Light of the Night (Posts tagged character design)

kaiba-s-giant-ego

42 character development questions!

johannescena

PHYSICAL PRESENCE AND GESTURE.
1. How do they move and carry themselves? Pace, rhythm, gestures, energy?
2. How much physical space do they use, active and at rest?
3. How do they position themselves in a group? Do they like to be the center of attention, or do they hang back at the edges of a crowd?
4. What is their size and build? How does it influence how they use their body, if it does?
5. How do they dress? What styles, colors, accessories, and other possessions do they favor? Why?
6. What are they like in motion–in different environments, and in different activities? What causes the differences between these?
7. How do they physically engage with other people, inanimate objects, and their environment? What causes the differences between these?
8. Where and when do they seem most and least at ease? Why? How can you tell?
9. How do they manifest energy, exhaustion, tension, or other strong emotions?
10. What energizes and drains them most?
11. How are they vocally expressive? What kind of voice, accent, tones, inflections, volume, phrases and slang, and manner of speaking do they use?
12. How are they bodily expressive? How do they use nonverbal cues such as their posture, stance, eyes, eyebrows, mouths, and hands?

DISPOSITION AND TEMPERAMENT.
13. How do they greet the world — what is their typical attitude towards life? How does it differ in different circumstances, or towards different subjects? Why do they take these attitudes, and why do they change? How do these tend to be expressed?
14. What do they care deeply about? What kind of loyalties, commitments, moral codes, life philosophies, passions, callings, or spirituality and faith do they have? How do these tend to be expressed?
15. What kind of inner life do they have — rich and imaginative? Calculating and practical? Full of doubts and fears? Does it find any sort of outlet in their lives?
16. Do they dream? What are those dreams like?
17. Are they more shaped by nature or nurture — who they are, or what has happened to them? How have these shaped who they’ve become as a person?
18. What kind of person could they become in the future? What are some developmental paths that they could take, (best, worst, most likely?) what would cause them to come to pass, and what consequences might they have? What paths would you especially like to see, and why?

CONNECTIONS WITH OTHERS.
19. How do they behave within a group? What role(s) do they take? Does this differ if they know and trust the group, versus finding themselves in a group of strangers? Why?
20. What kind of individual relationships do they have with others, and how do they behave in them? How are they different between intimate relationships like friends, family, and lovers versus more impersonal relationships?
21. What kind of relationships do they tend to intentionally seek out versus actually cultivate? What kind of social contact do they prefer, and why?
22. How do people respond to them, and why might these responses differ?
23. How do they respond to difficult social moments? What makes them consider a social situation difficult?
24. How do they present themselves socially? What distinguishes their “persona” from their “true self”, and what causes that difference?
25. What do they need and want out of relationships, and how do they go about getting it?
26. How do they view and feel about relationships, and how might this manifest in how they handle them, if it does?

ACTIVITIES AND PREFERENCES.
27. What do they strongly like and dislike, in any category? Why?
28. What are they likely to do if they have the opportunity, resources, and time to accomplish it? Why?
29. What kind of activities, interests, and hobbies do they have? What significance and impact do these have in their lives, both positive and negative?
30. What is their preferred level of activity and stimulation? How do they cope if they get either too little or too much?
31. Is there anything that counts as a “dealbreaker” for them, positively or negatively? What makes things go smoothly, and what spoils an activity or ruins their day? Why?
32. Do they have any “props” that are a significant part of their life, identity, activities, or self-presentation somehow? What are they, how are they used, and why are they so significant? How would these props’ absence impact them, how would they compensate, and why?

THINKING AND LEARNING.
33. How do they learn about the world–what is their preferred learning style? Hands-on learning with trial and error? Research, reading, and note-taking? Observation or rote memorization? Inductive or deductive reasoning? Seeking patterns and organization? Taking things apart and putting them back together? Creative processing via discussing, writing about, or dramatizing things?
34. How do they understand the world–what kind of worldview and thought processes do they have? Why?
35. How and why do they internalize knowledge? What effect has that had on them?
36. How much do they rely on their minds and intellect, versus other approaches like relying on instinct, intuition, faith and spirituality, or emotions? What is their opinion on this?
37. Have they had any special education or training that colors their means of learning about or understanding the world? Conversely, do they lack some kind of education considered essential in their world? What kind of impact has this addition or lack had on them?
38. Is there anything they wish they could change about their worldview or thought processes? What, and why?
39. What sort of questions or thoughts recur in their lives, either specifically or as a theme? Why are these never answered, or answered permanently to their satisfaction?
40. What do they wonder about? What sparks their curiosity and imagination, and why? How is this expressed, if it is?

FREE FOR ALL.
41. What associations do they bring to mind? Words or phrases, images, metaphors or motifs? Why?
42. I have a question of my own!

Source: johannescena

long post character design

kaiba-s-giant-ego

thewordriven:
“How to Plot Character Arc by illuminara
”

Source: illuminara.deviantart.com

writing character design

kaiba-s-giant-ego

Creating Characters

letswritesomenovels

On the internet, the most common advice for developing characters I’ve found is to fill out a character questionnaire. It’s everywhere. What’s the best way to get to know your character, you ask? Fill out this form, they answer.

The official NaNoWriMo questionnaire is forty-six questions long, guys. Forty. Six. Questions.

This may work perfectly for some people, but I look at those things and die a little on the inside.

I know I can’t be the only person who hates character questionnaires, so if you’re not a fan of forms and also have no idea where to start with your character, I thought I would share my list of things I know about my characters before I start writing.

It is not a list of forty-six things. It’s a list of four.

1. Their Role

Character is story and story is character. You can’t have characters taking up pages and doing nothing. For me, knowing the character’s role in the story means knowing who I need my character to be. Even if a story is character-driven, the first thing you should decide is what about the character is actually driving the story. The role can be specific: a girl grieving for her murdered aunt decides to solve her murder. The role can be vague: the protag’s best friend. No matter what, it’s the reason this character is in your story.

2. Their Name

In real life, our names don’t usually say too much about our characters. This is not the way in fiction. Your name can say everything about your character. Whether it reveals the big stuff: Remus Lupin, Luke Skywalker. Or whether it just sets the tone of the character: Chad, Fitzwilliam, Lily. Choose the name carefully and you can get a rough sketch of a character based on it alone.

3. What Makes Them Unique

In a writing workshop, my instructor once had the class do a character building exercise. She had us close our eyes and imagine our character’s shoes. What sort of shoe were they? What color? Were they scuffed? Polished? We worked our way up the rest of the character, but first, we knew what their shoes looked like.

Having that one piece of information gave us something to use to inform the next piece of clothing, which informed their hair style, which informed the next thing, until we had a clear picture of our entire character.

It’s easier figuring out the smaller details of your characters and working your way to a composite than it is to start with a big picture. When you’re just getting to know your character have a few small, specific details about them that give you an idea of exactly who this person is and, more importantly, make you interested in this character.

Usually I like to have a mix of physical details and personality details. The best usually speak to both. They’re details that can be built upon. They give an impression of a larger picture. For example:

She has the nose of a Fox and the character of one too.
Her hair is always tied up in a messy ponytail.
She likes to wander through the garden when she can’t sleep at night.

For me, these details usually don’t change, no matter how many drafts I work through. The details are usually the reason I like writing about this character in the first place.

4. Where they’re sorted

When you’re writing, you need to be able to answer the question “what would X do next?” Therefore, you need to know something about your character that will help you answer that question.

How do you do this? Luckily, society likes categorising people, so there are a lot of shortcuts you can take to find a way to answer that question for every single character in your novel. You can use the Myer-Briggs system, the zodiac, even the question: cat person or dog person?

Personally, I like using Hogwarts Houses. For three reasons:

It identifies a key personality trait. It isn’t the character’s only personality trait, but it’s something to start with. Matching this with the list of things I know about my character usually defines the character completely.
It focuses on characters’ motivations. It makes me define the person at their core. I can use it as a sort of compass when guiding my character through the plot. It also vaguely answers the question what does this character want: knowledge, power, glory, friendship?
I speak the language fluently. I am my own sorting hat. I can look at anyone, sort them into a house and tell you how it fits into their strengths and weaknesses. With fictional characters as well. I don’t have to think about it. When they make a decision, I don’t need to ask myself: is this in character or out of character? I just know.

Once I know these four things, I write the first draft. I let my characters grow with the plot, using those small things I know about them to guide the rest of their development. At the end of the draft, I reevaluate my character. My list of unchanging facts about the character quadruples. Instead of using their Hogwarts House to guide their decisions, I identify single, solid goals.

The best thing about this is that it works for developing both minor and major characters. For minor characters, this information is usually all I need. Even that grocery clerk who only speaks once can have a name, a Hogwarts house and a couple of distinguishing characteristics. For more major characters, it’s the groundwork for a character I enjoy writing about.

Source: letswritesomenovels

long post writing character design

elkian

schrodingersowen

important headcanons to consider:

can they use chopsticks
what do they do when they cant sleep
what would they impulse buy at the grocery store
what order do they wash things in the shower
what’s their coffee order
what sort of apps would they have on their smartphone
how do they act around children
what would they watch on tv when they’re bored and nothing they really like is on

writing character design

elkian

mrimmortal

http://spaztique.deviantart.com/journal/The-Simple-Character-Creator-Formula-351762100

i’ve been looking into a lot of writing tips recently and this blew my mind

fatmomsgetfit

Ooh

Source: mrimmortal

writing character design neat

elkian

chronicliing asked:

do you know any good generators to help with OC's? Ex: names, appearance :)

which-oc-would answered:

Oh man this post is super handy when you’re stuck or ideas about family relations, appearances, backgrounds, and more. Had to dig this one out of my for writing tag.

This post has a list of character flaws you could add

I dunno if you need this post but it helps when making a realistic character for plot purposes

This site give you like a whole fake identity, like name, age, country, job, email, favorite color, you name it

There was a really cool generator I once saw but can’t find that had like genders including non-binary, body shape, hair color, purpose, weakness. I’m sad I can’t find it for you albknfdl.

Source: which-oc-would

writing character design

fiswyn

Character Sheets and character creation →

thatfrenchhelper

When creating a character, there’s a lot of questions you ask yourself. Whether it’s an original character or one you’ve been playing for a long time, using a character sheet to get to know your character better can always be a nice idea. With it’s help, you’ll be able to think about things you didn’t necesarily thought about, and ask some important questions to yourself that might activate your character’s voice, or help you to get your muse back with them. Everyone has their favorite character sheets, some people prefer to have a lot of questions, some others like it a bit more vague, so here’s a masterlist of the character sheets I found on various websites and found quite interesting, plus some other things that could be used to help you see, for example, how other character view yours.

With these sheets, you could also try to find your character’s Jung and Enneagram Type or use the Moral Alignment tool. All of these things can be really useful to get a better grip on a character.

Then, if you’re trying to create a character, and do not have many ideas, or get stuck, I’d suggest for you to roam around TVTropes, which gives you a lot of tropes used for character creation. Maybe you could try to mix a few of these and create an original character?

Or, if you’re a skillful writer and know how to make your character different from another, make a list of characters in fiction you happen to find interesting and why. Try to keep it short. Then, maybe, try to mix and match things from two or three characters, take a character and change their backstory, to see what would change. Play with them to inspire yourself and create something new, original and truly yours.

Oh, and here’s a little guide to Mary-Sues and OCs, just in case you want to make sure your character isn’t going to become a Mary-Sue or a Gary-Stu

And last but not least, this article about building fictional character definitely seemed interesting to me, and is full of many other links that could guide you during the creating of your character and help you file one of these sheets.

Source: thatfrenchhelper-blog

writing character design

damnselfly

shacklefunk

a thing i only recently realized i knew abt character design that isnt just common sense apparently:

do not start ur character design by doing a full, refined turnaround/model sheet.

like. everyone in my childrens book il class is fuckin doing this even though most of them are illustration majors and its a huge mistake (our prof literally warned them against this, and YET)

any time you design a character, start by not caring. by just doing what feels right. dont settle on the first thing; play around. and then draw your character a shitload of times before u start a ref sheet

dont finish anything, just. do super fast sketches of them over and over and over. fill up a page or two. as you draw them theyll evolve. that will happen whether your sketch it out at the beginning or jump right into a final draft, and lemme tell u, u do NOT want ur character evolving and changing AFTER ur final draft. u want to get that out of the way early so u can get a decently consistent finished product

then when you go to do your model sheet you will already be able to keep your character on model without it bc youve drawn them a shitload of times. then it wont be “struggling to draw the character the same every time” itll just be “this is what the character looks like and i could draw them with my eyes closed bc of muscle memory”

dont just jump in and be like “shit i gotta have this full complex polished thing right out of the gate!” like. in the beginning, Do Not Work Hard. play. play a lot. and THEN do a refined drawing. your refined drawing will look way better, too, bc by then youll be completely comfortable with your design

its just a super bad idea to present a character as “heres a ref sheet” as soon as you have a concept. your concept will evolve and u have to let it, or else ur designs will look rushed/bad and your drawing will looks stiff and uncomfortable bc u can only draw ur character at a ¾ths view in a particular pose bc youve drawn them twice in ur entire life

Source: shacklefunk

writing character design

the-prince-of-pigs

justsomecynic

I’m a very lazy person. I know my characters well, but every time I try to fill out a proper character sheet, I either get distracted or simply never finish them.

SO!

I made this! A silly, simple character sheet in which you only have to check boxes to get to know your dear ~~puppet~~ character. Use to your heart’s content, and if you’re going to repost, please credit! Enjoy~

PDF/Printable version on Google Drive