gradient - This deck is simply a logo deck for LotusinHand, designed to looked like general casino style playing cards. Both sides will feature LotusinHand logo, the low-poly art-style of a lotus flower. The faces of the cards are standard with a slight customization. The full color background features one picked color. But, as the name suggests, the color has a twist - every single card has a different gradient [hence the deck name]. The gradient goes from lighter color to darker color - i.e. Navy Blue to Black and Orange to Red. If you spread the cards accross the table, without messing up with the new deck order, you can see the gradient on the cards.
- Duo - The deck has no numbered pips and courts artwork or any indices at all. The deck is simply a colored triangles with two choice of colors. Imagine the card face and back has a big diagonal cross on, one line from top right corner to bottom left corner, and the other is from top left corner to bottom right corner - this cross will create four triangular segments. One face will have the top and bottom triangle colored, while the other face will have the left and right triangle colored. With these white and colored triangles design, packet cuts and spins would look stunning and pleasing.
- Normal Cards - It is simply a regular deck of playing cards - all of the courts and numbered pips are all standard. The Jokers featured a jester springing cards. The back design is one way - simply a full colored background with the text "Normal Cards". It sounds more like a pun, when people asked whether you are using a deck of "normal cards". On the latest two colors releases, the Jokers will feature a cartoon illustration based on the color, and a new ink technology is applied - photochromic ink, creating a printed text or background that can changes color when under exposure from sunlight. Next, the backs will have a foil showing two tones of colors: from blue to violet, and it also applies to the faces.
- Solids - A standard deck of playing cards with a "solid" backs. For this series, LotusinHand is experimenting with different finish that would looked great for cardistry. The first Solid is using holographic foil, creating a light bending reflection while doing cardistry under the light. The latest one is using thermochromic ink, creating a printed background that can changes color when in contact with heat.
- Lotus Series - A deck series involving logo back design. While the background color remains the same color, the logos on the back of the cards will be foiled. The decks will be numbered according to series. The number "00" is exclusive for LotusinHand VIPs.
- Tetra - Just like Duo, the deck is a non-standard deck of playing cards - all of the cards in the deck is a pattern. The design is a bordered two colored squares. One side is a grey and red square, while the other side is a grey and blue square. This design complies with the packet cuts in card flourishes.
Total Decks: 35 (1)
Why It's REALLY Hated?
Of all of the hype brands that have existed in the cardistry community, LotusinHand is probably the most terrible one in terms of marketing and sales of their decks. These are a few reasons why:
- Their decks are all in very ridiculous print runs - 1000 and lower to be exact. Some of the decks would have exactly 1000 decks print run, but others are even more ridiculous number of print run. For example: the 1:51 Echo Niagara/Cabernet/Sycee is made 691 each editions, 1:51 Echo Amethyst is only 44! Worse, Arctic Duo is ONLY 17 made! The numbers are not even! In the interview, the brand founder stated that this ridiculous number of print run is to tackle the fact that many people in the community continously asking for print run on every time the decks are revealed. In other words, the brand is 'punishing' scalpers. While that is a good idea, it is MAINLY a bad idea, because how would people who actually wanted the cards and used them can GET IT with that very low number?
- Because of the VERY LOW number of print run on every decks they released, every new releases would only lasts for below 5 minutes - usually 1 to 2 minutes to be exact. The lower the number, the duration of the items last on the store decreases. AND the other problem is that there is seemingly no limits to how many decks can be obtained by one customer - [even if there is a limit, that limit is very high]. It is no wonder that it is always sold out withint 2 minutes. Although, the time can be longer in case the decks in release are in high price. Not applicable to unlimited Pre-Orders.
- The decks were pricey very higher than usual. Mostly thought that the spike in price usually due to the fact that it has a very low number of print run [general rule of costs in printing deck: the higher the number, the less cost it will be] - but majority believe that the brand is GREEDY. For example, the price for a set of Echo X Smoke and Mirror is 70$, which means each of the deck is 35$ each - a steep 15$ raise from the LotusinHand Solid.
- There are words that the number of print run they did isn't exactly how many decks they have it for sale. For example, a deck with a 1000 print run, will only have 200 decks to be sold on the store [thus explaining the quickly sold out event], while the rest of the decks are sold through eBay for a very high steep price. More proofing that the brand is really greedy.
- One of the decks in the series, M Guac Ventus, is a very exclusive deck that only opens for only 5 mins. This is one of their stunts that they've done. People who are too late to receive the notifications will always missed it. Definitely, releases like this are much more rewarding to the smartphone junkies. And there is an issue of the brand doing tailgating: specific editions only obtainable from getting a brick. What makes it more annoying is the fact that this "tailgating" of deck edition is made up to look like a competition - like this example: "First 10 people to get a brick will receive this edition and to be put within the brick box". The releases are nothing more like a game of who is the fastest shopper of playing cards on the planet.
- During the 1:51 Echo release, the people were surprised when it is discovered that the editions will be based on region. The Niagara Blue be available only in Americas; Cabernet Red be availabla only in Europe and Africa; Sycee Yellow be available only in Asia and Oceania. This is something like in Pokemon games, where there are few Pokemons which appearance are varied depends on region [perhaps this might be where they take that inspiration]. Due to this, people have to go on a hunt frenzy to get the remaining colors OR trade with the colors of their choice.
- Perhaps their motto of "GET GOOD" can mean that you should be very vigilant and better prepared on every time LotusinHand released their decks. Because of the very low and odd-numbered amount of print runs and the sales that is always out within minutes (because there is no limit OR a very high number of limit), you just have to "GET GOOD" at purchasing the decks ASAP, or you simply missed it and will have to pay double the price in the aftermarket, with the motto seemingly mocking you for being losers [like how rookie game players gets bullied by pros].
- This might be irrelevant point, but the brand doesn't offer REAL uncut sheets, but VIRTUAL Digital NFT [Non-Fungible Token] uncut sheets. Simply put, the uncut sheets just be large images out of reach within the screens of gadgets. For those who are interested with MetaVerse, these NFTs might just be your prized artworks in your virtual reality space. BUT, these NFTs are won through lottery, with the participants of that lottery are those who copped a brick of decks during releases.
- Recently, LiH holds up a short design competition to release the next deck in Echo series. After many design submissions, the nomination results are dissapointing: they ended up picking up the basic solid colors and not for those which are something new (gradient and patterns). They said "do whatever you like as long as you keep the main element of the deck", but that is actually not the case. They could have said "suggest a color scheme for the new deck" other than it. "Think outside the box" they said... Just remember to stick with the basics instead of trying something new.
- The latest release of the new decks in the 2023 lineup starts with the first deck of the year got listed without any announcement other than a password shared in IG Story. For people who didn't regulary check up the social media, they would sure be miss it. A brand that depends on people being a smartphone junkie.
- Recently, they are doing "early release" of their decks - an hour early, for the people who are "lucky" to own their "precious" NFTs of their uncut sheet. This might be a more disadvantage for the people who don't own them - knowing that their decks are always on a very low and odd numbered print run with no apparent limit. There might be a case where all decks are sold out before it is done for the public release. A truly cardistry brand for the "elites" - "elites" who probably are just plain scalpers who want to take advantage of unknowing victims for quick profits.
Decks listed with double stars are collaboration decks. If the entry is bolded/italized, the decks are printed outside Dex Playing Cards Co - BOLD for decks printed in USPCC / ITALIC for decks printed in LPCC/EPCC.
2018
Ventus - Blue
Echo - Black
2019
[*][*] Flux
Gradient - Navy Blue > Black
Guerrilla Echo - Green
2020
Mauve Ventus - Purple
Arctic Duo - Turquoise/Grey Black
Duo by You - Red/Black
Ardor Gradient - Orange > Red
M Guac Ventus - Avocado
Arctic Echo - Teal
Normal - Black w/ White Text
Contra Ventus - Grey/Blue/Orange
2021
Solid
Kizuna Normal - Grey w/ Yellow Text
1:51 Niagara Echo - Grey w/ single Blue [America]
1:51 Cabernet Echo - Grey w/ single Red [Europe & Africa]
1:51 Sycee Echo - Grey w/ single Yellow [Asia & Oceania]
1:51 Amethyst Echo - Grey w/ single Purple
Toucan Duo - Orange/Black
[*][*] Echo Smoke - Light hue Holographic Foil
[*][*] Echo Mirror - Dark hue Holographic Foil
Lotus #00 - Navy Blue w/ Gold Foil logo
2022
Thermo Solid
Lotus #01 - Aqua w/ Silver Cold Foil logo
Mesa Ventus - Tan/Orange/Teal
Ultraviolet Normal - Baby Violet w/ White Text
Mint Green Normal - Mint Green w/ Purple Text
Echo by You - Vintage; Brown w/ Black
Tetra - Grey/Turquoise/Coral
2023
Lotus #02 - Dark Brown w/ Rose Gold Hot Foil logo
Aether Duo - Yellow/Blue
Two-Tone Normal - Foil w/ two colors
[*][*] Shiv Echo - Red
Lotus #03 - Purple w/ Gold Hot Foil logo
TBA
??? Normal - Optical Illusion Black Text
