Everything is still unfamiliar over there! You have trees, and they even change colors when it's autumn. Our roads look like http://farm1.static.flickr.com/135/369592297_2244e79f04.jpg , so yes, looking out the window on the drive to/from the airport and not being able to see past the shoulder because of a forest (as opposed to a cut-out cliff wall) is still like being on another planet. Come to Albuquerque someday, you'll see.
My exercise wasn't something I actually had anyone do in real time so much as a "this is a good thing to try, you should do it sometime" lecture, and it was lifted directly from The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy (Volume One) edited and compiled by Darin Park and Tom Dullemond, with about a zillion contributing authors but the one who did this particular section was Lea Docken. (I had to double-check all that because I'm probably going to use this again, and it would be dishonest if I couldn't properly source it.) It's just making a ridiculously elaborate character sheet filled with everything, including things you don't expect to come up for absolutely everyone in the story (circumstances of birth, like was it at home or a hospital or what, what was their education like, what sorts of things make them angry, how do they handle anger, what sorts of things frighten them, how do they handle fear, etc.) and then filling it out for everyone. If there are holes and you don't have a good answer for everything, then make something up, but just fill it out completely and don't cheat, because you'll be surprised at how that can end up being the seed of something useful.
I gave the example of how Celine's tail started as nothing more than a half-assed quick answer because I needed to put something there ("Does Celine have any nervous gestures or tics or behaviors along those lines? Oh, hell, I don't, know, um, I guess ... she poofs out her tail like Hobbes when she gets scared! There, sure, why not.") and then ended up being something I actually used in the novel, a little quirk of the character that added some personality and helped bring her to life.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2013-11-03 04:59 am (UTC)My exercise wasn't something I actually had anyone do in real time so much as a "this is a good thing to try, you should do it sometime" lecture, and it was lifted directly from The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy (Volume One) edited and compiled by Darin Park and Tom Dullemond, with about a zillion contributing authors but the one who did this particular section was Lea Docken. (I had to double-check all that because I'm probably going to use this again, and it would be dishonest if I couldn't properly source it.) It's just making a ridiculously elaborate character sheet filled with everything, including things you don't expect to come up for absolutely everyone in the story (circumstances of birth, like was it at home or a hospital or what, what was their education like, what sorts of things make them angry, how do they handle anger, what sorts of things frighten them, how do they handle fear, etc.) and then filling it out for everyone. If there are holes and you don't have a good answer for everything, then make something up, but just fill it out completely and don't cheat, because you'll be surprised at how that can end up being the seed of something useful.
I gave the example of how Celine's tail started as nothing more than a half-assed quick answer because I needed to put something there ("Does Celine have any nervous gestures or tics or behaviors along those lines? Oh, hell, I don't, know, um, I guess ... she poofs out her tail like Hobbes when she gets scared! There, sure, why not.") and then ended up being something I actually used in the novel, a little quirk of the character that added some personality and helped bring her to life.