How Do Actors Manage To Stay So Still When Playing Dead?

[dave50]

Especially when playing dead on an autopsy table with all the camera close ups involved, they don't move at all, not even their eyes, how do they do it?

[andy-hughes]

Acting.

That's not as flippant as it sounds. You can train yourself to breathe very very slowly, and lie totally still. It takes practise, but it's part of the actor's art.

[Philoctetes]

Relaxation, chiefly. And being filmed in very short takes

[bert_h]

An autopsy scene would usually be filmed with a wax model. They can be made very, very good; too good to see the difference on a film.

[aelmpvw]

they can do it so long as nobody passes wind on set

[hc4361]

The bodies on the table aren't real. They are models and prosthetics.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/3561501/Silent-Witness.html

[Canary42]

They use dummies.

[heathfield]

Some tips here...

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1997-10-26/news/9710260346_1_stage-actor-dead-film-and-show

[Scylax]

Often, the shots you see are 'stills', interspersed into the film.

[weecalf]

Some or most of the "actors " are wooden so t should not be a problem

[joko]

sometimes they are prosthetic, sometimes not.

to make a full body and face life cast and model of a person is time consuming and expensive - esepcially if the person was also alive in the film, as a lot of matching up would be needed - so sometimes its only done if it was being cut open or something.

there are a few techniques they use such as simply filming the scene many times and cutting the shots together that they are still in... or as many of us say on-set - 'we'll sort it out in post' (post production) ... and basically alter it with CGI.

or sometimes its a fake chest plate - so they can breathe a bit underneath but it wont rise.