Characters

Characters are what drives your story, what pushes it forward. Their interactions add flavor and humor. The best kinds of characters are like Snape. They aren't purely black or purely white, but having thick, ever shifting layers of complex personality and often an internal struggle, a love-hate relationship, something to make them more interesting and compelling. Characters are a very important part of the story, so making them is also very important.

Sometimes, you find yourself simply meeting someone, or so it feels- you already know all about them. But that rarely happens to me, and mostly I have to develop them. 

Here's what I use to develop them:

1. A form. My forms vary. Sometimes I use a form with just Appearance, Name, Age, Personality, but I only do that when I feel like I already know the character pretty well. Mostly I just grab Gail Carson Levine's character form from Writing Magic:

Name:
Nickname, if any:
Kind of being (human, animal, extraterrestrial, fantasy or fairy-tale creature):
Age:
Gender:
Appearance:
Occupation, if applicable:
Family members:
Pets:
Best friend:
Describe his/her room:
Way of speaking:
Physical characteristics (posture, gestures, attitude):
Items in his/her pockets or backpack or purse:
Hobbies:
Favorite sports:
Talents, abilities, or powers:
Relationships (how (s)he is with other people):
Fears:
Faults:
Good points:
What (s)he wants more than anything else:

This is not saying you would have to fill out all of these, but they're very helpful. I generally just fill out the ones that apply the best. I also add other ones if I think them necessary. 

An example of a doodle of a character. It shows the full profile and also some things
the character might do.                                                                                                      

2. I then fiddle around with them a bit. Write some scenes from the backstory, draw them, doodle out their outfit, anything, just get to know them a bit better. Figure out how they would react in various scenes. What would they do if a robber tried to pickpocket them? What would they do if their friend betrayed them? 

- Indigo