#character personality

[penandpaperdreams]

Are your characters too “perfect”? Struggling to give them negative traits?

I’ve definitely fallen into the trap of making my protagonists and side characters too “perfect” before. It’s an easy mistake to make, but it can lead to your characters feeling one-dimensional if you’re too afraid to make them seem morally grey.

Here’s a very simple method:

1. Take a character’s main positive trait. Let’s take Hermione Granger, for example - her intelligence is a defining aspect of her character.

2. Exaggerate it into a negative trait. In the instance of Hermione Granger, she can come across to the other characters as a know-it-all. She’s not always portrayed as perfect for her intelligence, which is what makes her character more interesting.

Using this method, we have a number of options for negative traits for an intelligent character - patronising, arrogant, smug - to name a few.

I use the Fatal Attraction theory for this, which suggests that we fall out of love with someone for the same reason we were initially attracted to them. So, if you grew to like someone because you liked how strong and dominant they are, you may become tired of that down the line when their behaviour is controlling.

I’ve illustrated a few examples for how to exaggerate common positive traits into negative ones in the image above, but I have a few more examples to share so you really get the idea:

1. Comic relief / funny - can’t be serious, humour as a coping mechanism

2. Dark and mysterious - emotionally distant

3. Creative - aloof

4. Loyal - neglects own needs, willing to hurt for those they love

5. Compassionate / empathetic - overstepping boundaries

6. Honesty - overly blunt

7. Responsible - too serious

8. Humility - lack of self-belief

9. Trusting - easy to manipulate, overshares personal information

10. Perceptive - rude

11. Flirtatious - inappropriate

12. Organised - controlling, “neat freak”

13. Easygoing - lack of care about serious matters

14. Flamboyant - can be too much for some

15. Spontaneous - puts self in danger

Of course, you don’t have to do this. You can just have a character be spiritual and creative without making them out-of-touch and aloof. It’s completely up to you!

Using a method such as this, even if you only apply it subtly, adds a touch of realism to your writing by making your characters feel more well-rounded. It means that their negative aspects are truly coming from a part of them, rather than selected at random and mashed together from a list online.

[marshfeldman31]

Drawing a Goblin

If one were to venture into the frequently overlooked nooks of fantasy, beyond the valiant knights and damsels distressingly undistressed, one might stumble upon the goblin. Now, a goblin is not merely a subject for a sketch; it's a revelation in ridges, a symphony in scars, a cacophony of crooked crannies waiting to be explored by pencil and paper.

Drawing a goblin is like dancing to music that only you can hear, but the music is slightly off-key and the dance is more of a shuffle. It's a delightful divergence from the pristine and predictable. With each stroke, you're not just capturing a creature; you're delving into a personality, a story, a life less ordinary.

Their faces are landscapes of life's tumultuousness, each wrinkle a road traveled, each scar a battle braved, each crooked smile a tale in itself. Sketching a goblin allows the artist to tread the fine line between the grotesque and the endearing, to find beauty in the asymmetrical, the imperfect, the downright odd.

And let's not forget the humor in their haggardness, a subtle reminder that even in the realms of the imaginary, life is no less fraught with the absurdities that plague the human condition. The act of sketching a goblin is to embrace the chaos, to find the order in disorder, and perhaps, to see a bit of ourselves in those twisted visages – because, after all, who among us hasn't felt a little goblin-esque on a Monday morning?

So, wield your pencils as a goblin wields his cleverly procured trinkets - with a sense of purpose and a hint of mischief. Because to sketch a goblin is to sketch the heart of fantasy, a heart that beats not with the thundering drums of epic battles, but with the quiet determination of the overlooked, the underestimated, and the oddly charming.

[rase-kalian]

[maninmauve]

Inspiration: Character Flaws

One of my favourite things about character creation would be flaws and quirks. There are many that can picked, twisted, and combined. Some are more popular than others, especially among newer writers or even young roleplay and writing enthusiasts. Heterochromia, face scars, unusual hair and eye colours are some of the physical quirks that I noticed in my roleplaying days. While erring to not give…

[bunny-kittens-studio]

I think a nice way to develop character personality or like if you are having trouble with trying to figure out personality of your character or your version of an existing character

Take personality tests and try to answer the question as you think your character would answer them!

For example

A cute little 12 question inter personality test with visuals and your own little guy. I will use my result as a reference to one of many results you could get!

[ahhvernin]

We can love the same character for different reasons.

A little reminder to folks that people like characters for a number of reasons. They enjoy characters because of what they do outwardly in a story, aka screen time. But people also enjoy the things that are implied. People also like characters because of their noticeable quirks, people also like characters for their smallest, the TINIEST nuances of their personality that only shows every so often or in certain situations. People also love to headcanon and extrapolate a given personality and stretch it into the past, future or even alternate reality. Based on the character's history and experiences in a story and based on the fan's experiences and learned knowledge, they can bring forth another potential facet to a character. Loving a character, is brain food, day dreaming about their potential adventures gives your brain something novel to think about.

Creating "what ifs" is a huge part of the fun. All this can result in fan created stories that are so cringeworthy, that it feels like you've had a loss in blood flow, or a story that becomes so beloved and memorable that it basically becomes "canon" in the sea of headcanons among a fandom.

Some fans love a character solely based on their role in a story. And other fans may love a character based on what they COULD or SHOULD have offered in the story. Either way the character is loved.

In addition, depending on a fan's life experience and culture, the way they interpret a character and their actions can be different, but still valid. The same way a story told in western media can be interpreted in a different way to an Eastern audience due to all the various nuances and differences in human behavior. And the same can be said visa versa.

The nuances in gestures and side dialogue, and verbal inflections can say alot about character, some may not pick it up and others spot it immediately. Just because 8 out of 10 fans didn't pick up the nuance gesture, doesn't mean any stories written by the 2 fans who did pick it up and interpreted in a way, are "out of character". Because its there. Its out of character for the 8 fans, maybe eventually a few might see it later and join the original 2. It really doesn't matter. The fan made stories or art are for the fans, its for fun. The reason why we have so many pieces of art is because of the fans ability to extrapolate. If not the fandom goes dry and dead. The best part of joining a fandom is to see what other facet a character can have that was not shown in the book or show or movie. So to answer the question of: did we read the same book, or watch the same show?

The answer is, yes.

[gyftedjobsmeetpersonalities]

Which Character Personality Quiz

[a-fox-who-writes]

Let's create a character!

I will create four polls every week, and you guys get to choose what hair colour, eye colour, clothing style, and personality this unknown character will have - and in the end, I'll write a oneshot/monologue with the character :D

Poll no.3 results

Poll No.4 (the last one!)

Reblog after voting :D

[ukrainian-groove-metal]

I love the "came back wrong" trope but from the opposite side.

Imagine you are dead. And then you are RIPPED from the embrace of decay into the world of the living again. Your memories are hazy and you don't recognize any of these people, but they act like they're close to you? Like they love you? So you try to get your memories back, to act like you belong here, but everybody tries to forget you died. And you can't. It is omnipresent. And just trying to grapple with that fact pushes the people who "love" you away, and they're incapable of understanding, and they're so confused, what's wrong N̶̄̀O̶͛͗T̷̉́ ̷͋͝Y̴̎̌Ȍ̴̈U̸̓R NÄM̴̃͑E̵̾̇? And you just need them to understand, you aren't that person! You aren't! You don't know who that person is! You don't know why any of this is happening, but they're unwilling to bend, they keep insisting you are that person, your memories will come back, everything will be normal again, and you want to scream and cry and claw yourself open to show them you're different. Your existence as a being wholly separate from whoever you "used to be" is a sin unto itself. All you can do is scrabble for life and to them, you're killing whoever they loved to do it.

just. lots of fun in that concept, you know?

[callisteios]

i made a character uquiz. i 100% promise you that you will get a character you know AND like

[lgbtlunaverse]

It's a unique type of frustration when you agree that a character is deeply flawed but other people keep missing what's actually wrong with them and assigning them new flaws that they don't even have it's like free my man he did none of that. He did a bunch of other shit tho.

[iwasbored777]

We're not appreciating the Weird Barbie enough. It's said in the movie that she helps everyone who need help while they always see her as someone who's not as good as them. She was friends with all dismissed Barbies and Kens, was there to offer support and safe shelter for everyone who needed it in Kendom, without her nothing in the movie would've been alright. When Stereotypical Barbie calls her "ugly and unwanted" she still helps her.

She was representing a woman in women's world who was pushed aside by other women because she didn't fit in but still had more wisdom and kindness than everyone who thought they're better than her.

[seahagart]

Drífa went from no friends to more than 1, so she is pretty happy

[a-little-ray-of-fantasy]

The five cutest, most wholesome characters in Hazbin Hotel will still look utterly terrifying the moment you are threatening their loved ones (or you're in stabbing range, in Niffty's case).

[coffeenonsense]

"astarion is a traumatized abuse victim who deserves kindness" and "astarion is a mean rat bastard man who would rip out your throat for a corn chip if he felt like it" are two statements that can and should coexist

[bixels]

I'll be participating in a charity livestream with other storyboard artists to raise money for careforgaza and e-sims! @tulliok and I will be live on the 4th, 5PM PST (8PM EST). Check the list above; artists such as @kianamaiart and @mak-to-the-future will be participating as well on either the 3rd or 4th.

Now's your chance to make me sketch a 1920s AU design of an MLP character I would have otherwise never designed!

Like this guy.

🇵🇸🕊️