Character Description, how much?

I generally dont put too much effort into describing my characters because everyone is going to create a different mental image of the character. When i do describe them, I like to have my characters describe each other and since my series takes place in modern times, I use references to create an image. There is a Butler in the series that one character describes as "Alfred". My main character is described as "Rosie the Riveter". If you get the references, you can form the mental picture of how they look.

I personally hate the "laundry list" descriptions. I've never once needed to know a female character's bra size or descriptions of her private areas to picture what she looked like, but people still take the time to write about it. If a character wakes up to work out, I already know they're in workout gear, I don't need an itemized list. This method also bugs me because the descriptions don't stick. They become generic figures with names I don't recognize.

If there something important about the character's appearance or background, I just say it. My MC has thick, curly hair. I write about her fixing her ponytail or pulling her hair into a sloppy bun. People with long hair understand the struggle of keeping their hair out of their face much more than describing a certain hairstyle. One character talks about his Haitian grandma and wishes he knew more about his Haitian roots. Another character wears her mother's Star of David. I like to celebrate the little things that make people unique in my descriptions.

This thread reminded me of a book all of my friends were passing around in high school because they thought it was really good. And when I finally read it I was so angry. Almost every other page had extremely gratuitous character descriptions for even background characters that included name brand clothing and little 14 year old me was so incensed that I wrote the author a very strongly worded email.... (to be fair, it wasn’t just the gratuitous description. I also thought it was carrying a dangerous message and everything else just sent me over the edge.)

I think its important to have faith in the reader’s imagination and trust that they have the capacity to fill things in themselves with just a basic amount of information and dole it out whenever its necessary. If you tell me a character has olive skin and curly hair I’ve already got an image forming in my head. Tell me that character has to look up to face another character and BAM there’s a height difference now and the image becomes clearer. Heck, even just personality archetypes can form an image even without a physical description sometimes. And isn’t that part of the fun anyway? Seeing different interpretations of the same description.

I dropped Welcome to Nightvale pretty quick after it started but I remember when you almost couldn’t get away from the fan art for a while and it was so interesting seeing all of these characters depicted by fans just based off of audio description alone.

Was it Three Steps Over Heaven by Federico Moccia, by any chance? :'D (...probably not, but the way you talked about it definitely gave me flashbacks from that book: every single character would be described by the brands of clothing they were wearing, the story was crap... yet every other 14 years old in my high school was raving about that book. I hated it :'D describing the exact brands character are wearing is another one of the things I dislike the most: again, unless it's necessary for the plot, please don't D: ).

As a writer (when I'm doing prose and not comics) I struggle with finding the right times to describe a character without it being awkward. I was FAIRLY happy with how I did the description in my novella with a single protagonist (she drops little bits of description that reflect on herself here and there throughout the whole story), but I'm usually at a loss.

As a reader though, I LIKE description, especially if it makes sense for the given character and narrator. Like I was recently reading a (published) novel where an 18-year-old guy protagonist (who is a pilot and an officer graduate so I'm gonna assume he's in good health to have a sex drive, and we have not been given any reason to believe he's asexual) had a crush on another 18-year-old guy and there was like... NO physical description at all and I was just like, excuse me, have you MET any 18-year-old guys? They're petty and physical as all hell (source: I work with older teenage boys). I think the only physical description we got was that this crush had curly/brown hair and a nice smile. I was like yeaaaaah no. He'd be describing the exact shape of the curve of that other dude's left buttcheek. I'm not saying you need to go that detailed, but like... pick one aspect of the body and focus on it. Because that 18-year-old pilot? Yeah. He wants the booty.

So in that context it doubly bothered me. Not only did we not get any description of either one of the characters, but it also made no sense that we didn't have any descriptions of them.

I am so NOT a visual person IRL that I sometimes don't have a clear picture of what the character looks like unless I have a reference photo! (Seriously. I get lost in my own neighborhood, mistake other people's cars for mine... it's a whole thing).

So it doesn't bother me a lot when there isn't much character description. But I've realized it is important to give people some idea of who you're talking about. I struggle with trying to make it organic, though, particularly when describing a first-person narrator.

I think it is ultimately left up to the author, reader and also the situation overall for the story. For me I went to university to get my writing degrees so there I learned to be more of a visual story teller for showing what happens in my novels instead of just telling about it. So when I write my for my novel on here I always have one of my writing books open and I also have several websites open as well so that when I come across a scene where I want to tell bring out the visuals in my story I have look up descriptive words, replace common words with better descriptive or action words.

For character descriptions to help me out I always try to be as detailed as possible just to provide a visual of what they look like to a certain degree. This helps bring out their personalities, styles, and overall presence they have in my story. I don't go into in depth detail down to the very center because that then leaves some room for the reader themselves to envision how these characters look and how they act.

Sometimes I find myself falling back on old habits of telling instead of showing but then when I look at my work during rewrites I find the places where I do that and then rework it so that it follows more showing than just telling.

For me I love writing detailed descriptions of my characters, for a second I thought you were calling me out ! Haha, but seriously my first chapter was basically a description of my character. I love describing everything, I feel like it's a given if you're writing a novel, just describe everything-- though it's not for everyone I know.

I don't mind it if theres no description for the character, but it makes it hard to empathize with them when I don't remember much about the character except their personality, and a few descriptions here and there, I end up forgetting the small details especially as the story goes on for a long time. I like to remind my readers over and over, though that's just me, if you want an example of what I write.

These are excerpts from my own novel.

"A boy can be seen sleeping in his bed peacefully. With chiseled features and a small button nose and platinum blonde hair that seemed to shine when sunlight hit it, he gave off an ethereal look akin to what many would believe would be an angel. His lips, although thin, were a deep rouge in color. His skin was fair as though he had never worked outside his entire life, but if one looked closely they would see the multitudes of freckles covering a lithe body."

Or for background I sometimes write it out like this:

"It was as big as the soldiers quarters if not bigger. The walls were a deep uninviting gray color; each wall looked as though it were man-made, carved to the utmost perfection with intricate designs in many of the stone. The colors on the ground contrasted heavily with the exterior of the building with the bright friendly flowers planted in front, in reds, yellows, and orange which served to distract visitors from the overwhelmingly haunted aura the building gave, as well as provide a welcome to new guests that decided to visit or enroll into the courses. The surrounding area was devoid of any vegetation, many of the trees were cut down to provide large areas of land where one could see laundry hanging on some of the clothes-line. It made one think if the people taking the courses lived there instead of it being a one time thing."

They're not the best, but they're what I enjoy writing. It's like drawing a picture inside a person's head, but when I read other people's work even the smallest amount of detail can make me imagine the wildest things even if for a short while.

All of mine are drawn first, though I have comics I also have standard books too (wattpad back in the day​), I'll always draw them.
When describing them, I try to get to the point quick as I have a tendency to waffle, basic description, any standout features, their outfit if it looks out of place in any way. I never describe anyone as attractive/beautiful etc, it's too subjective for me and growing attraction to a character will be down to their actions, yet my works are often supernatural so there are shortcuts to this.

I write with very, very heavy description, but I spend next to no time describing characters, even if it's someone my pov character encounters. If I do describe characters, I prefer to focus a) on vibes, and b) to work elements of character throughout interactions, i.e. the classic of "Light slid across his dark hair like silk."

POV characters, however, they aren't getting anything but their own perception of themselves, and I like the idea of readers drawing images from the way the character acts/thinks. Although I did have to add a couple of pointers on my MC in Stains because someone thought my 22-yr old scrawny, dark-haired MC was a balding, chunky middle aged man

I think it's because, despite writing a lot of description, I don't laundry list it. All of my description is active and "moving" and entwined with thoughts, so I don't have the place to sit and describe a character outside of my POV character's reaction to them.

e.g. Casper's first time seeing Cain, the love interest - nothing on features, but i think it gives a good sense of him

Then Casper saw him, and he couldn’t quite believe he’d managed to miss him the whole night.

Casper didn’t know what it was about expensive clothes that made them look expensive, but no matter that all he wore was black slacks and a loose white shirt, the scent of money just rolled off them. Perhaps it was the way the watch on his wrist hung real-gold heavy and posed like a work of art all at once. Perhaps it was just the way he wore them – even leant against the end of the bar nursing some of that watered-down whiskey, his posture was a billion dollars. Straight back, easy hips, loose shoulders.

The alcohol warmth lifted into Casper’s chest and spilt over into his groin.

Absolutely fucking gorgeous.

A crooked smile touched the stranger’s lips, one that failed entirely to hide that something breathless in his features as Casper met his gaze.

I would prefer to describe my characters if I can, but I do have problems in inserting where it could be.

I think it's better to do it in a manner that seems natural based on the current situation. Like when the character looks in the mirror or something.

I would also like to try describing chacters based on others perspective, not their own - I just feel like the characters might feel egotistic if it's from their own POV and they describe themselves nicely (but that's just me, I think)

Personally as a reader, I'd like to get the gist of what they look like. I think it's the writer's duty to make me imagine the scenario and the overall feel of a certain scene or story.

Be careful with the 'mirror' approach I'm fairly positive that's considered a cliche way to describe a main character

@WillowTree - yeah it seems so, right? That's why I'm going to try some other ways to do it..

Do you have any suggestions?