How do you create characters?

I almost sort of, become my characters.

I try to live my life as they would to the best of my ability and then in my writing, it just comes through naturally.

 

I couldn't agree more. When I start a story, I have no idea who my characters are. Oh, sure, I know approx. age, sex, occupation, etc., but beyond that, I have no idea. I love putting my characters in situations and let them figure out how to get out of it. Eventually, I may step in, like a parent who lets his child put his hand close to the fire but grabs it before it gets burned.
It is character discovery. If it isn't, you are trying too hard and not writing in your true, honest voice.

 

I find that too much pre-planning of a character stifles me. I need to know a bit about them when I start, but not everything. Makes it fun for me to get to know them.

 

I'm at the point in my WIP where new characters are coming to the proverbial party, so I've been paying attention.

What happens is one of two things: 1. a visual pops into my head of a miniature version of that character jumping into a manuscript on a desk (like jumping into a hole). Or, a blurry visual of the character emerges in the scene like on film. The ones that blur into the scene either require a lot of rewriting or get scrapped altogether. The ones that dive into the manuscript tend to be fully formed and require very little tweaking. Yep, it's weird, but you asked.

 

I used to use charts to develop characters but it often hindered my creativity rather than helped it. At some point, I found it was more or less irrelevant to put down a character's favourite song, food, place, if it has nothing to do with the story. Now I just write out my general summary for the character, their most obvious character traits and appearances, their main flaws and desires (the often driving internal conflict), and how they might change throughout the story.

Eventually they're consistently growing as the story moves on.

 

Does anyone ever think about writing the kind of characters you want to write about? Maybe it is just me from having read books, and watched tv shows and movies and drew patterns of character types and having favourites and then I just think about what kind of character I would want to write? For example, I generally prefer characters who have more of a gregarious feel to them rather than character who have a introverted vibe to them and especially in books there way too many of these type of characters. And if a character is shown to be more extraverted, they tend to be quite shallow and two-dimensional which I dislike when they could be so much more fleshed out and more fun! If you don't plam your characters before writing, do you subconsciously write the kind of characters you want to write?

I have tried characters that were half-assed and not defined enough and wrote 7k when I was trying for NaNoWriMo in 2014 and I failed, obviously. I only got to 7k and I had no idea what I was doing. I am not sure if I am able to get to know my characters as I write. I like having an idea, sometimes I think of people I have met and I think of this vibe about them that I liked. The person's aura or exterior, as real people do all have some aura about them and there is always that first impression (that is not always correct), and I use it as a base for my character and I flesh it out from there. However, because I am so indecisive and I don't know where to start and I do not have idea's for motives or conflict in my story, I have not been succesful so far...

Me not being succesful with it may also be because the backstories of my characters just seem seperate from me having personality idea's that I want to write and I try and fit them together like a puzzle. Which may not make sense? And again, I am so indecisive!

I guess you should do what works the best for you.

 

For me, that's where the editing comes in. As I discover more about them--especially when their backstory comes in, or they reveal an emotion that I didn't know what there, I go back and fix anything that isn't consistent with the new knowledge...or, if need be, make the sudden revelations look more intentional. In my current WIP, there's been a lot of this with the F MC because she's been very hard to get to know.

To answer your question, yes. I do think of kinds of characters I want to write about. Since I don't plan, it's more like planting a seed in my head, though. What sprouts is what sprouts...sometimes the package says carrots and you get a rogue radish.