"When you're happy and you know it; Smile!"

invernom:

startrek-marysues:

that70srpc:

I find that, when writing bios, it’s really helpful to look at a list or a chart like the one above. Picking two or three traits from each chart and building a character based around them will give you a really interesting bio, because they will serve as a reminder that characters need depth and dimension.

Independent and clever.

VS.

Independent, clever, pretentious, and stubborn.

The first combination doesn’t come with any flaws, whereas the second will provide a more dynamic character.

HEY GUYS, this showed up on my dash this morning, and I thought it would be helpful if any of you are writing characters and don’t want them to come out as picture-perfect Mary Sues! :) 

One thing I’d like to add, though, is that you should make sure the character traits don’t conflict in an oxymoronic way…. for example: Ambitious and lazy, or patient and impulsive. WAT. (Believe it or not, I HAVE seen it happen before! Don’t do it!!)

I dunno, doing oxymoronic character traits could be an interesting but doable challenge. For instance, if a character is ambitious and lazy maybe they’re someone who has learned to achieve what they want by cleverly manipulating others into doing it. Or maybe they’re a person who wants to achieve great things but doesn’t have the drive to really do them, so over the course of a story they have to overcome the obstacle of their laziness.

If someone is patient and impulsive, maybe the character just exhibits those traits in different aspects of their life - perhaps they’re patient when dealing with their friends, but impulsive when it comes to spending money.

Just because two traits sound incompatible doesn’t mean they are. Real people are full of all sorts of conflicting and oxymoronic qualities, and exhibit different sides of themselves for various purposes and in particular situations.

Actually, I’d recommend anyone who feels like it to specifically choose qualities from this chart that seem like they don’t work together - I think figuring out how those traits can be reconciled could be really helpful and beneficial to the process of creating a character and making them interesting.

rinatan:

I really want Homestuck nails, so I made a reference sheet! ◕v◕

human-proportions:

From: pachurz:

Some building block references my Life Drawing teacher drew up for us for our Figure Drawing class. Thought I would impart the wisdom.