Directing Actors: 101
It doesn’t matter if you are working on a video game, animation, commercial or anything else, directing actors is a skill in and of itself. It takes time, experience, knowledge and patience to get right and even when you think you got it right, every actor can be a different experience depending on how they are trained and their own process.
Well that’s the scary bit out of the way, hello!
Now it might seem daunting but what I have stated above is true, people spend their whole lives trying to get the process of directing perfect and make it their sole focus. If you are here you might be a writer/copy writer, game developer, marketing executive, or even just run your own business; maybe you are someone already involved in the audio recording world looking to branch out into directing. Whatever your level of experience, this article aims to provide you with the very basic knowledge of how you can get the best performances from the actors you employ during live directed sessions and come away with a positive experience.
Let’s get stuck in shall we?
Too Many Cooks
The first and a crucial aspect of your live directed session to get right from the start is that there should only ever be one voice in the actor’s ear giving instructions.
“But we have multiple people on the call who have feedback!”
That’s a legitimate concern and I understand where it comes from. However either at the start or prior to your session it is important that one person among your team be nominated to direct the session and pass instructions to the actor; it will be there job to take feedback from the team on my performance and feed it back to me. At the start of each of my live directed sessions I ask my clients to do this because:
Sometimes ideas can conflict with one another, therefore the director can either fight back against ideas they don’t think have merit, or pass instructions with conflicting results along one at a time to get different takes that offer more choice in the edit. It’s important to understand that just like when you’re cooking, if you throw in too many ingredients at once, that doesn’t necessarily make for a multi-layered flavour profile so much as convoluted sludge.
If they believe that multiple parts of the feedback do have merit they will naturally feed that back in a single instruction which gives a far clearer indication of the overall vision for the performance.
Remember that every opinion might be valid but a wall of noise is not conducive to a productive session.
Start on the Same Page
What I mean by this is to make sure that when you hire your actor, ensure that the information you have passed onto them prior to the recording, or even during, is in line with the vision you or your clients have for the recording.
This might seem obvious and to be frank, yeah it is. However I have had a handful of session where I have been contacted by a member of the creative team for an ad or video game. They have either provided instructions, samples of audio, or even pointed to samples in my reels stating: “This voice is perfect!”. Then we come to the recording session, I perform a take and low and behold, either the brief has changed, or the original instructions were not accurate.
This makes both myself and those who relayed those instructions look very silly and quite unprofessional. So make sure that when it comes to the session everyone is up to speed.
What We have Here is a Failure to Communicate!
Cool Hand Luke, great movie. Anywho, directing for the most part is all about communication, passing on information in a clear way that let’s your actors know exactly what you want from them. There are a number of ways you can do this, some directors are meticulous and know exactly what they want e.g. “Put the emphasis on X word.” Some prefer to relay their instructions as a scenario in order to stimulate the imagination of the actor: “Imagine you are telling your best friend bad news.” The number of styles are innumerable and their deliveries as unique as the individual using them.
Whether you are looking to direct as a career or just want to get better at this aspect to support your main role, figuring out how you are going to communicate your wants to actors in a manner that works for you and also achieves the best results is essential.
It’s also important to know that actors speak a secret language and each dialect varies between individuals depending on their background and training. This actor’s language is how every director would speak in an ideal world. However it takes a lot of knowledge and experience for a single director to learn multiple styles of communication that they can then skew to direct each actor individually. For reference I have met maybe 3 directors in my 15+ years of acting who could do this, in fact many Hollywood directors can’t do this, which is why an experienced actor also learns to translate directors notes into their own language in order to help it make sense within their own process.
With all this in mind - and to make it a slightly less daunting process - let’s go through a few simple rules of thumb for the Do’s and Don’ts of directing a voice actor.
Do
Provide clear feedback geared towards achieving what it is you want from the performance.
Let the team speak through you, don’t rush and take the time to consider each piece of feedback and how they all fit together.
Remain respectful and be open to suggestions from the actor, they know their craft and want to help you get the best performance possible.
Consider the manner in which you are providing notes, actors are very literal so if you tell us you want a voice over in the style of a specific video, we will emulate that. Think about the language you use to communicate.
When all else fails and you are on a time crunch puppeteering an actor isn’t my favourite method of direction but it works. This means reading the line yourself in exactly the manner you want it delivered, however don’t rely on this as your primary method of direction.
Be considerate of the actor’s needs. If you hear their voice getting tired, offer them a break.
Don’t
Mimic the actor - yeah I’ve had this. Especially when describing what you don’t want, do not impersonate the actor’s performance. However well meaning it might be this can come off as insulting and can be detrimental to the session, putting the actor “in their head”.
Rush the session or put pressure on to get it done quickly. As my dad once told me when we were in his woodshop: “There are two ways to do something, the right way, or the fast way.”
Give convoluted notes that conflict with one another. Take the time to consider each note and ask yourself how they impact against each other.
Ask for loud or shouted lines to be done at the start of a session. Screaming, shouting, roaring etc takes a lot of energy and vocal strength. Doing this at the very beginning risks turning the rest of the session into a write off.
So there you go, the basics of voice directing from an actor. If you have any questions related to voice direction feel free to get in touch, or if you want a live directed session for your voice over pop me an email.
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About Eloquent Bard Voice Over
Johnny is a veteran actor with over 15 years in the industry, having started voice acting in 2015 on Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: India they have gone on to provide voices for hundreds of projects.
