RebelGoddess

I'm curious as to how all of you out there create your character descriptions.

Do you see the character in your head and then describe it in detail on paper before adding him/her/it into the story?

Do you just do a rough sketch then fill it in later?

Lately my prose has been flowing easily but the characters are ellusive; usually it's the other way around.

Right now I'm looking for new ideas to try and get me back in touch with my characters.

So, how do you "meet" your characters?

Racheal

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Dephere

It's funny, I just let my characters show up, kind of like my story.

They come in, they flaunt their attitude, they just are. I let them tell me how they look. I know, probably not very helpful, but if it helps any think of a person who tends to act like a specific character....What do they look like? I don't use this, but I know some people who do, to varying degrees of success.

Good Luck!

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Hodge

I take parts of my psyche and form a personality, and if some physical detail is important (like eye color, skin tone, a scar, etc.) I'll mention it on paper. I don't do character sketches.

I "meet" my characters by being them.

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Titania

I guess I do the combination of both of the above. The characters just sort of come to me, and then a lot of times I end up holding conversations in my head where I am one of them, which is how I figure out how they act... I don't know. It's hard to describe . Often there's a single characteristic that defines them, and I start from there.

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cbrmale

I have some characters appear to me as if they were friends from my past, I can see them in my mind and hear them talking to me. Even so, I always do a character profile to fill out their details, even if the character ultimately came from part of my psyche or from someone else in my life like my wife, a former friend or a former lover.

The profile obviously helps describe physical appearance. I use the profile to make the character's behaviour and values consistent throughout the story. I also find a profile helps to fill out details of the character's past if they reminisce about past events.

CZ

For me, it's always a thin line between wasting time/procrastinating and ensuring that the character will be represented consistently. For main/major characters, I'll write up a page and a half on their basic characteristics so that I can refer back to that document and not have to pore through each chapter. For the minor characters I have a whole document for their names and a very brief description in parentheses by their names such as eye/hair color and personality, area they live, in a few words.

All the main characters have created themselves over time. The minor characters leave me scrambling to write down a quick description... often when I'm in the newsroom and editing something, or in the middle of an interview, or when I'm driving somewhere. I've had to develop a good memory for those pesky minor characters.

Oh, I find that walking while thinking about what you're writing can help a fair amount sometimes. YMMV, but it clears my mind and helps me think.

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Talia_Brie

I used to have a notebook in which I had described all my characters. Eye colour, hair colour, all that stuff.

But now I don't. What the character looks like is up to the reader, as far as I'm concerned. I see each of them in my own mind, but that's just for my purposes. I would find it restrictive for the reader if I were to limit their perceptions of the characters.

For me that's a part of 'show, don't tell', and it helps engage the reader in the story. They have to make some sort of emotional/mental connection to the reader if they have to imagine their appearance. It's too easy to disconnect from a story if you are being told everything.

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Phouka

My characters usually spring from a scene at least partially formed. I usually "hear" them first, and then let them unfold as the story goes on. However, once I have gotten them out in the open, I need to figure out who they are -- which may include description, history, quirks, etc. Even if these things never show up in the story, knowing that my MC is an avid birdwatcher may give me insight into how they will respond to a specitfic situation.

I probably get into far too much detail, but keeping notes about the little things makes me feel as if I really know my characters. I usually have a clear picture of them in my head, but I also use the written notes to make sure that I'm consistent.

Talia, do you mean that you don't include any physical description in your writing? Most of it is not important, I guess. And I know how I feel when the "look" of the character doesn't match what I imagine as a reader, but I can't imagine none.

CZ, your sig quote is probably quite accurate!

Talia_Brie

I prefer to give an impression of a character's appearance through the way other people react to them. I don't describe hair colour, eye colour. I'll sometimes mention size if a character is exceptionally tall, for example, but that's all. I don't say, 'six foot tall', I give an impression that the character is big. I generally try for less descriptive phrases, and more reactions.

For example, if you have a very attractive person, people stop and look at them in idle moments, they follow them around the room. When attractive people smile at you, it makes you feel better, warmer, and happier. When very strong people stand next to you, you sometimes feel safer, and sometimes intimidated. I don't have to mention that someone is strong, or beautiful, if I can describe that reaction.

Does that help.

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SilkFX

One of my favorite quotes on character description and development is found at the end of The Color Purple:

"'I thank everybody in this book for coming.' --A.W., author and medium"

That's pretty much how it works for me.

Characters are often composites of people you already know, or people you don't know but about whom you let your imagination roam.

I almost never outline a character before I've gotten a significant portion of him/her on the page. And even then I might not do it because I prefer to let the character tell me what they look like. I know it sounds kind of spacey, but if writing isn't the spaciest occupation out here, I don't know what is.

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Stewart

Unless it's important to the story, I don't care what the characters look like. I'll add a little clue (e.g. russet eyes) but the real challenge is to make your characters speak and act. What a character looks like is usually irrelevant, so if you have a pad with hair colours, shoe size, and occupation written down, burn it. Just write; the more you redraft then your characters will out themselves.

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simon woodhouse

I always see my characters' flaws first, and then build upon that. I give quite a lot of thought to their history, as what happened to them in the past will affect how they behave now and in the future.

I'm a bit vague on physical descriptions as I think most readers form their own.

I've recently realised I'm no good at writing noble characters. I find them boring to write, which I suspect means they'll be boring to read.

duberdurm

I'm with Talia. The reader should be left to decide how a character looks. I hate spedning time writing a character's description beyond the bare basics. For example, if I have an evil scorceress character, I might say something describing her build or demeanor, but detailing eye color hair length, skin tone boxes the reader in. If I *have* to describe a character I'll do it through dialogue or progressively throughout the story, never all at once. Unless a writer is really good, I ususally find myself disappointed in any description of a character at the end of the book because I have my own idea of how this person should have looked.

The writer may describe his mechanic as having a big pot belly and a balding head, but I'd rather imagine him as a smallish ('smallish' patent pending) slender fellow with long hair tied in a ponytail. It doesn't determine the worth of the story over all, I just may not be able to wrap my mind around a fat balding mechanic as well as a slender one in a blue jump-suit. Fat bald guys are supposed to be mob hitmen or buisnessmen, not mechanics, but now I'm stuck with this fat bald machanic the rest of the story.

RebelGoddess

WOW! I didn't expect to log back in and find two pages!

Thank you all so mcuh for all of this advice!

What's weird though, is that a few hours after I first posted the character I was having trouble with popped into my mind.

Talia, I'm with you on letting the reader create a picture for themselves. I like to give them one or two simple characteristics like hair or eyes and let them fill the rest in with composites of the people they know/have met.

And the personalities I always have introducted through their actiions in the story.

Oddly enough, I have one of my characters written down to a T (what does that expression even mean?) before the story was written. She's not the MC, but she's pretty important.

I was great to see how other people meet and create their characters; thanks for the enthusiastic responses!

Racheal

P.S.

I do a lot of theater so I also tend to think in the mindset of one of my characters. I've been known to read their lines out loud to get just the right pronunciation that I can transcribe into personality traits.

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Kimahri

I had a vague idea of most my characters at first especially when I began to write them into the story, but over time they have developed into who I think they really are. I have written descriptions of them, listing their physical features, attributes, and personalities, but I only go back to those to make sure something's accurate like eye or hair color, otherwise I let them just flow. Now I do plan--when I am ready to edit my book--to look at those descriptions and make sure they are consistent with the character, that way I can change them either in the story or in my notes.

kimahri

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