Four Character Development Exercises

hey guys it's Jalen and I'm here today with another rating video I want to talk about character development methods character development is a very interesting thing you're inventing a human being there's a lot that's going to go into that and the thing that inspired me to make this video was kind of a trend that I see in terms of character development not in terms of the actual characters that are being created and that is a trend towards these kind of character charts or character lists I'll probably refer to it as a character chart but you know what I mean I actually have one available on my website that I put up there to download because I'm an enabler in this trend and it's basically a chart and it's like what's your character's name what's their birthday what's their astrological sign what's their favorite color what's their favorite song are they religious I see them all the time and I see people talking about Phil in the Mount realize that they actually kind of annoy me and I don't like them I don't personally use them I think that there's becoming this idea that this is the way you did all the character this is the best way to develop a character and in my opinion it's not now I'm going to put a little disclaimer if this is how you do your character development by filling out these charts or lists and it works for you and you like it and it really helps you understand your characters that's awesome the great thing about writing is that there's not one way to do stuff I want to spare the big dinner writers here if you use this method and it works for you that is awesome but if you're new to writing these charts tend to give you kind of a laundry list of fact birthday favorite song favorite book character development is not about facts it's about understanding your characters soul as cheesy as that sounds it sounds so corny but it's about understanding their essence and their soul you have to get into their mind does knowing their favorite band really help you get into their mind maybe a tiny bit a lot to the extent that you need it to these character charts when they're used as the only or the primary method of character development you have a different relationship with your character the relationship that using these character charts to develop a character creates is one of being friends with someone on Facebook you are friends with someone on Facebook to the sake of this example I don't know why you're friends with them on Facebook but you've never actually interacted them you never met in real life you've never had a conversation with them or anything for some reason you're just friends on Facebook you kind of see the stuff they like you know what events they're going to you see they go to a concert you know they like this band you see what pages I like you know where they work you see pictures of them with their friends you know who their friends are kind of what they did on the weekend you get a little notification when it's their birthday do you know this person you don't how do you get to know this person by spending time with that I truly think the best way to develop character is to write a character which is why I always write some scenes from the point of view the character as I'm developing a book that's my method of character development I develop characters in a very intuitive way by spending time with them by writing them I get the feeling that people like something more concrete then being like you just get into their brain people like something more concrete especially when they're beginning you know I started writing at a very very young age a lot of writing is extremely intuitive to me and I don't need to seek out a formula for it because I've been doing this for my whole life but for those who are just getting into writing I understand the draw of a formula and I understand the draw of a chart or a list of facts that you can fill out and feel like you're developing a character when you're not really and I also think they're kind of ineffective because when I have tried to use these in the past I remember trying to use one when I was planning my book rainstorm and I tried to fill out a chart for the character Aaron he's the main character in that book was fun at first right I put down his name I make up a birthday for him I know what the meaning of his name is oh wait I should give a medal middle name because it's a so I think of a middle name I still remember to this day it's Kyle I'm just filling out this chart and I get to these questions what does his room look like I don't know I was trying to fill out this laundry list before I knew his essence and it's very hard to extract like what genres of music person would like style of clothes that would work what their room would look like when you don't know their essence you should try to get the essence first and then maybe a fun villain character to later to get some facts basically what I'm saying is I don't think they're that effective so I have come up with a few exercises that you can use if you're looking for something a little more concrete to help you develop a character I'm going to have a document on my website and available for download with all of these explained like a template that you can fill out for your characters and I just think they're a little more effective at getting the soul getting the inside the character number one this is one of my favorites and this is one that I find I can use to develop a character but also it helps me know if I've developed a character like if I struggle to do this I know I haven't develop the character enough if I'm like struggling to come up with stuff for this it's so easy and it's so fun all you do for this first character development exercise is make a list of stuff that reminds you of the character this can be anything a song you can include specific songs or bands colors situations I'm going to read you an example and you're going to see the variety of stuff that I include in these lists now I just made these kind of quickly for the video you could make these super super long just anything that reminds you of the character so for Luna this is stuff that reminds me of Luna a clean room with lots of art on the walls blank sheets of music writing poetry and the margins of your homework foggy weather punching up your shoulders because it's cold looking out your window at dawn a sunny field wrapping your hands around a warm cup of tea and the patterns the skein make in the air standing on a beach watercolor paintings indie music when a book makes you sad but in a good way sitting with your friend in a parked car at night talking about deep stuff telling your best friend you love them light rain those aesthetic photos of girls sitting in front of windows wearing knee socks that you always see on tumblr some of those are so random like like the last one with like the photos you know the ones I'm talking but you always either want tumblr this is never gonna come up in the book those photos in particular whenever I see them they remind me of Luna so I make this list it's just random stuff that reminds me of her some other ones I made I'll just read the beginning of these ones because some of them aren't quite long to get the feeling that Lunas were a lot of situations and it really just has some character for Aeryn the protagonist a rain storm I said not saying anything at a family dinner because you're the quiet one sitting on a staircase talking with someone blanket forts laughing nervously butterflies in your stomach for a reason you can't quite place realizing you have a crush on someone goofy family traditions knowing exactly what someone is feeling just by looking at their face for Alice hers are a lot shorter for summers in physics rain boots navy blue what a secret you've never told before knowing random facts about everything shy smiles supernovas leave dyeing your hair cloudless blue skies the moment a plane takes off laughing at your own jokes tattoos the first time you refer to your best friend as your best friend for me those were all very developed characters like I said I made those lists for the sake of this video so it was very easy for me like I rattled those off in seconds as a boom boom boom lick that lets me know that I know the character really well like I could have gone on and on and on about the stuff that reminds me of these characters literally any associations that you make write it in that list I find associations making those links much more useful for really getting to character soul then then just lists of facts because when you know someone real-life you know when you see something and reminds you of someone you go blah blah would really like that and then hopefully you text them and tell them because I saw this in a reminded you it was like such a nice thing to say to a human it always makes them happy you should do that when you start to make those associations it's especially going to help you with symbolism later on because you're gonna know these random of things that you associate with your characters they never even have to come up with the book just like I said this is just for character about them number two this is one that I think is really fun this is the added list basically what I will provide you with in my template is a list of adages and what you do is you go through and you think about how your character would feel about all these adages as if you don't know what an adage is it's like a common statement that you know expresses some sort of wisdom or truth like the early word that's the world the thing about an adage that kind of separates it from like an idiom is that it's kind of supposed to have a lesson in it I believe I hope I'm using these terms correctly some examples of some colonnades antigens like an adage or proverb they're kind of similar they're two wrongs don't like right the pen is mightier than the sword the squeaky wheel gets the grease no man is an island fortune favors the bold better late than never there's no place like home can't always got what you want a watched pot never boils you've heard these right you hear them all the time in life they're kind of like very generalized called an advice and I think it's quite interesting to go through them answer for your character whether or not they agree with this whether or not they implement this so for example the early bird gets the worm if I was analyzing this one for my characters I guess I'll just care through these same characters that I'm using one would have an interesting opinion on this Luna is very early riser she wakes it very early every single day but I do think she would disagree with this because she's not one for a competitive existence or she's like why are we fighting for this worm we kept early because the sunrise is beautiful and I want to see it and I like be in the world when it's morning it's common it's still um but for her it's not about the worm it's just about the early Leawood snake not a chance in hell I want to sleep in I don't care I think these are fine you can use the ones that I've provided on the list or you can just come up with your own that you hear a lot and that you like putting your character into the common vernacular I guess you could say so the next one is a little more labor-intensive the best way to get to know a person is to spend time with them so the best way to get to your character is to spend time with them means it's time to actually write some stuff I usually write scenes that are just from the book I usually end up rewriting the once I get to that point in the book because I've developed the characters voice so much more I think it's also interesting to write your characters in other situations basically what I'm saying is that you need to write fanfiction for your own book ok I'm going to give you a list of situations again you can come up with your own and basically just write what you think your character would do in that situation I'm giving you some pretty outrageous ones a fancy art show how its character act out of fancy art show I know they would probably knock over an expensive sculpture accidentally and then just fully and like it would be a terrible thing but she'd somehow get away with it um a drug deal even if your character would like never be involved with this like Luna like limb is never going to be involved with a drug deal then part of the question is asking myself well how did she get there you have to problem-solve these are problem solving and to problem solve you have to develop that character it's forcing you to develop this character because to know how they're going to react in this situation and to know how they got in this situation for Luna fancy art show it's easy like a little does that that's a fun Friday night out of hers going to an art show really like how did she even end up at this Art Show probably someone dragged her she misread the sign I don't know seesee for me because I've developed these cares so much so I know but if you're working on developing your character you're going to have to do that extra problem-solving work to know how they got in that situation so other ones I put on the list a breakup that's a more kind of common one interesting to know like how does your character act in a breakup are they the dumper or the dumpy I would write both honestly karaoke is always gonna be fun with Lee if you get kicked out or everyone would leave and she need notice what I would suggest would be to just write out kind of what you think they would do in the situation not necessarily write all the scenes then pick a few and actually write it like it was a scene like it was a real scene from your book you spend that time with the character problem-solve how they're gonna act and what they're gonna do and how they got there on the last one is a little more I guess you could say classic some of the better character charts that I've seen in my life are the ones that goat a bit more into psychology ask about drives and motivations and goals and stuff which is right you should think about that stuff those are the better character cards that you should be using one way that I like to look at motivations is a pyramid of motivations this is kind of in a way similar to that thing what's it called hierarchy of needs there we go it's not that I'm not asking you to like fill her acute needs for your character but maybe that would be cool but it's kind of looking at motivations as a pyramid it's not just one simple goal that they have I personally like in my creative writing classes they're always like what is the characters goal and I'm like well I can answer that but like goals are more complex than that like I have many goals in my life and I think that goals kind of stack upon each other kind of have this lower basic goal and then you go up to kind of more abstract goals very similar to dire cabinets it's kind of like that a lot of times I think for most people the the base goal is to not die most of us aren't really thinking about that like I'm not on a daily basis like how could I not die today depending on your book you might have that as the basic goal I'm going to use a character from a book I wrote a long time ago because heards does include this bottom level so that's why I'm using her wrote this book called don't I made the wolf the main character Kaiser was in a very bad situation for her the bottom level of that pyramid is to not die anything above it she can't achieve if she can't achieve that goal above that is to get home anything above that she can really achieve if she doesn't get home above that is to find her brother this is related to to get home and in many ways they're on the same level but she has to get home to find her brother because that's where she thinks her brother will be eventually you're going to get to the top where you going to get to these abstract non-physical goals and these non-physical goals are things like for her find a sense of redemption find a sense of purpose beyond violence you're going to get into these more and more abstract goals and think of it as as a stack right it's a pyramid if you remove one level it all crumbles they have to be achieved in the order I totally I'm only realizing now that it's basically the hierarchy it means she can't even think about finding her brother if she can't achieve to not die because to not die means like if that was a long she can't achieve anything without getting home she can't achieve anything about getting home I like to kind of look at my characters motivations not in terms of just one simple motivation but in terms of their level I think every single character starts with to not die unless you have a ready link suicidal character for the majority of people the bottom of your pyramid is to not die it's not going to be conscious in a lot of characters because it's not a problem like if you're writing like a realistic book like sitting like high school their character is probably not even concern it's not dying but technically speaking it is their because they're living organisms just keep in mind with character development that there are so many ways to do it and you should just really find the methods that work best for you I tend to do it pretty intuitively and not too formulaic Lee if you're drawn to formulas I you know I'm more formulaic in other aspects of my writing character development doesn't tend to be one of them there's some exercises that I have for you to develop your characters that I think are just a little more effective than lists core work charts I think if you're going to use a chart you should use it in conjunction with other things don't purely rely on a chart and this looks like a really freakin good chart the one I have on my website I think is pretty good because it does go into the more psychological aspect of things but I still wouldn't rely solely on that it's still too one-dimensional just cuz you know a character's motivation or goal doesn't necessarily mean you understand them and they're developed thank you so much for watching if you have any questions you can always send me an ask on tumblr and I will see you in another video bye

Channel: ShaelinWrites

Views: 100,774

Rating: 4.9349084 out of 5

Keywords: writer, writing, author, novelist, creative writing, writetube, writetuber, writing advice, how to write a book, how to write a novel, aspiring writer, teen writer, writing vlog, teenager author, creative writing degree, books, nanowrimo, character development, character development methods, character, writing better characters, character profile

Id: vRLIu5bDgPk

Length: 15min 27sec (927 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 07 2016