My writing tips

outlining Characters

Begin with a character sketch that includes the character's name, age, physical description, career, likes, dislikes, hobbies, write down any details you know.

Cover the main points of your subject 3 main parts; Introduction, Body, or Main Parts.

Use whole sentences or brief phrases When you have number 1 you must always have a number 2 Always include the topic in your outline.

1; Characters

2; Story

3; Scenes

4; Plot

5; Combining parts 1-5

Characters- are somewhat hard to model and create without an outline to help you out. Even with an outline, sometimes your characters can produce epic fails. So, in order to prevent any character fails.

Number 1; Create a profile; Create the details about your character before you start writing about them, How tall they are, what color is their hair, do they have any unusual features, and their personality.

Number 2; Information page- This is where you get more specific about your characters ie the nitty gritty details. As you don't put too much personal information in your own profile, the same goes for your characters, otherwise your profile turns from a small paragraph to an big text block of doom, and nobody wants that. It just makes it much more difficult to write about them when you have to search through all the extra details, and just like just like readers don't like the massive text blocks of death, you would not like them either and will grow to dislike your characters, something that a writer shouldn't have happen! This text about your character tells you what happens to them in the story, kind of like a general story outline, but focused on that specific character instead of everyone, It allows you to get to know them inside and out, instead of just making it up, as you go along.

II Story;

Story outline; What you want do first, plot out where, and when you want your story to take place. This will set the stage up for everything else in the background. (Example) Storyboard for Bob's Adventure

Time: Mid ninteenth century, around 1850's.

Place: Hawaii (because everyone likes Hawaii)

Think of this basic information as a play, with the time and location as the stage ready to be filled with the actors (characters), props (setting) and story (plot). Next comes what you want to do with the story itself. Where you want it to go, how many chapters it might be...as I said before, you want this to be a rough outline, as stories are constantly evolving overtime. A dynamic (constantly changing) storyboard is much better than a static one. Don't be afraid to change this at a later time, as change is good when it comes to a stoy.

(Example)

Length: 50,000 words

Chapters: 10-15

Introduction: Chapters 1-4

Body: Chapters 5-8 (12 for 15 chapter story)

Climax and Conclusion: 9-10 (13-15)

This type of structure allows you to be flexible with your outline, while still giving it a basic framework to work with. You know can go on and plan out what you would like in each chapter, as you know how many chapter you have to work with, instead of guessing and running too long, or too short.

That is a good start, as the characters are the most important aspect of a story. Also try writing down potential scenes for each character, as then you can visualize their reactions, as in how they might react to different situations and such. That is what I am doing as of late and it seems to be helping me out a lot. :D The character outlining is a superb way of outlining in my mind