How do you "know" your characters?

[apexdraws]

More of a discussion, not something I need advice on BTW.

For your comic, novel, etc. in what ways do you feel like you understand your characters? For example when I think of a friend or family member, I have this sense of them but it's not something that I can easily put into words. The same goes for my characters- sometimes I have a difficult time describing who they are using character sheets and stuff, even though I do know them. (I certainly don't know Everything about them, and still have to put a lot of thought into their decisions at times :v But I'd say I understand them the way I understand my friends)

There've been a few times where I've tried to make character sheets for my series, but I either never finish them or never end up using them.

So what about you? Is your understanding of your characters more concrete or abstract? Does it change the more you use a character? Do you like making character sheets or doing those "100 questions about your character" challenges? I don't think one method is better than another, it's just interesting to think about

[Rodrigo_Silveira]

an interesting thing about Aurora, is that basically all the characters are my friends in real life, with a few exceptions. A lot of the characters' reactions are things they would do in real life. This helps a lot with the story.

[DokiDokiTsuna]

So what about you? Is your understanding of your characters more concrete or abstract? Does it change the more you use a character? Do you like making character sheets or doing those "100 questions about your character" challenges? I don't think one method is better than another, it's just interesting to think about

My understanding of my characters is definitely concrete, but I still don't do those character sheet things anymore because they're just a huge waste of time. ^^; I already know all the necessary details about my characters (and more); I don't need the temptation to spend hours writing fluff about them when I could be working on their actual story.
The only reason I'd do it nowadays is if someone asked me, which no one ever does, so...

Anyway, I think I "know" them like they were real people...except a little differently, because I actually like them. ^^ Little bits of trivia about their life histories and idiosyncrasies continually pop into my head as I keep using them; the more time I spend thinking about them, the more I learn.

Sometimes, if I enjoy them enough, I'll take them out for 'walks' in my mind-- i.e., I imagine them in a certain situation, canon or not, and just watch what they do. And even if I can't use what I see in the story, I think this exercise helps a lot to round out their characters even more. The more 'walks' a character has been on, the more they feel like a real, 3-dimensional person.

[AlydaB]

I think I started abstract and then got more concrete. I like some character sheets- but the 100 questions challenges usually feel like a waste of time to me.. depending on what questions are asked '^^

Nowadays, after years with my characters, I've gotten to the point where I don't rely so much on character sheets or written descriptions. I know who they are and what makes them tick, because I've spent so much time with them- observing how they behave in different situations, how they interact with other people, and the choices they make.

But I definitely think this stuff (character sheets, descriptions, etc) is crucial in the early stages of creating your cast and story. At the starting point, you don't know your characters yet and likely only have a vague concept of who they are, so it's helpful to have a list of defining characteristics to guide you and help you decide how they'd behave in any given situation.

Whether you write it down or keep it in your head (which might be forgotten, if your project is a very long-term one like mine), I think it's important to know what their personality, motivations, fears, desires, relationships, strengths, and weaknesses are. Before any of the rest, you should know what role they're supposed to serve in the story in order to contribute to an overarching theme or plot point.

I guess this all doesn't absolutely need to be put down on paper. You just risk forgetting information or mixing it up in your head if you don't. Documents are easy to keep for reference, while memories aren't.

On the topic of describing your character in words... I'm of the opinion that you should be able to do this. One writing teacher I was following online brought up a fun and useful character writing exercise that stuck with me: Describe your character without mentioning their occupation, age, gender, appearance, or using the word "driven". If you struggle to do that, your character might need work.

If I were to do that exercise with my comic's main character, it'd look like this:

MC is a reserved, level-headed voice of reason and a natural leader. They are deeply compassionate and loyally devoted to their few loved ones above all else, but their fear of loss holds them back from building close connections with others and causes them to become unreasonably risk-adverse and prone to anxiety. These flaws hold them back from accomplishing their goals, but over the course of the story, they learn to accept that life, risk, and loss go hand-in-hand and gain a sense of courage, peace, and acceptance, allowing them to step up and fight for the causes they're passionate about.

Anyways, there's my two cents. These kinds of exercises are not only useful, but fun imo :]

[ShidoDraws]

I don't think I ever consciously written a character with a friend in mind. Every time I create a character I give them their personalities based on their agenda in the story. It's probably terrible writing but I had written stories with real life bullies/abusers as my characters, usually as the antagonist. Not really something I'd tell to a random reader but thought it's better than nothing, after all most of my characters are kind of just a bunch of me(s) talking to each other and falling in love with each other. Haha! Who knows me best? Me.

Just now realized how curse that is.

Also, I tried to make character sheets for my characters, I just could never finish any of the character sheets. I really should make character sheets for my main characters at least, but eh, I'll make them when I really really need them.

[NickRowler]

Some of my characters are an aspect of me but pushed to an extreme. Tho I do also sprinkle in other quirks.

I don't think you necessarily need to fill out 100 questions for each character, it's a bit overkill. But sometimes coming up with little things like favorite food, animal, music, and color can add some personality. And having things they really love vs things they really hate and not having what they love/hate just be another character.

[apexdraws]

@rodzeye That's cool, do you think you & your friends have more fun with the story this way? I've never had a character based off me (to my knowledge) but I think it'd be interesting.

@DokiDokiTsuna Yeah, sometimes I wanna write a whole wiki for my story, but it'd be way better to spend that energy on the story itself xD Though personally I don't think character sheets are a waste of time unless the questions are all fluff

@AlydaB Agreed, I think sheets can be a helpful tool when first building characters. Also that exercise sounds really useful. Thanks for sharing it!

@ShidoDraws None of my characters are based off of other people, even myself, but I do think there's a part of me in most of them. Sometimes it's their sense of style, other times it's a fear that drastically altered their life (even if it didn't drastically alter mine.) It helps me connect to the characters and make them a little more believable.

@NickRowler Yeah! I don't make it a point to give every character favorite music, favorite food, etc. but I do know that stuff for some of them. I think it can be fun

[Rodrigo_Silveira]

they loved the idea. Btw no much of them are reading the story.

[GumshoeComix]

with my characters, it started very abstract like I didn't know much about them yet
so I wrote them over and over in prompt after prompt until I felt like I finally had my characters figured out
for me at least I see my characters as tiny people that live in your imagination, you just have to get to know them and the only way to do that is to write them. A LOT.

[IndigoShirtProd]

I usually have a pretty clear understanding of who my characters are by the time I start writing or drawing novels or comics, respectively. Despite that, I do use character sheets, written character sheets specifcally, not so much drawn one unless, depending on the property, there are a lot of characters or each character has very specific details. I'm just a forgetful storyteller do when I get into it, that I'll end up not remembering how I'm supposed to characterize a character. So for me, it's good that I have a baseline. Most of my sheets aren't like 100 questions long, since I don't need to know that much about my characters, instead I focus on important things like personality and motivations.

[375]

I usually have a pretty good understanding of my characters but sometimes I do have to rewrite them and ask them what they want. What is their purpose? How far are they willing to go to achieve this? Things like this I constantly seek out to make sure their mind hasnt changed

[smokesalty]

Interesting! I get what you mean.

I think with my characters while I'm able to describe their main characteristics, there are also intricacies things about them that I can't quite pinpoint, I just know it's them when I'm writing them. It could also be their context in the story, but even if I had a character in a different story with a similar personality, I don't think it would be entirely the same.

I don't write character sheets because I usually work out my characters as people through the writing itself, where I feel my characters just go from base personality traits to actual people.

[N1ghtm4r3]

i refrence in my mind charcters i have seen who are similar and kinda do a bit of "acting" to see if they would react in a certain way

[xkdeSskf]

My characters are like bits of my soul scattered in terms of psychology. Thus I really like my characters. I frequently put them in dangerous scenarios which I would tend to think about. My characters are able to portrait what I would be in the scenario. I would have different attitudes and take different actions and I love to see how each character turns out. It looks like an experiment, but it isn't at the same time. This is a form of comforting my sanity.

[TheLemmaLlama]

It depends from character to character for me

Sometimes, I develop a character with a top-down approach (abstract -> concrete). For instance, with Alana, she started out as 'tsunderesubversion; the MC think she likes him but she's just not comfortable with open affection in general'. But then I have to think 'who is she exactly in this setting? What does she do, where does she live, how do I make it logistically plausible for her and MC to meet?'

Other times, I take a bottom-up approach (concrete -> abstract). For instance, with Eury, she started out as 'the GM of a roleplaying campaign the MC joins'. But then I have to think 'but who is she as a person? What makes her tick? What drives her?'

My 'top down' characters are more often main characters/part of the core cast, and also tend to be 'transplantable'; a lot of my characters predate the story I currently have them in because they're top-down characters from old, abandoned projects (For instance, Alana was originally from an old visual novel idea with a different MC to my current project)

Whereas my 'bottom-up' characters tend to be side characters and more grounded in their setting, and thus more likely to be new since I almost always come up with them as part of the new story I'm developing :]

[bulgariansumo]

It's been so long since I made my mains. I think I started out with a pretty straightforward, concrete understanding of them because they were simpler characters, but then as time went on and I fleshed out their surroundings, life stories, etc, things became abstract to the point where I struggle feeling like I can accurately describe any of them fully aside from if I were having a conversation with someone.

[Kuma]

It depends on your process. I know people who like writing books worth of backstory for characters while others do it on their heads.

I like having a strong concept for the character and I like mapping their dynamics with other characters. If you know the core of your character and how he relates to others, the rest can flow easily. Each character has their own inner compass. Their goals, aspirations and morals. Knowing how does interact with other characters helps you a lot to develop dialogue and to understand the character.

I feel like you don't need to write an atlas with 5 volumes for each character, but having their core thought out is something you need to do.

[AmandaJ-art]

I started out with a vague idea of who they where and built upon it. I find it more fun to be inspired by something or someone. I like to take real struggles I've seen from people and mush em in characters.

Mine really start as ideas and feel more real when I actually make the comic.

[RiidDisBuk2]

See the character as if you were that character within the particular world. It's a basic start that answers many questions.

[system]

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