how are ocs created?

so, i've been wondering, how are original characters created?

'cause, well, i've tried making ocs before but none of mine were actually good and i never really managed to focus on them for very long. so yeah...

how are ocs created? how do characters start existing? are there multiple ways or just one? and how do people manage to get as invested in their own characters as they are in other people's?

i just don't entirely get it, honestly, and i'd like to understand it. and i figure kintsugi is a good place to ask about it.

 

well personally i usually design my characters around tropes/themes or needs i have for a setting and then i play around with them, see what they develope like
let's take my personal favorite trashbabies, Flannery Roan And Theodora Slaine
So Flan started their life as 'i need an occassional comrade for the main characters who is really really fucking weird' for the Charon verse
Quickly Flan got a sidekick, a talking teddybear with a nurse head, because well, making daggers from blood as your primary fighting method means Flan gets injured a lot.
and then i realized 'wouldn't it be funny if something eldritch gave them these powers' and i knew they were already missing an eyeball so after a bit of deliberation Flan got a Voidling roommate in that eyesocket.
However that meant Flan quickly became very very powerful even for the setting i had deliberately written to allow for ridiculous anime-esque powers, so i relocated Flan And Teddy to their own verse were now they are treasure-hunters/grave-robbers in a high-fantasy kinda setting. Teddy got updated to a human body, is a real nurse now and Flan's lover
Their twisty turny wonky bonky thought processes developed somewhere along the line when i realized that someone who sticks a cursed artefact into any of their orifices has a problem most likely, and that whoever keeps using really weird exotic skin grafts on their main patient she preferably skins from life-subjects, probably has an equally big one.
And that is how i got my chaos death and murder children.

 

@IvyLB thanks! :D

and hmm... i think that strategy might've been one of the ones i used back when i was younger and made ocs. like, for example, i think i once created a female genie oc 'cause someone who really hated slash was reading (and reviewing) a fic of mine and had a feeling that, well, if i didn't pair up norm the genie with a girl, i'd eventually give into the temptation to do a slash pairing with him and well, lose that reader. who i think might've also sorta been a fandom friend. which yeah... "no homo" is not a great reason to make an oc but, well, i was thirteen and new to fandom and didn't quite know how queer i was yet, haha.

 

A lot of mine are around vague concepts and ideas. Even colors sometimes. My little freckled mage from my comic started because "red hair, magic, and short boys". Another character came to life because 'moss green and deer gods" decided that, yes, a dryad fellow with a stake of plant life in his hair that mimicked the current weathers effect on deciduous trees was a needed thing.

Other times I'll get an idea for a story and be like, SHIT THIS IS COOL. .... WHO COULD FUCK IT UP WORST. or WHAT KIND OF PERSON WOULD ROLL AROUND IN THIS. and run with it. Features kinda come along after I get a grasp on what they're like inside.

Then there's the people I doodle randomly experimenting with features or hair styles and stuff and i think what kind of clothing they'd look cute in and what kind of world would have them wearing that fashion style.

eta: i also play games with friends where we design people based on a concept and see how well they'd do as a couple which is fun. Kostya came because of that, the evil little shit. :D

 

I'm not very good at making ocs, but usually I run into a single trait or idea that I really like, and just build around it. or I fiddle with a dollmaker's random button until it pops out something interesting, and I save the design until I feel like actually giving them names or personalities. if you don't mind chibi shit, dreamselfy is okay for that sort of thing

there's character survey-type things, which are more surface level character creation, but they get you thinking about it, at least. charahub is one, or there's ocsurvey.tumblr.com, which is a little more in depth if I remember.

but I dunno how to get invested in it, other people's characters are always more interesting. maybe if you co-created an oc with someone?

 

@TheMockingCrows @Lambda @IvyLB thanks!

i think this is all giving me some insight into what my particular difficulties with ocs might be. and into what i'm not doing and maybe should be.

 

Fandom OCs are somewhat looked down upon it seems, but honestly they're very good practice? and sometimes you can take them out of the setting and make them their own story and make them all yours, basically. Plenty of my OCs came from needing a side character to fill a role in a fandom roleplay, and then over time I had to come up with more personality traits as they interacted with people more, and they became more fleshed out.

I'm kinda superficial and I will start out with a character's appearance a lot of the time before i decide on their personality. But it also sorta happens...naturally in a way that's hard to describe, as you think about different situations and how that character might react to them.

 

And of course Ophira Aurum, aka Resch
I wanted an apprentice to a bomb builder (build this character to join a bro at a LARP con)
what I got was an obnoxiously annoying but surprisingly FUN hermetic alchemy joke extending over several meta levels

 

@IvyLB yep

@Enzel thanks!

hmmm... well, i don't think fandom ocs being looked down upon has been what's stopping me from making them. it's more that, i dunno, i don't entirely have the inclination, the drive. like, that gemsona maker - i used it to make a gem!norm the genie, not a gem!me or gem!anyone-else-that's-not-a-canon-character. and though i'm hella attracted to norm, i've never really felt like putting myself in there, necessarily... even in my private fantasies, honestly... which might be a dysphoria thing, i dunno. maybe if i was more cis, norm/me would feel more natural...

 

My usual tactic is asking myself "what would i do in that situation?", and then at some point the "me" in the story starts doing things i wouldn't have done, and that's when they start becoming independent. Catherine was created that way, and sometimes I really want to whack her over the head.
(Aventura started out as Sesshoumaru from Inuyasha's older sister, bc that one film had a third sword from the brother's father, so ofc there needed to be a third sibling. She's a tad more interesting now, but still associated with wolves and the moon.)

Sometimes I put already existing OCs in different settings and see what they do, and then they spontaneously develop into different people. That's how Nasim and Jawna came about. And Zaleina.

Sometimes already existing OCs tell me about people they know. That's how I created Damien.

Sometimes they just set up camp in my head.

 

@whimsicalobservant thanks!

the what-would-i-do thing is something i think i often have trouble with, since i then get stuck on how useless i'd be in an exciting situation and on stuff like my sensory issues. like, the theoretical!me starves and i'm just like, "okay then. fine. it's dead. i'm done."

and those are interesting ways to do it.

 

WARNING LONG POST TAG ME AND TELL ME TO SHOVE IT UNDER A SPOILER IF NOT WANT

SOmetimes I make them in dollmakers randomly

So lets start with these random people I made a few days ago, that I havent fleshed out thus far, other than "in love and pixies)

SO they look like this, and while making them you might starting thinking out "Well, WHY did I give them three scars on their hand" or "Why do you have paint on your face all the time?"
So as you go through, you can throw in RANDOM features you like. Try those face paints none of the pre-existing characters have, try the non canon wings, whatever the hell looks interesting.

Usually by the time clothing happens (even by hair time occasionally) I have some ideas about personality. Such as "Purple face paint pixie has a slightly less mean personality than me, and doesnt have social anxiety. She has cool looking wings and likes purple more than her blue wng colour so wears that instead of her wing colour. Red chick doesnt like green all that much but since her face [aint is green probably is decently 'okay' with wearing it. they are TOTALLY a couple, because why the hell not.
^actual liveblog of my thoughts while looking at these

So now that my ideas from just looking at them have come out, I usually start analysing
Why does red wear green facepaint if she doesnt like it?
Maybe she has strict parents or something?
Maybe it is required by law and purple is a rebel?
Maybe she doesnt mind green that much and likes contrasting her red shirt-dress?
Why does she have butterfly wings?
Why are they green?
Why does purple fairy wear different face paint?
Is she a mutation?
Is the face paint actually birthmarks?^
is she a criminal?
Is it a social rulle to wear facepaint same colour as wings?
How did they meet?
What are their lives like?
Based on outfits and hair, there isnt much to go on for jobs, but maybe during my thought process above, while picking face stuff, I thought of red as a gardener.
why are purple's wings like they are
I put them in some form of building...
is it their hojuse?
is it their workplace?
is it somewhere else?

you can also look things up like
"green butterflies"
and then look and see if sometihng is rare and then you have some more to choose to go off
Maybe red is actually a mutation, and nobody has seen green butterfly wings in hundreds of thousands of years, since some ancient princess, so she hides away and tries not to be spotted thanks to guidance from her dead parents, but then purple finds her and discovers what ther wings are, but she had fallen in love with her so she didnt reveal her to the governament, and they have a secret relationship, but they [robably get caught, or maybe purple has very vigilant parents close to governament, and they catch her and something dramatic happens with red almost getting killed, but they get away and run from the governament and purples parents, and go off to some distant country and work the land to live and get a single small house to live in together for the rest of their days, and live peacefully until... *sequel premise*

But that was literally just taking the first ideas that came to mind and writing them down.
They are also many different ways to make ocs as evidenced by everyone else up thread
this happens to work for me, and usually leaves me with many undeveloped characters who have tiny random thoughts associated with them, but not neccesarily that whole book idea I just wrote (that would be a shitty book anyway)

 

Just wanted to share: so the vast majority of my OCs come from random pictures I draw. I draw a thing, it looks cool, so I give them a name and a really basic set up. Like, I played lotsa video games back in the day, so important things were weapons, type of magic, any cool skills, and then a basic trope personality. I literally have a character I call my "happy character". That was how she was born.

Then I just sort of keep them around in my head. I have them interact with eachother because I find it entertaining. I will make weird scenarios that I enjoy and play around with who is there, how they would act, maybe try out a couple of different backstories for some of the characters. Eventually, they become their own character. Certain scenarios or characteristics evolve and develope, often times much differently than the original character design.

These types of chars created the frame work for my world/setting. Then, I started creating chars when I needed a role filled. They are usually friends, enemies, lovers ect of my picture born chars. I eventually feel like they need to be developed further than just a supporting role, so I start putting them in with different scenarios/backstories ect. And this continues on forever actually. I spend a lot of time just roleplaying chars in my head.

 

@Imoyram thanks!

i really like the question strategy, actually. i think it'd fit in pretty well with the way my brain works, probably, asking questions about random characters from a dollmaker and seeing what answers my brain gives. 'cause i think i definitely do feel that kind of curiosity about stuff.

@rorleuaisen thanks!

 

SOmetimes if you can even just do multiple outfits, or groups fo characters, and you will prob come up with dynamics within them while you make them.
If that IS up your alley I'd suggest one of the eight doll doll makers, then you can just fill it up and then think about them, shove em in different settings... throw em in other outfits..

 

@Imoyram thanks! :D

 

You see, when a mommy plotbunny and a daddy plotbunny love each other very much...

 

I feel like collaborative storytelling really helps with oc making. A lot of my characters have evolved from games and stories I played as a kid. Creative play was developmentally important for me, because it's where I got a lot of my social cues and stuff, and it put a context into how different people thought.
I've used several different method for character creation besides that, but a lot really go back to roleplaying games.
Like sometimes I would just choose a name, and kind of base my character off of that.
I also really liked to draw, and design different characters, and would go off of what they looked like.

Some characters just come to me, too. I don't really know where I get them, but they seem to already come with their own stories.

don't know how helpful, but maybe more input when i'm not so tired.

 

@Soul thanks!

 

Oh! The what-would-I-do thing I bypass by giving my characters severe emotional baggage that I don't have. I give them triggers and put them in situations that trigger them. They react differently than I do. For example, what if there was an event where there is a dance party thing? What if a char has emotional baggage that makes them fearful of crowds? Of being touched? Of being ignored? Maybe they have bad experiences and they drink to deal with it. Maybe they lash out. Maybe they shut down. Does another char try and help? Tell them to suck it up?

... And that's the sort of scenario playing I do. I just keep tweaking and finding something that works. I put chars in different positions and see how it plays out. Mind you, I am most interested in my characters' emotional state, so that's how I develop them.