When you create your characters, are they influenced by anything?

[Cereza 2]

Mine are always influenced by something. Usually shows, movies, or books I've read. Since I've been doing this for a while, I can say it's influenced by previous characters. Sometimes too it's influenced by what's going on.. or if there is a hole left by a character that is gone, dead, or transported to one of the other worlds connected to our main world. 

[Croftt 6]

My characters typically come from me finding a face claim, falling in love with some aspect of them and fleshing a character around the face.

[jordancullen72 4]

I once did a OC based off a friend of mine from high school. She is one who to me is currently most memorable. I am so proud to this day over how much I developed her. Her name is Kimberly McKendrick. I used her in my Alias RPGs. I miss using her in roleplays.

[Seravian 50]

I would definitely be lying if I said video games, images, and real life people did not influence my characters in some way.

[Somniac 207]

Definitely. Statistics is probably, weirdly, one of my bigger influences in designing a new character. There’s something tongue-in-cheek about playing something closer to The Average Man.

[Dragon 673]

I've got a family of characters that was originally based off the real shit that an older friend of mine went through growing up. His dad, grandfather, uncles etc used to literally take them out to the stable, put them into one of the stalls, and force them to bare knuckle box while they bet on who would win. I used that, and other life experiences he had, to delve out how this family grew and formed - kind of an exploration in how messed up expands. Also used a lot of what I've learned studying psychology to build them. The characters I've built out of that are easily the most loved among the people I write with, or who just follow what I write. 

 

Of course its fucked up in reality. But it was a different time, different generation. Shit was just different. He knows I've incorporated the stories he's told me into my writing. 

 

I've had the great fortune to meet very colorful people, with all kinds of life experiences. And I've experienced a lot myself. Almost all my characters are created with some element of influence from either my life, or the lives of people close to me. 

 

 

 

 

[Prophetess 137]

That's a good question. Most of the ones I have currently have been ones that I have tinkered with for years off and on. Finally having a home most of them have been able to find their feet. Some have come from books I've read and thought how they would work as characters. Others have come from tv shows or movies. Something will tick an idea and they evolve from there on their own. 

[Guest Moxxi]

Most of mine typically come from images and sometimes music. Often times I see a photo and immediately think of a name with it. Other times, it's much harder than that. There have been a few times that TV characters have given me inspiration but most of those characters didn't seem to last long. 

[Mectre 9]

I draw a lot on images and personality types. MBTI helps a lot, or other similar systems. I used to scour through TV Tropes back in the day, too. Stereotypes are good bases to work with, then just building upon them.

[Mayu 12]

As someone who has played way too many JRPGs in their life, it is safe to say that ninety percent on my inspiration comes from games.

However, I do have quite a few characters that I' made on a whim without any inspiration in particular. Even I often wonder how those characters came about.

[Zelkova 12]

Sometimes a picture, sometimes a song, sometimes flashy scene I thought up in my head, sometimes want-ads that are really freaking good.

[akakios 14]

Yes, I have influences from both media and real life. I think lately I've been interested in forced codes of politeness in the professional/corporate world, and my characters reflect that in their career pursuits and personalities. 

[Redalia 3]

Yes and no. I have the tendency to pull a character out of a hat spontaneously when needed, no influential factors involved. Then again, these characters don't always contain real depth, unless I ultimately continue to develop them and actually turn out to like them.

 

However, many of my own characters are influenced heavily on myself, those around me, and oddly, personality tests. Something very therapeutic for me is writing a character that is my exact opposite. Somehow, I find myself relaxing stressors that I just always have, since I'm fairly OCD with a strong, ethical, moral values. Writing a character that isn't OCD, who is totally chaotic with no set guidelines sort of releases this tightness that it seems I'm always living with. I'd say that's a large influential factor. Likewise, I also build characters with other mental disorders and learning disabilities.

[4rt3m1s 16]

I'm mostly influenced to make a character because I see a face claim and they spark some sort of idea or a name initially, but the details as to character biography and personality generally end up stemming from reading or watching something. I think books really influence me because sometimes after reading, if I get a really good and solid character vibe from it, I sort of end up writing in that style for a short while until I get into the groove of that character, and then they just start to flow completely naturally and start to be influenced from the world into which I inject them more than any outside source.

[snowbird 4]

I usually get snippets of people floating around in my head, and I can place them usually to tv shows i see, or songs, but I got the surprise of my lifetime recently.  

My great uncle was talking about my grandmother, who reccently passed away, as a teenager, and he spoke about a movie quote that reminded him of her ("Hey Johnny, What are you rebelling against?" "What do ya got?" - The Wild One) Looking it up a few days later, I was realizing how perfectly it fit my character, and how many similarities they had both in their youth and as they've aged.