I don't normally do this, but the other day I began mapping out something for my Madeline. The following is what it looked like after a day.
What do you call this method of character research? Someone in my writing group said it was snowflaking. I kinda think of it as webbing. I claim ignorance about this because I've never done it for a character before. My character sketches are usually some well-thought-out interview questions and maybe a mini-scene written to expose their personality. I find the majority of my characters show themselves throughout the plot, not behind the scenes like Madeline did.
I recently got my hands on a copy of Office 2013 and converted the "web" into PowePpoint. Suprisingly easy, might I add.
Overall a mix of surprised and satisfaction with the final product. It was fun to make in PowerPoint. You can see I finally decided on a last name for the poor thing. I gave her "Smith" as a placeholder, although it makes me think - will anyone give a character the last name of Smith ever?
The five major aspects that define Madeline are her roles, her age, her emotions, and her gift. I wanted to stay away from elements like "gender" and "not sure about sexuality" because these things don't affect her personality, something I wish more writers would take into account. They affect her decisions, yes, but decision-making is for the plot. This is the fleshing-out part that I need to figure out before I write that.
What defines your characters? How do you meet them? Snowflake or web?
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