Sorry I really couldn't help you much more without being able to see it. Maybe you could post a short vid. One of three things is going on. 1. You just naturally have gift for the pinky count and if that is the case you could just disregard everything I have said. 2. You are overestimting your ability or underestimating how obvious the move is when someone is burning your deck hnd. 3. A long shot since a pinky count is one of those moves that is exactly what it says it is- you are not actually doing a pinky count. I couldn't tell you which one it is without seeing it. I can see the tension in Darwin Ortiz's hands when he does the move and he is the one responsible for bringing attention to the move.

My honest guess without seeing it is #2 and here is why. There are moves that are tough and everyone knows it. The one handed pop-out, clip shift, or even some cuts like the cobra cut. It is easy to tell that these are tough moves because it will probably take you some time just to get the mechanics of the move down at all let alone do it with any modicum of fluidity. When you are first starting out with moves like this you know you are making a mistake because either a card goes flying in the wrong direction or in some cases the entire deck explodes out of your hands. Then there are those subtle knuckle busters. The ones in which the basics of the move is quite simple but getting it fluid and inperceptable can take a long time. Progress comes in incriments and in order to gain those incriments you need to be very self critical. The pinky count is one of those. Riffle stacking is another good example. I could teach you a riffle stacking routine in an hour because it is another one that is what you say it is. You stack cards while riffling. But making it look like you are riffle shuffling the cards and not counting out individual cards as you riffle will take lots of practice.

So to sum up. Counting off individual cards with you pinky is pretty easy. Doing it while someones eyes are burning the deck and making it look like you are just holding the deck, as opposed to using your pinky to count off cards, is very difficult.

Hear...I'll put my money where my mouth is. I shot this to get some feedback on my pinky counts and riffle stacking. This is after several weeks of practice and there is still a long way to go. http://vimeo.com/16581895

Sure, I'll do a video, but is there anyway that I can send it to you? Because I don't want to put it on YouTube.
You guys made me paranoid, so I started pinky counting, and asked 2 people if they thought my hands were tense or unnatural, and they didn't think so. I don't know, I think that it still has a lot to improve, but I don't think that it is tense, or anything like that. What's there to notice in the pinky count? There is no movement, or anything like that.
Btw, good job on your video, I watched it sometime ago, when you were asking for opinions.
Thanks.

Sure. If you get a vimeo accout you can make password protected videos. Then you can PM me or others you want an opinion from and give us the link and the password.

I'm not trying to scare you or discourage you. It also could be me. I think that routine has about another six months of work. I do the pinky count on three occasions in that video and each time it is painfully obvious to me. Granted the moves will likely fly by most lay people but as an rule of thumb I like to work my stuff until a competant magician can burn me and ,even if he/she knows what I'm doing, not see a flash.

Yeah, I also think that it will need a lot of work, probably months, but I don`t think 6 months.
Thanks.