30-Day Fanfic Meme - Days 6-7-8

[wiseheart]

Since those are short answers, I decided to deal with 3 questions in one post, so that I'd get this meme finished before work restarts.

Day 6 – When you write, do you prefer writing male or female characters?
I have no specific preference. I write male characters more often simply because the source material usually has more (and better-crafted) male characters. But I love to write females, too. Uhura being my absolute favourite. And Éowyn from LOTR - the book version, not the anorexic wallflower of the movies.

Day 7 – Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
Quite often, actually. I'm trying to keep an open mind. Two of the main characters I went from despising to loving with were Rodney McKay (SGA) and Jack Harkness (Torchwood).

Day 8 – Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on OCs.

I do write bunches of OCs. My Halabor stories (Tolkienverse) hardly feature any canon characters at all. My method of keeping them believable is to find people in real life on whom I can base them. Since I know how these people would react in a situation I've created, I can show convincing reactions from the character in the fic. It doesn't always work, of course, but often does.

Comments

[jenn-calaelen.livejournal.com]

Q6 is a rather bizarre question, don't you think? It really makes me wonder - although there do seem to be a lot of stories written that ignore all female characters.

Your original characters are really good and believable in the situations that you put them in. It sounds like an interesting way to make the characters seem more real.

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

I came up with the method because I need faces for my charcters. If I don't have any real life templates, I choose actors. Knowing what the people look like helps a lot. Having real personalities to build on is better, of course.

[jenn-calaelen.livejournal.com]

Wow! That is really interesting. It is totally different to what I do - but that is probably because I'm no good with faces, so apart from vague ideas about things like hair colour and physical fitness, I don't usually think of the physical appearance of my ocs.

It is fun to learn how differently other people do things! :)

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

I'm not good with faces, either. I can't imagine them myself, so I need a solid basis where to start from. OTOH, in other aspects I'm a very visually inspired writer - I see something, that kick-starts my imagination, and I roll with it as long as the momentum carries me.