When you can't picture a character

Discussion in 'Character Development' started by Lea`Brooks, Aug 14, 2015.

  1. Tenderiser

    Tenderiser Not a man or BayView

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    What are their personalities like? You can work backwards from there, try and find out how society might treat them for them to have become that way.
     
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  2. ManOrAstroMan

    ManOrAstroMan Magical Space Detective Contributor

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    I'm a pretty visually-minded person, so that aspect comes fairly easy to me. But when I do get hung up, I start with the broad strokes:
    *Is he younger or older? What age group makes sense for the personality and profession I've given him?
    *what's his race/ethnicity? if he already has a name, what fits the name I've given him? Italian, Korean, Cuban, etc.?
    Once you answer those two questions, you can start getting a little more specific:
    *Build. Is she an athlete? Does she meticulously restrict her calories? Or is she a woman of ample physicality?
    *Hair and eye color. The race question influences this, as certain traits are common to certain ethnic groups.
    For most characters, that's enough of a description, as the reader can fill in plenty of blanks themselves. However, if you feel like you want to get an even clearer idea, you could do what I do and pick out actors who you feel could play the part, and imagine them when you're writing. Should a particular scene require mentioning a particular detail, like a love interest drinking in their features or an antagonist memorizing their enemy's face, you can list features belonging to Jennifer Lopez or George Clooney or whoever.
     
  3. C. W. Evon

    C. W. Evon Member

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    I can never picture my characters, but then, I can't picture faces in my mind at all. Thus why I fail to recognize people I know very well all the time... But still, I do google image searches and pinterest and I found pictures for all my characters that help me describe them.
     
  4. Morgan Stelbas

    Morgan Stelbas Active Member

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    I know this is an old thread, but I came across it searching for something else and I thought, what the heck, I'll add my two cents ...

    I came across this recently. I had a basic description in my mind of what my characters look like. But sometimes, I can only see hair, and eye color and I'd like to see an actual face, to help with my own visualizations. I don't intend on describing their features in detail but when I'm typing a story and I can see the characters in full detail it helps me move the story along easier.
    This is what I did: I googled actors or actresses that fit a vague description, and I go thru the list (usually in IMDB.com) and find obscure actors. I didn't want famous actors because I felt it would taint my character development, instead I'd pick actors that I'm totally unfamiliar with.
    Maybe that's strange, but that's what I did, lol!
    I did consider using Sims, which I thought was funny to see how many people did that, but I felt it too cartoonish, I wanted to visualize a real person.
    Anyways, that's my two cents. :bigwink:
     
  5. MrStoryTeller

    MrStoryTeller New Member

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    I usually see a photo online and have a mental image stored. As all humans, my memory doesn't remember exact details so my mind alters how they look slightly, enough that I know what they look like but they aren't the same person as who I based them after. Which is very helpful because it makes them unique.
     

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