9 Steps to Help You | Don't Depend Only on Acting Ability

A good actor's frustrations of not getting a break

Do not let anyone fool you.

• Acting ability alone will not help you much in your acting career if you cannot get the right people to see you.

1. This will help you: For the right people, read the relevant post from this blog on good casting directors or coordinators. Just type "Casting Directors" and then "Arist Coordinators" in the search box at the right sidebar of this blog. The relevant posts will open

• It will not help you much if you do not understand the difference between auditioning and working as an actor on a film set.

2. This will help you:  Read and follow the relevant posts on camera acting and auditions from this blog. Put query in the search box as mentioned under No 1 help

• It will not help you much if (preferably), you cannot arrange sufficient money to fund your acting career in such a way so that you do not have to work for someone in order to make ends meet. This will help you to devote 100% of your time and energy in pursuing your dream to be a successful Bollywood actor

3. This will help you: If you cannot fund your living, then the only alternative you have is to take up a part time job, home business opportunities or be a freelance online worker and be patient.

• It won't help you much if you don't truly understand what are the hurdles an aspiring actors have to face before they see a ray of hope. The enormous commitment, a long drawn struggle and an ability to withstand failures, rejections, frustrations you will need to make in order to just get to making enough money to live off, working only as an actor.

4. This will help you: Build your body and a strong personality by joining a gym and learning Yoga, Relaxation, Exercising, Auto Suggestions and Self-hypnotism. Read relevant posts in this blog. This is possible. Save money by rationalizing expenses on housing, local travel, head shots and on show reel. Use internet and web technology as, much as you can. It is cheap

• It will not help you much if you do not know the steps to take not just to get your career started, but to build a base for getting auditions and acting work regularly and not just once a while

5. This will help you: Keep your eyes and ears open. Exploit every available audition and casting notice sources such as web, Facebook, Yahoo and LinkedIn groups, regularly contacting your coordinators to name a few

• It will not help you much if you do not really FEEL with every cell of your mind and body that this is what you really want and there's nothing more that you want. If you don't eat, sleep, drink, talk and walk acting its not gonna work
• It will not help you much if you do not realize what will drive you forward is your undying passion for this career and not the fame, not the money, not the glory, not the red carpet, but the just your love for acting.
• It will not help you much if you don't realize that no matter how good of an actor you think you are or how good others tell you you are, it's not gonna work  unless you are professionally trained and continue to learn and update techniques acting till you die!

6. This will help you: Join a good training school. Preferably, have a coach who wants to help you rather than with an objective to earn only money through you

• It won't help you much if your whole strategy for becoming an actor is built on "I gotta get a Co coordinator and find auditions.",  This strategy that statistics show has a success rate of almost to less than 3%

7. This will help you: Exploit all the avenues at one go. Run around to auditions whenever, wherever these are. Make contacts and friends who would inform you of these events

• Why, in spite of struggling for long periods still not getting acting assignments regularly? It will not help you if you do not identify the reasons and correct your mistakes in your current strategy. 

8. This will help you: Before you start, does a SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunities, Threats) analysis of yourself and review your strategies and �Change� if required.

Girls, this is important for you

• It won�t help you much if you are shy and reluctant. Bollywood, serials, private feature films or commercials require pretty, tall and bold girls.

9. This will help you: Be bold. Learn to be embarrassingly close to your Co actor in romantic scenes and be ready to kiss. About fashion, shots or prints learn to undress partially until you become a star. Then you can dictate your terms and refuse to do the objectionable scenes.

Refuse sex

Updated Post

*However, this does not mean you should be ready to have a sex. Under no circumstances, you should sell yourself. Be blunt and say a big �NO�

If you integrate your acting abilities with all the OTHER THINGS as mentioned above, you will for sure become a full-time working actor.
( You can contact the author for a free help)

9 Steps to Help You | Don't Depend Only on Acting Ability

How These 4 Tips 'n' Tricks Can Ensure a Star Performance

Tips on great camera performance

1. Showing v. Telling

A critical acting tip is to remember that you are showing a story, not telling it. The advice may sound simple at first, but it's harder than you might think to thrill your film audience. Simply reciting your lines and obeying director's instructions won't be enough. The acting involves the whole of your character or personality, in other words, your Essence per se. Each movement, each breath, and each spoken line contribute to your performance. When you are on screen, know that your actions must be deliberate. Everything you do must work to show the audience the story.
By showing the story, you should act like a magnet for the audience, attracting and involving them in the story and its rhythm and changes.

2. On Listening

�Just listen,� is perhaps the best acting tip you can receive. As an actor a good deal of your work will be scripted, but just reciting lines is not acting. You must actively respond to the material you are given and to your fellow actors. Listening, constantly and vigilantly, is the best way to do this. Listening to your fellow actors helps you to respond naturally and flexibly. Listening to yourself provides an important check for your own performance, allowing you to gauge how well you are working with the material.

3. Be Aware of Your 'Habitual Behavior' and Gestures

Many of us have certain habitual or fixed behavior normally we are not conscious of-like a particular 'standing style' like weight on one leg, nodding our heads while talking, saying 'um'... Or 'array' main ne kaha tha ne..,in our normal conversation, moving our hands, or lips etc.
Be aware of these behaviors and gestures because this could not match with a character's behavior and therefore are irritating and deadly for a good performance. Ask your friends or the best to your acting coach to identify such odd behavior and correct them with practice

4. Performance Tension and Jitters on a shoot

You go for a shoot. Either immediately or after a considerable waiting time in artists or make up room, you are called to perform in your scene. You arrive and stand at designated place and find yourself in a total chaos. People are running around, shouts, adjustments of lights, camera angles and focus, makeup artist patting and giving your face final touches and your co-actors muttering and remembering their lines.
The result- tension builds up in your body and the mind gets totally blank!
The moment director says �action', your throat is dry, you forget your lines, you sweat and eventually mess up your performance
Why? Because you observe that you are being observed. Yes, all are staring at you, including the director.
When an actor becomes aware that he/she is being observed by 'them', tension finds its way into the actor's life. The key factor here is 'aware'. The actor must first become aware of being observed before the observers can cause the actor to suffer with tension and 'camera fright'.
So the "trick" is NOT allowing oneself to become aware of people around and staring at you!

Try the following:

• Rather than looking at the people around you, immediately select an object on the set-may be something near the camera, a prop, may be a director's collar or anything and continue looking at it till you hear the shout 'action' from the director. And then just go into your character and shoot your line without bothering about your performance.
• Create a fourth wall: You are not looking at the right, left or behind, but at the front, so that's a fourth dimension which you are looking at. Block that view by creating a familiar wall. It could be a wall of your bedroom, study or kitchen or sitting room and substitute your front vision by this wall called as fourth wall. Got it?
• Take a deep breath and go on giving auto-suggestion to your mind like, 'I'm good', 'I'm so and so 'character', 'I remember my lines', 'I'm going to give great performance'
• Remember, you are a unique actor and there is nobody like you. Just don't bother and shoot. There could always be another 'take'. The director wants just one good 'take'

How These 4 Tips 'n' Tricks Can Ensure a Star Performance

7 Beginners Tips to be a Great Bollywood Actor

Transforming beautifully into a character! Daniel Radcliffe as Arthur Kipps, a young lawyer in 'The Woman in Black'

Acting, as I have understood to be an actor, a filmmaker and as an acting coach has been making myself free for a while and become somebody who I will never be. It is like living an alternate life for a brief period of time. It is an opportunity to win over all my inhibitions, imposed by society, religion, customs and release myself from them.

Here are Undisclosed Tips for Beginners

1. Empty your mind

If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything, it is open to everything. In the beginner's mind there are many constraints, wandering mind, possibilities, but in the expert actor�s mind there are none or few.
As the Zen masters say, if you try to fill a cup, which is already full, it will spill all over. To fill something new in a cup, first it must be emptied.
Therefore, before a script and your character analysis, remove everything which is in your mind. Remove clutter and move with creating a new life (of your character)

How to achieve this?
Practice relaxation techniques, including Yoga, self-hypnotism and auto suggestion
(If you don�t know how to do it, join our one on one coaching)

2. The fear of the camera, people and forgetting your lines

How to deal?
To deal with it and forget it: Concentrate on your role and think about nothing else. Learn to enjoy the location, crew, co actors, lights, set, spotlights on the set and just do what you need to do! The fact is-with your every performance you will get better at handling it. A little fright will always remain which is good and will keep you alert on a shoot.

3. Beware of Overacting or Faking Acting

Warning! What separates good actors from bad ones is their sincerity of emotion and belief in front of a camera. The audience can spot a phony actor right away! Good acting is not over acting or mechanically saying lines. Words flow, when real emotions bring them out of memory or imagination and it's not the other way round. Feel the emotion by identifying what triggers an emotion; connect with it, embrace it and words will then flow naturally.
An exception: to this rule is a �Star� who can fake it so beautifully that to an audience, it looks real. The other truth in this case is that the actor playing a character is audience favorite �Star� and that�s all matters to them

4. Belief and Creative Imagination for Acting

The acting is living a different life, as I said before. It is 'creating truth in an imaginary scene'. The audience is only going to believe that you are the person you are playing to be, if you yourself believe that you are that person!
The actor must use his imagination to be able to answer all questions (when, where, why, how)
How to do it?
Learn the art of Observing:  watch carefully people of different attitudes, note the details, let your imagination run wild, and create a small story with dialogs and practice it. This way your imagination will improve considerably to help you to transform into a character you intend playing

"The actor has to develop his body. The actor has to work on his voice. But the most important thing the actor has to work on is his mind." - Stella Adler

5. Why to Repeatedly Read the Script?

To get to the soul of the story!
Read the script thoroughly. Then, read it yet again. Keep reading till you get to the soul of the story. Understand the script first and think about what the storywriter has tried to say through the script. This a view from the outside. Then again read the story from the angle of the role you are playing.
Don�t hesitate! Ask the director what exactly you feel about the story and clarify your doubts. This is very important, as you need to understand the people, the surroundings, the time of the story and its message.

The Process
A. The father-the author of the story or screenplay or script
B. The mother-that�s you (actor) who is pregnant with the role inside
C. The child-the role to be born.
And finally
D. The doctor- director who helps in role (child) birth

6. Lose Yourself in the Role but Stay Aware

On a character level you must become that �character� and get involved, but your awareness as an actor should also be there, all the time, while performing. What I mean here is being aware of the limitations on a set, camera �position, shots, angles, width and length, blocking; lights, props and their uses, where the co actors are and listening to them and reacting.
You got to have a �switch on off� mechanism in your acting instrument (mind and body) which puts instantly into a �character� or an �actor� mode

7. Why to Enjoy Acting in Films?

Last but not the least, to do it right, you must enjoy the process! A very important part is bonding with your co-actors and developing good chemistry on a set with everybody. A film is a team job and you need to be a team player. The success of a role or a film is directly proportional to how much the team enjoyed while preparing! Keep learning and always have the passion of a beginner's mind and you will never cease to progress.
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/acting-tips-for-beginners.html

7 Beginners Tips to be a Great Bollywood Actor

Star Tip for Great Performance | 4 Rules to Observe People and Practice

An actor observes "characters" in people

You are already a great actor!

In your day to day life you perform different roles and that too, successfully! For example, when you talk to a child, your tone, language, gestures and feelings are different. But when you have to talk to your father or grandpa or your beloved or to an outsider with whom you have to get some favor or to your boss, your approach is different. You mold yourself accordingly and give a great performance. However, this is natural and there are no camera or sound or lights.

So you see, you are already an outstanding actor!
Then why can't you portray a character given  by a casting director or a director? The answer is simple.
In life, you go on acting naturally, subconsciously and as YOU! Whereas when a role is given to you, you find it difficult to transform into that character because you don't know how to get into the skin of that character.
The reason?
You have no data bank in your mind of different types of people with different attributes- for example: you might have seen a postman, a teacher, a beautiful girl, a police officer, a shop owner etc etc. But you don't remember them.
Well, though we shall be discussing various acting techniques in the subsequent posts, I'm giving below a simple and the best way to learn how to portray different characters and bring out different attitudes and emotions.

Rule 1

Always Keep a diary/ notebook and label that book as "Observation"

Rule 2

Keep your mobile with you with voice recording and video enabled below mobile screen
A binocular, if possible

Rule 3

OBSERVE

• Observe people in different walks of life, for example on the road, in a train, in a garden, in other public places and in your own house
• Observe different kind of people keenly around you and record  their types, profile, walk, posture, language, accent, attitudes, emotions. If this is not possible in a public place, just keep in mind and note down the details in your notebook.
• Easier is at your home, neighborhood or to go to a garden every day, identify one or two people and record them.

Select Different Types and Odd Types

REMEMBER- Films are the stories of life with different types of character: a thief, a police officer, a mother in law, a lover, a beggar  a pundit or a priest, a car driver, a judge and many more...

Rule 4

Practice your noted/ recorded characters every day in front of a mirror till they get imprinted in your memory. This way you can have a rich data of different characters in your memory for an instant recall when a director gives you a role.

Observing, Recording and Practicing Emotions and Attitudes in People!

Star Tip for Great Performance | 4 Rules to Observe People and Practice