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Aeolian's Observations
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Author:  AeolianMode [ September 29th, 2011, 2:40 pm ]
Post subject:  Aeolian's Observations
Over the years I've come to a few understandings about creating characters, and it comes from a slightly different point of view than some. I felt that perhaps my observations may be beneficial to some people who wish to learn more about developing their characters, especially newcomers. I hope I'm putting this in the right place, and thank you for reading. I hope it actually makes sense because I can ramble a whole lot. I hope it is understandable.

Introduction

We as human beings relate to a story. We are drawn to a narrative, because our own lives are stories. It is part of our very nature as participants within God's own storytelling. He is weaving a great Story, in which the victor is Christ and we are His chosen people who are blessed to be a part of this grand narrative.

The very Biblical narrative is what gives shape to all other narratives, so Tolkien observed. Every good story is just a retelling of the greatest Story ever told, the Story in which we are stuck in the middle of yet we already know how it ends. God has gifted us with creative minds, and has called us all to use our minds to His glory, by telling stories that reflect His truth.
Characters are vehicles of any kind of storytelling. You cannot have a plot develop without characters. In order for someone to be interested in your plot, they must be interested in your characters.

How Our Minds Work

What wonderful tools God has given us! The complexities of our minds are so amazing I could type about it for hours. I had to debate whether or not I wanted to be a film major or a psychology major in college. I love storytelling and I love studying how God made us think from a biological side. I did end up becoming a film major. Anyway, let me continue.

The human mind works a very interesting way. We look at things as a whole. For example, during my film editing class, I was putting together the final cut of a production we shot in class. Some of the scenes were shot while the air conditioner was running, while other scenes were shot and the air conditioner was silent. When I put the film together, cutting scenes here and there, watching it through revealed that the sound was very disjointed. Wherever the camera cut from two characters, the fuzzy background noise appeared and disappeared. It was very disjointed.

In order to 'cancel' out the background noise, I added in the air conditioner sound effects to every scene in which the air conditioner was not present. When this happened, the air conditioner was a 'constant' and thus, my mind filtered it out when I watched the entire production. It no longer seemed disjointed and it flowed well, because my brain was no longer getting 'thrown off' when a scene cut. It no longer felt like one constant scene, rather, it was disjointed and felt like a cut-up collection of scenes, which it was, but sound is essential to the illusion of a flowing scene. (This is how important sound is in a good film!)

So what does this have to do with characters? More than you'd think.

These observations are not going to be about creating individual characters. I believe people worry too much on creating interesting individuals when the important thing is how your individuals relate to your cast as a whole. Made no sense? Let me explain.

Say you have a character that is extremely strong physically. He can protect his friends from evil with his sheer might and swordsmanship. And let's say the other characters in your cast are civilians- perhaps children- with no power of their own. This makes your swordsman seem very powerful.
But let's say your swordsman was in a cast of characters where *everyone* was either a great swordsman, or an axe-wielder, or a marksman, you name it. He no longer seems so strong anymore, since everyone else he's with are pretty tough in comparison.

That's how our minds work. We don't really think that much about the individual himself, rather, how he is in comparison to everyone else. We make comparisons and we think about how someone is in relation to someone else. Our brains locate "the norm" and thus, it becomes ordinary.

When I was editing my video, the air conditioner sound effect needed to be constant throughout the entire video so it would become "the norm". Odd as it is, we treat characters the same way. Our swordsman only seems powerful if he’s put in a group of characters where everyone else is weak. Our skinny character only seems skinny if everyone else is of average size. Our comic relief is only really funny if no one else is funny. You name it, it applies. Our brains only effectively receive a character’s presentation based on comparison of others, and not based on the individual alone.

I hope all that makes sense. Basically, you need to know this: Our minds make comparisons. That’s how we determine “the norm” in a story, and the effect that we as writers present to our audiences relies on this fact. If we want to communicate a certain effect, we have to know what we intend with a character- and we need to present it in a way where it will be received as intended.

Analyzing Characters

There are some terms you should know about writing characters, and I think the most important terms are these: Round and Flat characters.

Round characters are simply characters that change throughout the story. They come to new understandings or resolve conflicts in their life.

Flat characters are just the opposite- they do not change. That is usually the case with secondary characters and background characters who do not contribute much to the plot.

I believe that the best characters are round characters- characters that change as the story progresses. But, there’s more to making a good character than making a round character.

Let’s look at some different characters now, from other series. Just to help me explain myself I’m going to use two examples: the Pirates of the Caribbean films and the Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon series.

I understand these are all based on my opinion and some people may disagree with me, but for an example’s sake, this was the first thing that came to my mind.

In Pirates of the Caribbean, probably the most interesting character was Jack Sparrow. He is the face of the Pirates franchise and he is given the most interesting scenes and dialog. Over-all, Jack is an entertaining character… while the rest of the cast is nearly left in the dust, shadowed under Jack’s colorful personality.

From an individual perspective there is nothing really wrong with the other characters in Pirates. They’re all fairly round characters given their stories and how they change over the course of the three movies. Interestingly, Jack changes the least. However, he still manages to steal the show more than anyone else. When put together in a film, the other characters seem neglected under Jack’s shadow.

This character began how the developers like him and he continues throughout the series without really changing from his selfish, anti-hero ways. Jack is a flat character- and he’s also perhaps the only character the developers of Pirates really, truly like. They want us to like him. They give him a lot of funny scenes and interesting shots.

In comparison to everyone else in Pirates, Jack is incredibly unique and he does not change very much. I don’t know about you, but I wasn’t inclined to care very much about the other characters in the series, even though, by themselves, they’re perfectly fine characters.

This goes back to what I began talking about earlier, in that we perceive a cast of characters based on comparison of the others. Jack was a very unusual sort of man, so he stood out above all the others in a way none of the other characters did. This was perhaps what the director intended: to make a quirky anti-hero pirate. However, the way Jack was presented made it harder for me to enjoy the other characters.

Now I want to talk about something I really enjoyed, and that was the Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon series. Despite its focus on Eastern mysticism, it also had a few wonderful truths: forgiveness, love, and loyalty were strongly present in Avatar’s plot. But what I loved about it especially, was the characters.

Even though Aang, the main character, was unique, he was still on the same level as the other characters. I could find something to love about everyone. Katara was a caregiver, loyal and motherly to the others. Sokka was the comic relief, genuinely funny and entertaining. Toph was a tough girl on the outside who really just desired friendship, love and acceptance. Aang was kindhearted and devoted to protecting his friends. And Zuko… well, I won’t spoil it, but he was indeed a very round character.

There was something admirable and enjoyable about *every* character, even though they served different purposes. They all changed throughout the story, became stronger, and resolved conflicts in their lives. Throughout the story, they changed, and the plot was strengthened. By themselves, every character was interesting- but together, the cast felt balanced, everyone had something to contribute, and everyone was held with importance.

The bottom line to all of this is something I love to tell people about creating their characters. You know you have a good cast of characters when your readers have a hard time picking their favorite. There’s something to like about everyone. You want your readers to say, “Hmm… my favorite? Well, I love Lucy, because her faith is so strong… but oh, Sam is so loyal and devoted… And goodness, Gimli is hysterical… I’m sorry but I love them all!”

Our brains pick things out based on comparisons. When something stands out, it seems out of place to us. That’s what I discovered when I was making my film, and the sound was fuzzy in some places but clear in others. When I added fuzziness in-between the clips, it seemed normal.

When one character sticks out like a sore thumb, he’s probably trying to get too much attention. Of course, your main character *does* have to be who the story is about, but you can still make the supporting roles just as likeable as he is. You need to give something likeable, something interesting about all of your major characters, so that they can be loved as a whole.

Making Your Characters

With all that said, here are a few questions you need to ask yourself about a character. First, let’s just focus on a character individually. Fill this out for each of your most important characters in your story.

1. Why are they in the story? What does this person contribute to the plot?
2. Do they change? Do they resolve any conflicts? Do they come to new understandings? Are they touched by any particular event?
3. How do they change?
4. Do they influence or change anyone else?
5. Describe the character visually.
6. Describe the character’s personality.
7. Describe this character’s abilities. Are they amazing at anything in particular?
8. What kinds of scenes does this character usually have? Do you give them a lot of crazy-awesome action scenes or a lot of interesting lines?
9. How does this character relate to everyone else? Do other characters like him? Do they dislike him? Do they think he is wise and helpful or does he just get in the way?

Now let's compare your characters to each other. Forget about the individual themselves for a moment and think about how they relate to everything else.


Final Thoughts

I’d like to leave with a few final words that basically sum up all these observations.

All Emphasis is No Emphasis. Imagine you’re reading a story where in every other page, something REALLY BAD happens to your characters. The more times something bad happens, the less we’ll feel like it’s a big deal.

Our Minds Make Comparisons. The “All Emphasis is No Emphasis” phrase is all about how our brains have compared one thing to another. A character only seems intense if no one else is intense. He also stands out a lot of he’s the only person who is interesting in a cast of completely uninteresting people.

Love Them All. As hard as this is, for every writer (I am one of them), try to love all of your major characters. Make them all useful to the plot and likeable in one way or another as people (unless, of course, they’re villains!)


That’s all for now. I hope it was somewhat helpful. Maybe it made absolutely no sense. xD I will definitely be editing this off and on for organization and tact. Until then, I’ll just stick this up here.
Author:  Airianna Valenshia [ September 29th, 2011, 4:19 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Obsservations
Aeoli, you wouldn't happen to like to facilitate my hording habit and send this to my darling little elf (Philadelphia) for the HW blog, would you? It wouldn't post till January-February, when the new blog schedule comes out, but I'd love to snag this piece. :D

The thread can remain here, I'd just like to publicize this post a bit more. :D
Author:  AeolianMode [ September 29th, 2011, 5:12 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Obsservations
I'd love for it to get more publicity, thank you for thinking of that. I just don't know how this blog thing works >.<
Author:  PrincessoftheKing [ September 29th, 2011, 6:30 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
That was a wonderful post, Aeolian! :D

You pointed to so many things I'd never even considered. And, now that I think about it, most of my favorite stories are the ones where all the characters stand out, not just one.

I'm hesitant to bring Harry Potter into the discussion, since so many people are against it... but I wanted to mention something, really quick. :)

There are dozens and dozens of characters in HP; three of them are really important, and one is the main character. But every single one of them plays an important and distinct role. In fact, many of the minor characters could outshine Harry in terms of ability. Harry is always the main focus, but none of the other characters ever fade into the background.

The same thing goes for Lord of the Rings, or Narnia... and any number of brilliant stories, though I never realized it before. Thanks for pointing that out!

*ponders how to apply this to her own story* :D
Author:  Ophelia MirZA Mimetes [ September 29th, 2011, 6:42 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
This is a very helpful post! I'll have to reread it again and add it to my "things to remember and go back to" list. :D
Author:  AeolianMode [ September 29th, 2011, 6:45 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
@ Princess : I hesitated to mention Harry Potter as well, but that is definitely what I was getting at. Lord of the Rings is the same way. I... confess I have yet to read all of the Narnia books. >.< Thank you for reading!

@Elmirza: I'm glad it was helpful and I wasn't just rambling uselessly. Thank you for reading :D
Author:  Lady Elanor [ October 1st, 2011, 4:25 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
This is a really indepth, interesting, helpful post, Aeo! Thank you so much for sharing it with us!
Author:  Aragorn [ October 1st, 2011, 4:47 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
Those are fascinating observations, and good to keep in mind while writing. :book:
Author:  Andrew Amnon Mimetes [ October 1st, 2011, 8:52 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
Excellent post, Aeolian; thanks for sharing :)

eru
Author:  Airianna Valenshia [ October 1st, 2011, 8:57 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
*returns* Well, what you will do is send a copy of this to Philadelphia, who will store it in my secret stash! :twisted:

Then, once I release the new blog schedule(this is the current one), your piece will be in one of the slots. I will e-mail you-

You know what, it would probably be easier for you if I just gave you the link to the post. *shakes head at silly self *

viewtopic.php?f=40&t=2895

And here is a lovely little tutorial written by Philli on how to use the blog, when you are ready to post. :D

viewtopic.php?f=40&t=4201

Hope that helps! :D
Author:  Skathi [ November 2nd, 2011, 3:31 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
lol. Nay, Aeo, you were certianly not rambling uselessly. I found this post really helpful. When I have the time, I'll return, peruse, and post you my thoughts on it. :D
Author:  AeolianMode [ November 2nd, 2011, 3:40 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Aeolian's Observations
Yikes, I really feel off the ball on checking this site. I have been meaning to get involved again but I haven't had the time. Sorry for my absence, and thanks for reading my post!
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