Cassandra De Klerck: "Acting In VR, A Whole New World"

So I thought, let's see what I can do there. But it was the first thing a Darryl . So, and for me , uh , with a background as an actress, but as a VR maker now it's really interesting. So what I can do to make the whole acting part in this new medias better. So, yeah. So Cassandra , you're based in Amsterdam? My ticket and yeah, my company's based in Amsterdam, but I travel a lot around the world and I'm most of my time in la now. But yeah, that's not bad. No . And most of the diamonds.

Beautiful. Better . And uh , I love to be in Venice beach. Yeah, we all lived in Venice. Yeah . Not Quite as, you know, you know, it's con is absolutely much more beautiful with the, the beautiful water here and the nice end and the fact they keep it so clean, that good old Venice edgy. And it is truly the ground zero of, of acting or in, in, in the modern day world. It's absolutely where you have to be. It makes sense. Yeah. So how did you get started?

Um, yeah, that's uh , it's um, it's a long story now. It's, hey, we'll make it short. But um, I have a background as an actress since I was a kid, a ad and then , um, I become more a script maker and a director and five years ago I found out virtual reality and I was in love with that because if the next step we, what we can do in film, like the immersion, like dip psychology things in it.

And um, then after making a films with purple pill, I found out like acting is different here I have to teach the actors I work with and then I, then nobody is doing that yet. So I will start giving workshops to them. And then I thought there's so much to find out in this like rural. So I want to do research and develop new tools and that became the virtual acting institute to help other makers and uh , create new content where we also focus on the acting part in it.

What do you see are the biggest problems when, I mean we've all seen VR pieces that had acting in it and sometimes we, mo or maybe a lot of times we've seen where it's not really good acting. What do you think is the fundamental problem actors are not doing when it comes to three 60 or VR or immersive? Yeah, it depends. It depends a bit on the medium what it is. But what I see a few things like three 60 is differently.

When you use the three 60 camera, you work with different angles, you have stitch lines , stuff of that. Um, another part, what's really important is the interaction part because acting is reaction, right? And if we talk with each other now, then we feel like the energy and we can see each other in the eyes and yeah, you really have that. But if you act instead of a camera and it's not giving you something back, it has to come out of your imagination.

And um, next to three 60 , uh , cinema, I go much further and work with animation and stuff like that. And then you work like in the green screen with a mocap suit or in a volumetric video studios and then it's all about imagination and to say, what can you imagine in a, in a green room, you really have to be strong. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I love that part. I live , yeah. When I create it's all out of my imagination.

So, and there are a lot of actors, they already work with their imagination, but it's different when you have a whole like custom and you have your other actors or being alone in the studio, what, what the tech, and we see that in CG acting already, but now it's the next level because you also have the interaction and the timing. And how to deal with that. Like yeah, that's a heavy stuff that is quite heavy and I would imagine that asks a certain kind of talent .

So would you say then, well certainly that you have great stage actors, you have great film actors, you have some that can do both and some that can only do one. And I'm imagining now with the CGI and immersive that that's a type of acting that not everyone can do either. Absolutely. That's true. Somebody are really talented for it and some people less so. Yeah, it's a new, it's a new section. Can you get better? Of course you can train it. Where would you do that? Cause No .

So , um, what are some skills that people can do to improve their acting technique? In Mercer , what I do in my master classes , I've worked with virtual reality. So I developed a method in four phases . What we do is like we practiced a lot in green screen studio, but then to help your imagination, we go into virtual reality and first we start working with, with frictional environments, how to handle with that. How is it to walk in a forest?

What , what does it mean if it's dark or bright or what is it? If it's completely fantasy and then we go out into out of the VR and start doing that in a green screen and things like that. We do also for situations, frictional situations and how it's to be a fictional character. And then the last part is how to interact with all those fictional stuff . So yeah, that's about what we do. And I think training your imagination and your three 60 thinking that's an important part.

And, and also like if you have all the technique on you like that, that also influenced your acting. So it's good to train how it is to work with face dragging or in a mocap suit and yeah, we do all that kind of stuff. What about facial expressions? Do these need to be more, can they be more subtle to capture the very minute , um , delicate expressions? Or do we have to overemphasize facial expressions?

It depends a bit what you do, but if it's like it's not theater, it's like still filming for , for that example. So you don't want to have to overacting it's super septal and you have to experience it. I think it's not really the rules for it is more intuitive. If I work with actors then yeah we train it. Or if I direct the actors we we scale it up and bring it down and find the good way in between Yam.

Okay. So there is, you have to, you have to kind of know I guess or work with the director in terms of figuring out how far to push your um, your gestures or your, your facial expression . Yeah . Yeah. And it's also a combination with what the designer animator, like if he created the characters. Because it's like, yeah, if you look at film, it's only like the , the extra stripe , but now technology becomes more and more important.

So on the other side we'll work a lot what a tech people do to , to let them know what it is to be an actor and the skills actors have, can do a love for the like creators in behind the characters. So, yeah. All good. All good. All immersive. Not only is it more challenging for script writing, it's more challenging for acting and you have to now think of like extra people to give you guidance. Absolutely changed everything, right?

Like a whole new world will give us some idea about if you're not imaginative or you know, or how , how would you improve that, if that's such a key point of acting and communicating and letting people into the story, what could they do to improve their imagination from an acting perspective? Yeah. What, I think it's, it's part of acting already. Like if I will talk with actors, everybody will tell. Yeah . But , but being an actor is also working with your imagination.

But um, I think what's really important to let go boundaries, like we are in our whole system. It's like about doing it good or doing it the right way or thinking out of one perspective. So if I work with, with, with uh, the actors or working on set , then for me it's really important. Come close to yourself and start , um, start working works for fantasy. So sometimes we have only an object, like an app or something.

And a whole world can come out of that apple and we will train that and in the beginning I will guide the person's like you can imagine of this or that or shows him virtual reality. And in the end, if you do that more often, then you see that people start being more like creative and having their own fantasies in mostly , um, they start , um, sometimes they are afraid of it. Like, is it good or bad or weird? But if you do that a few times and it then it gets easier. Yeah. Yeah, it does.

I think that fear element, I mean we're all wanting to do something that people like and appreciate. Yeah. And I can certainly see how an acting that involves standing up and exposing yourself. Like you say, boundaries. Do you have any other techniques? I mean, perhaps some of these techniques can help any kind of person that works in an imaginary space or creative space. Um, something else I could do in the car, in the shower or they work on interaction with their friends .

Yeah. I , I think like , um, if you, if what I always do is like, but then in the car it's not not that safe . But yeah , when I look to the clouds, like I see the whole world's in and it's what you, it's good to be , uh , go back to your childhood a bit. Like sometimes I buy candy, which I bought when I was a kid.

And then all that, like imaginations and tots , what you had assaulted , you had so many imagination then every kid has, and it's, you can, you can try to become a bit more closer to that. What, what, what do you really love? What , what, what , what were your dreams when you was a kid? And that can help to be closer to your imagination as an adult. Yeah. Very good. So what's next? How do, how does your school work?

Um , um, yeah , it's a virtual institute, literally like virtual in the air or webinars. So what I do now, I give master classes , uh , to professional actors and I do it worldwide is a bit exclusive now because I also want to test what I developed that it is a value for a really professional actors with a lot of experience. Otherwise it doesn't make sense. But I also blog a lot and I work with partners on like online training too.

So like I can reach more people in the end and , and share the skills. Um, but that's how it works for now. It's now me with a small team that the teaching the skills we know now, but we are growing and sharing morph to staff and yet online will be a part two . So it's unfertile acting.com and people can follow it. Yeah. Well thank you very much Cassandra for sharing this and you know, bringing something new to the artists . Storytelling is the communicating, so, yeah. Thank you.

Thank you very much.