Hello students, Bluegrass here.

As I hope you have gathered from my introductory letter, we don't use character reference sheets here at Characterization Academy. I feel that particular rule warrants some more detailed explanation as most every "OC" group seems to worship the ground they walk on.

We'll start out with what a character sheet is. A character sheet is a systematic listing of facts about a character. Age, height, weight, appearance, personality, flaws, background, etc. These sheets are supposed to reiterate the "important" information of a character. Often times they are given to artists as a kind of "here's what's up" or to introduce a character to an uninitiated person. When I ask for information about a character, a character reference sheet is often what's shoved at me. NO. Just no.

I understand the effort that goes into these sheets and I acknowledge from an art standpoint they could be useful, but they don't work for writing. Other than being about as boring as reading scientific instruction manuals, these salt-less references do NOTHING to tell me about your character. Reference sheets tell what a character is not who they are.

Think about it this way. Getting a reference sheet is like being handed a data readout from a computer program. It lists all the facts, but it implies nothing of their significance nor does it tell me that you've actually thought out a well-rounded character. If you wanted to showcase your ability to compile meaningless data, then congratulations, you've succeeded! If you want me to care about your character and see them as an individual rather than another copy-paste 2-D wallflower, you've failed spectacularly.

Nothing in a character reference sheet hints at what is truly important for a character. In fact, it pulls you away from what's really important. It encourages a systematic, automaton approach to characters that will leave them stiff, unnatural, and frankly boring. Professional authors don't approach characters like this. At least the good ones don't. They understand that all characters are individuals and should be treated as such!

Imagine for a moment that you're introducing a friend. Character reference sheet approach would be along the lines of: "Everyone, this is Allie. She's 15 years old, 5'2" tall, 100 pounds, blonde hair, blue eyes. Hobbies include three-legged races and watching the stars. Her personality is reserved but she can be spunky if she's fired up about politics. She moved here from Manhattan two years ago and still misses her best friends Bailee and Bree." How that helps you understand her as a person? Fact is that it doesn't. It would make you and your friend sound incredibly stupid and unrelatable.

So then, why do we insist upon that approach with characters? Why are we separating them from people when we should be treating them as individuals? If you want readers to relate to characters as people, treat them as such! You wouldn't introduce your friends with a character reference, so stop doing it to your OC's!

What's an appropriate way to introduce characters? Well, like you would any other person you know! Characters' lives are just a story within your story. That's it. So tell it like a story. Aspects of a person like personality, flaws, strengths, and the like tie together. The best "flaws" are often the same as a person's strength. A person's history obviously influences personality, approaches to life, goals, hopes, dreams, and flaws. Think of a character as a tapestry. Those "categories" in your reference sheet are nothing but individual threads of that tapestry. Weave it together rather than pulling it apart and separating it by individual colors of threads. If you pull it apart, you'll never see the "whole" of a character. You must keep the character's tapestry together to get a real picture of who that person is.

Now, what about visuals? I understand that a lot of folks use character reference sheets to show artists their character and request art. If you remove character reference sheets , what do you do about the ever important visuals? Well, if you absolutely need one, I suggest making separate "sheets" for JUST appearance. Let the artists know what your character looks like through them if it helps.

Here's a lovely example of what I'm talking about from Kell95 on deviantart. It's simple, clear, gives a picture of the character without trying to introduce the character on the sheet itself.

These appearance-only references can be useful for our art lecture, peer-review, or test threads. It shows what your character is, but I don't want them to become something you use to show who they are. That's your job. When introducing a character, there's no need for a system. Tell us about them like you are telling their story. If it works for you on your own, that's great, but here at the Academy, we'll move beyond that.

4739020 So harsh! But it was necessary you explained just why reference sheets are frowned upon here.

Though I'm sorry to say I have blood on my hands in this respect. As the organization freak I am, I have used a reference sheet for almost all my characters.
Name, cutie mark, age, appearance, and finally personality. Example of my my reference sheet for Sea Scroll's son, Devin.

Name: Devin

Cutie Mark: Clock and an old-fashioned pen. He grows up to be a historian

Age: Late Teens (exact age undecided)

Appearance: Tall unicorn stallion with black hair and white coat. His eyes are blue and almond-shaped. He usually wears a purple scarf.]

Devin is, like the rest of his family, highly intelligent. However, that intelligence comes with a lack of patience for anyone who isn't quite up to his level...um, and a lack of patience in general that makes him insensitive at times. It is in his nature to talk extremely fast, which just conveniently happens to throw other ponies off to the point of where they would never notice if he made a mistake (Sea Scroll is ALWAYS telling him to enunciate). His demeanor/attitude is self-important, but rather than being pompously so, he is always joking and being as casual as possible (especially when others are freaking out) just because he knows he's always on top of things. When he's not on top of things? Hell, he would probably act the same way and try to hide it. And if he COULDN'T hide it? o_o Let's just say he would get very cold...very fast. Because intimidation is the best way to make other ponies submissive to you when being the ever-competent wise-guy doesn't work. Devin may have been raised with 'old fashioned' morals, but that doesn't stop him from getting all the mares with his 'superb social skills'. Though he has never been able to maintain a stable relationship with any of them. . .go figure

.

I almost always follow this format. I really had no idea it bothered you so much, though, and I'll be sure to do it differently next time.

4739206

Hell, he would probably act the same way and try to hide it

source

No cursing in Characterization Academy, my dear.

4739259 Nooo!

Do I have to write a "I will not curse in school" one hundred times now?

4739262 [Holds up chalk.] Nope, but you'll be helping me with a visual character design lecture as retribution now.

4739270 QuQ Okay.

4739020

What's an appropriate way to introduce characters? Well, like you would any other person you know! Characters' lives are just a story within your story. That's it. So tell it like a story. Aspects of a person like personality, flaws, strengths, and the like tie together.

So how would you recommend you tell it like a story? When it comes to my characters for my games (Which due to the online text based nature of them I encourage my players to treat is as a collaborative story as well as a role play), I mix the types. I keep the factual data spiel because it comes in handy (it is a stat based game after all), but when it comes to actually describing them, I tend to break it down into three or four categories.

General Biography: Tends to be the overall history of the character. Touching on family, relationships, achievements, hobbies, failings, etc. Not always continuous in terms of the timeline overview, since I might jump to a few years earlier or later than the point to brush on any related impacts, but I try to go with a direct and logical flow.

Personality: Pretty much as it says on the lid. A more focused look on the individual's psyche. It is more often than not shorter than the Bio, but it often touches on some of the same things as pointers and explanations as to why certain they are the way they are, how it affects who they are, and who they appear to be and their relationships with others.

Appearance: Generally an overview of not only their physical appearance, but also their bearing, their common wardrobe, a bit of likes and dislikes. In a way, personality is who they are when you meet them, appearance is who they are when you see them, both with whys if I can think of it.

Traits/Traits/Characteristics: Generally the shortest section, it's one I normally come back to and jot down ideas and such in as it relates to the lesser features of an individual. Quirks they have (maybe the tend to adjust their glasses when thinking) things they might have acquired and keepsakes, little things to try and flesh them out further.

I'll admit that it's not a format I've really employed with my characters for writing. Lately I mostly sketch them loosely out in the sheet format before chatting with a friend about them and adding the (edited) conversation to the file.

4739020
Valid advice, I must admit, however there is another rule I feel should be shared for fledgling writers: "At the end of the day, what works for you, works." If a writer finds Reference Sheets work for them, great! If not, also great! Cause they do what works for them, that's all that matters when someone writes, they do what works for them.
4739206
You don't have blood on your hands, you did what works for you.
4739378
That's a pretty good setup.

4739378 Hmmmm. That does make sense from a gaming standpoint. I had a lot of trouble visualizing characters when I first started out, so I forced myself to learn art to draw out characters. I still have a long way to go and will often commission my artist friends for pictures. I have an obsession with artwork.

I guess I can give an example of how I'd introduce a character. This is the main character in my personal novel, Vincent Marshall aka "Vince."

A commission I got from my good friend Amdvinci on deviantart.

Vince is one of those people that you'd meet on the street and wonder if he was actually being serious or just playing games to amuse himself. Head of the Theatre department at Winston University (in Winston Montana) Vince steers his own ship; sometimes into sandbanks . . . He's flamboyant, loud, and tends to be very hard on his students. However, he genuinely cares for them and only pushes them so hard because he sees their potential and doesn't want to end up like him.

At 32, Vince hates what's become of his life. As a child growing up in rural Iowa, he had a lot of potential. However, when his father (a police officer) is shot to death by his best friend on a routine call, he loses it. From eighth grade throughout most of high school, Vince becomes something of a rebel rousing SOB to try and cope with the loss of a father figure that always had been there for him. However, Vince has always been wickedly intelligent, and his grades don't falter. In fact, he purposely does well in his classes just to tick off the teachers. During his rebel phase, he gets a bunch of tattoos, picks fights, and ends up in a lot of trouble with the law. He's not stupid, so he doesn't choose drugs or tobacco to mess with, but he gets a kind of perverse pleasure from scaring the crap out of locals and acting almost insane on a daily basis. That actually leads his little sister to distance herself from him and has actually prevented her from reconciling with him all these years later.

Well, he gets a rude wake up call Junior year of high school when he comes home from a fight pretty badly beat around. He's afraid to mention it to his already over-worked and over-taxed mother, so he keeps it to himself despite knowing that the injuries could be serious. His hemophilia however, complicates matters, and he almost bleeds out. After scaring his mother and sister half to death, he vows to change and starts playing the "good boy." However, he over-compensates, suppressing his naturally playful and fun-loving nature to please his mother and prove a point. So, though he adores theatre, he goes into physics.

With his intelligence and grades, he has no problem getting a doctorate in physics from one of the nation's top schools and receiving numerous awards for his research in theoretical physics. His love of theatre has been there the entire time, but he had become afraid to pursue it after his actions in high school. So he suppresses who he is and keeps playing the role he despises until he breaks down. After a botched suicide attempt, he feels trapped and scared. He doesn't know where to turn or what to do next. That's when his college friend, Mordechai (Chai) Knox offers a solution he never imagined possible.

Chai works as a physics professor at Winston and has heard about the Theatre Department head looking to take on a masters student. Vince applies and he ends up studying under the aging head of the theatre department for his masters in theatre. From there, gets a position running the department at Winston and is fairly happy in his career choice though he's unhappy with his personal life.

Vince is something of a brilliant troll. He's bored and lonely and takes that out on his students by teasing them relentlessly and being as over the top and dramatic as possible. He's a little arrogant and gets pouty if someone deflates his ego. Though he is a nice man overall, obsessed with helping all his student's succeed and find themselves. Because he missed out on so much between his delinquent and physics years, he tries to make sure they don't end up like him. Vince feels that he'll never be able to make up the lost time and find a woman/settle down (he really wants a family). This makes him a little bitter when he's stuck around happily married/dating people and has contributed to making him something of a loner.

That's how I approach introducing characters anyway. Vince is SUPER hard to introduce, let me tell you. He's a very complex character with a crap ton going on in mind at any given time. So, it's hard for me to summarize. I've got a lot to learn myself on that front!

4739467 First paragraph sounds like one of my appearances, last sounds like personality or Quirks XD

On the down side... so many characters to do this for considering the story I have planned... and two each, actually 0.o

4739538 Hmmm. Maybe. I guess categorization is in the eye of the beholder. I just never categorize anything, so to me whatever flows goes. But, if it helps to see it in categories, go for it!

4739812 This is a question for a question thread. Feel free to put that in a question thread clearly labeled [Question]: Title

This is a thread about reference sheets.

4739818 Thanks!