Do you struggle to write good dialogue for your characters? Are your characters flat and boring?
Do you avoid the writing process and race to the drawing stage when making your comics or cartoons?
What if your writing process could improve your character designs?
In this episode of The Paper Wings Podcast, Chris and Lora give you TEN questions that will help you bring your characters to life right on the page.
They also share the submission deadline and judging process for the first Paper Wings Challenge sponsored by WACOM Technologies!
This episode features examples from Batman, X-Men, Romeo & Juliet, The Big Lebowski, Mad Men, Friday Night Lights, LOST, The Godfather, Driving Miss Daisy and The Office.
Press PLAY, dig deep with your characters and let the design and dialogue flow!
READ ON to learn how YOU can enter to WIN a WACOM Intuos4 Tablet and to download the episode Cheat Sheet!
COMMENT AND SHARE:
What is your #1 Question about character design?
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Next Time on PAPER WINGS:
Character Design From The Inside Out!
EPISODE RESOURCES:
WACOM Contest Rules [ contest closed ]
Wow, what a great episode! Lots of food for thought.
I think it’s all to easy to get caught up in the intricacies of personality building and forget about the fundamentals such as what drives your character, their desires and needs. Your questions really address this and are a good springboard to developing not only the character but the story.
Another aspect worth considering are character traits or quirks. A distinctive trait can make even a minor character memorable.
On a slightly different note i recently saw an interview with a writer talking about character creation and how important it was not to judge your creations. He quoted Chekov (not the one from Star Trek i think) – “I do not judge my characters. I am a witness to them”
Just a quick question :
Chris mentioned on his Artcast about animation model sheets and suggested getting away from front, rear and 3/4 view and doing action poses instead which might be more useful. Do you think this approach might also be valuable when designing characters for a comic?
Looking forward for the next episode on character design.
cheers
Eddy, this is all fantastic insight. Great, great stuff.
Yes, I always try to follow that mantra about not judging the characters – in my own stories and in all stories I read or watch or listen to. It helps me enjoy the stories even more.
And, yes, I’m always one to favor a page of expressive character drawings over a page of orthos/ turnarounds – in any scenario. Orthos help some people.
…and they do serve a purpose sometimes. For example, on PLANES, I was drawing a lot of orthos as a regular part of our character design process.
Those characters are obviously more technical, so a combination of expressive drawings and orthos were used as guides for modeling them.
For my graphic novel, I’ve never done a turn around for any of my characters. I usually do one drawing that captures that character’s personality. And rough sketches if they change outfits for that issue. Personally, I feel like I ‘know’ my characters when I write them, and can see them in my mind already. So spending tons of time drawing & sketching and redrawing when I could be working on the next page seems like wasted time to me. That being said, if I don’t nail it on the first time, I keep trying!
Here’s an example of one of my character design drawings: http://comic-chic.deviantart.com/gallery/852110#/d144n0d
Hopefully you can tell a lot about that guy, just from the one sketch!
Thanks Chris. Yes i can see how ortho views would be more helpful for “mechanical” characters. I suppose it using the best methods to convey the personality of a particularly design or character.
Thanks, Lora. Love the sketch you linked to. I can see how you used his stance and body language to convey his character. By the way, one thing i find daunting with comics is having to redraw the same character and keep it on model.
Ooh, that’s a good one, Eddy. Keeping the character on model throughout an entire sequence of images.
And we hadn’t thought to include that in the upcoming episode. So thanks so much. We will definitely address that one.
Thanks for covering character development! (I may or may not have been the apprentice that was stuck on dialogue…)
There are a lot of tips in here that I’ll use. When I get stumped I also like the “don’t tell them what to do – ASK the characters what they want to do” type of mantra. I’ve found that a lot of the time, when I get stuck halfway through a conversation on how to end it or take it to the next level, I just need to think about what would make the conversation character-driven rather than story-driven. Then it feels more natural, less like I’m pushing them from point A to point B, and a bit of personality comes out.
Great insight about the character-driven conversation, Sarah. I’m taking that to heart and will be applying it to the scene I’m currently writing. Great stuff.
Thanks guys so much for what feels like a new chapter in the PaperWings Podcasts! I am always in dire need of advice on my character development, so these ideas and examples have really provoked some thought. I am excited to hear more about character design from you two! I wish had a specific question on character design, but in all honestly I just want to hear about your approach and process to character design.
Thanks, Lee. I think this is the kind of thing Lora and I are most passionate about.
We will definitely be talking about our own processes on the next ep!
Thanks Lee! It was fun to break out of the ‘how to’ type information the first few episodes were full of, and talk about something more abstract and creative. Glad you enjoyed it!
Great episode! It was very satisfying for me to look at all of these questions and be able to put a check mark next to my major characters and their personalities. It also made me realize I need to expand beyond my two major characters and look at characters who are essential to the development of the story, but just haven’t gotten the same treatment yet.
For me, I have to know what they look like before I can do anything else development-wise. This means I spend hours upon hours clicking through pictures of actresses and actors who not only most closely look like what’s in my head, but who I could see portraying these people who are so real inside my head.
A problem I’m having right now is that I’m writing (and painting) about a family with five daughters. “Worse” yet, it’s set in the 1940’s, on a farm. At this point, I have lots of references to contribute to the development of these girls, but it still doesn’t mean writing and drawing them in a way that gives them each a specific and unique personality isn’t still a royal pain in the neck. They each are as equally as important and essential to the story and development of the main character as the other, so I can’t simply get rid of a few of them to “make it easier” on myself. Plus, in the drawing process, I want to make them visually different enough so people can tell who’s who without there being a name tag.
For example, I’ve been told I look a lot like my brother; it’s kinda true, we do have similarities with some facial features and we share a love for old films, film-making, and storytelling. But, we are also drastically different people with drastically different storytelling interests. My brother likes mysteries and mind-twisters films, where I prefer character-driven stories about how people live and love stays the same throughout history, but it is the times in which people live constrains them on how they live. I don’t particularly have a question about character design, but I am excited to hear what you guys have to say on the matter.
One more thing before I end this overly-long comment: I love writing dialogue. Other than doing research and drawing, writing dialogue gives me the most pleasure in the storytelling process. Often, though, I end up going overboard with the dialogue and giving each character a huge speech every couple of pages or so. Whenever that happens, I have a quote from Alfred Hitchcock that I look to:
“Dialogue should simply be a sound among other sounds, just something that comes out of the mouths of people whose eyes tell the story in visual terms.”
Great stuff, Bethany.
Lora and I will try to address this on the next podcast episode but if we don’t get to it, just remind us and we will address it here.
Thanks for sharing!
Hi, Bethany! I think this is a legit problem to think through before you get too far in your writing. If you have 5 daughters, they do all need to be distinct and individual, and yet all come off as a part of the same family at the same time. Maybe it’s time to re-read Little Women and get some ideas!
re: dialogue, what kind of story is this? a comic, a screenplay, a novel? Longer dialogue works best in a novel, and worst in a comic. I love dialogue & banter, too. But sometimes my scenes get too long so I have to go in and really boil it down to what is essential to move the story forward. A lot of times, when I put my objective hat on, it is possible to whittle it down significantly. One of the things that has helped me most is cutting out repetitive dialogue. If a character is repeating himself, or makes a point, then later re-makes the same point. I try to cut it out so that I only have it in there once–and use it in the place where it is the most powerful and/or makes the most sense.
Looking back at my notes, I do have distinctive roles and personality traits down for the five girls, but like you said, I need to go deeper and figure some more things out before I get stuck. It’s awesome you brought up Little Woman, as was their story that inspired me to have five girls in my story.
As for the format, it started out as a novel until I realized I spend more time drawing than actually writing. I have to draw out floor plans, sketch period chairs and lamps, and figure out what kind of wallpaper is plastered in the living room before I can actually get myself to write a scene in that room, even if in the written part none of those things are mentioned. I have thought about doing it as a graphic novel, but so much of the story is quiet, emotional reflection, I’m sure the readers would be snoring by page 3. Plus, drawing environments around my characters in repetition is not a strong point for me.
So, for now, the story is still set up in book form, but with illustrations on certain key events.
Great episode! I imagined my graphic novel’s main character listening to the podcast with me, forming his answers to the questions, and laughing about the favorite clothes. 🙂
Thanks for providing a deadline for the contest! (But I have to confess that I got carried away with my entry and finished it in one weekend instead of working on it in installments like I had planned). I have a question about Chris’s description of the website for the contest, though. He mentioned having extra things besides the entry itself, and I was wondering if we had to submit that all at once or if we submit our final entry and then get a section of the website that we can edit? Or did I misunderstand this completely?
Once we have your entry & release form, we’ll post your entry on the Contest Page. Every entry will have it’s own sub-page, with the FB “Like” button… and from there, you can post links & updates in the comments section of you entries page!
Ah, I see! Thanks!
Hello Wingers!
Thank you all for the another awesome post. I am really looking forward to this series!
I just wanted to add in a few to thick’n it up an hope it helps someone. I am an artist and creator type person…not a writer. i can come up with grandiose ideas but the meat and potatoes that create the character completely evade me sometimes. On of my best friends is a writer of both comic style works and novellas. A few years ago, when I was wanting to start a comic for a story I had in me ‘noggin, he started asking me a few similar questions to yours. The two that stand out the most were what is his [my main character’s] favorite food and music? Wow…I had never thought of that. And that is when I knew that I wasn’t ready to write this tale yet. I didn’t even know who the guy was. How could I have him influence an entire world of people who needed hope if I couldn’t even tell someone else what mattered to him? Answers to simple questions like this influence his preferences, social status and in many cases, can improve or tear down peoples trust in him depending on whether they agree with his choices.
I have since worked on getting to know him better and then sticking to what I know, drawing. I have people who can help me work through questions like yours and with what I will learn from y’all, I should have a great foundation to any character for future projects.
Thank you two for your time!
Take care, me ‘maties, yo ho!
Captain Dutz!
This was such great advice!!! Thank you soooo much
I just wanted to say that I last listened when episode 3 was posted and I just returned today to check it out. You guys are doing some awesome work. Keep it up!
I really appreciated the cheat sheet from this post. I’m starting a new project soon and all these questions are perfect for building better characters.
You guys rock.
Being someone who grew up playing and liking to create characters for AD&D, Star Wars, Shadowrun, Rifts, Vampire: The Masquerade, etc etc etc I really loved going in to depth in regards to my character’s backstory and history (much to my Game Master’s frustration I think LOL). Then I would subsequently draw them and they’d turn out pretty well as I knew what made these characters tick. During the game itself it was always so much easier to know what the character would do in a certain situation because I knew them. It wasn’t me making the decisions, it was the character using me to tell the world what they wanted to do.
(No, I don’t suffer from a multiple personality disorder… well, *we* don’t think so, anyway…) ;-P
I haven’t gamed in a number of years now so I’m out of practice but would love to get back into it one day.
On another topic, when you were discussing characters from various films I was struck by the comparison I feel I have with Jamie Foxx’s character from Collateral – he’s convinced himself that he’s going to ‘make it’ one day but is so fearful that he can’t take that step. I’ve spent the last 4 and-a-half years talking myself up in regards to following my artistic dream and complaining about my day-job of being a teacher to the point where a lot of my friends and family are sick of me “talking the talk, but not walking the walk”. It’s come down to a “do it or shut up about it already” choice. I need to stop thinking like I’ll just be a teacher until “something” happens and actually go out and make it happen. Thanks for being that profound kick in the butt.
Now I just need to figure out how to make myself financially viable as a creative (because being a starving artist is not on my agenda). 😉
Thank you for the character questions cheatsheet!
I went through all my major characters and roleplayed their answers.
It’s funny because I knew who the characters were already, but with it written down it’s much easier to manage
and play scenes out between them now.
Maybe it’s just the feeling of the extra room in my brain, but with all of this on paper instead of up there,
I feel more equipped to tackle scenes I was previously dreading.
Very interesting and insightful.. The comments have provided great thought provoking questions.
Im also really interested in writing an overview of my story for pitch purposes.. would love to hear your opinions on this….
when i say opinions i mean tips on writing a great overview for a tvshow
i mean im interested in hearing your tips on writing a great overview for a tvshow