Basics of OC Creation!

What Made Them

This is a commissioned drawing of my OC by @wren.drawsstuff (on Instagram). I'm not sure if he is on Quotev, but I strongly recommend checking out their Instagram as it's super amazing! I decided to use Amari (my OC) as an example for this one because her backstory is the most complex out of my other characters, and I like to talk about her lore.

Backstory
    I think this is one of the most fun things to flesh out when making an OC. This is the thing that shapes your character - it drives them and their goals, contributes to their personality and is the reason that they are who they are. You need to make sure that you know most of your OC's backstory for them to be whole in who they are. I'm not just talking about big trauma moments. I mean the little developmental things that your character enjoyed and could be nostalgic for them now. Think of a small fond memory that you have. Yep, like that one! Your OC should have plenty of those too. Since backstories are so complex, we can break them down into categories to get a better grip on your OC's story.

Personality Shaping Moments - Major trauma or experiences that make your OC who they are
Nostalgia - Small, happy times that your OC could reflect on and remember warmly
Friends - How your OC met the people who make them who they are.
Necessity - Has your OC had moments in the past that forced them to do something new? If so, what was this moment?

Personality Shaping Moments - TW TRAUMA
    **For the personality section, I'll be using my OC Amari as an example because her lore is the most complex out of all of my characters.
    A personality-shaping moment is a singular event that caused a significant change in the way that your character behaves or goes about their life. This is mostly caused by significant trauma, but it can be different from person to person. With my OC, her significant change came from an early age when her village was attacked by a group of hunters, and she lost almost everyone that she loved. This changed her significantly in the sense that she was no longer able to "be a kid" because of all that she had seen, and she became quieter and more reserved.
    It's up to you to decide what this moments is and how your OC responds to it, but like everything else in OC creation, it can be almost anything, as long as it's personal to your character and impacts them in a significant way - it doesnt even have to be negative. If you're stuck, some examples of life changing moments can be:

Negative:
Family or friend death
Pandemic/Epidemic lifestyle
Invasion
Housefire
Abuse of any kind
Isolation
Messy/awful breakup
-
Positive:
First friend
Winning lottery or a large amount of money
Achieving a longstanding goal
Nostalgia

    Like anyone in reality, your character should have some happy moments to look back on. Even if they have lived a hard life, they need a few times of happiness to counteract the bad and avoid the "Walking Pity Party" trope that a lot of characters accidentally fall into because of the unbalanced ratio of good to bad in their life.
    For my OC, she has several good memorie from before her village was attacked - working on recipes for healing draughts with her mother, playing in the forest with her animal friend, thinogs like that. These times should generally be very happy for your OC, and its okay if they might seem cliche to you. Trust me. Childhood memories never get old. Some examples of positive childhood experiences are:(If you are a writer, these ones are good for flashbacks as well!)

Birthdays
Baking or cooking
Shopping on a special occasion (it's even better if the character still has these items even though they have no use for them in their current timeline)
Reading stories
Playing board games
Arts and crafts
Watching their favroite movie
Obsessing over a celebrity or fictional character
Matching clothing or bracelets

Friends
    If your OC has friends, its important to flesh out how they met them. This doesnt have to be a grand, heartwarming tale of friendship, but I think it's good to at least have a idea of when your character first met their friends and how their relationship grew/evolved over time.
    As I am a writer, I included some of the first sentences of my character interacting with her friends to show you how casual these discourses can be. I've also just changed the names of characters to Character A,Character B, etc.

*

"Excuse me," she said. The twins stared at her with confused looks, and Character A smiled. "Do you know where I could find Character B? It's very important."

             "I just saw her a few minutes ago," Character A said. "She's—" Character C cut him off.

              "What's in it for us if we tell you?" she asked greedily. Character D snickered in agreement and Character A slapped a hand to his forehead.

            "Definitely not human decency," she joked, earning a smug grin from Character A. "And not the mace either. I don't know how else to put this, but in all seriousness, I'm literally poorer than that yak over there."

            She gestured to a yak that was grazing in a nearby field. As if to prove her point, the yak shook its head, ringing the golden bell on its neck.

            "Bleargh," Character C grumbled. "You're making me want to be a good person." Her brother nodded in agreement.

*

*

"Oof," Character A said as she jolted out of her daydream. She had ran into something—no, someone, and apparently they were angry.

            "Watch it, muttonhead!" said a boy that looked like he was the same age as Character A.  

*

    And that's all it has to be! Just knowing how your character met their friends and how their relationship progresses throuhought your timeline is important because it not only builds your character's backstory, but also helps you to keep track of your character's relationships with less confusion.

Necessity
    This one is slightly more complicated, as it involves separating the trauma that causes change and the reasons behind it. For this one, it involves pinpointing on an experience that causes your OC to change in order to survive. An important distinction to remember is that this is a manual change and adaptation that your character brings about in themself, like working on being braver or stronger, versus an unintentional trauma response. For example, my OC realizes that she must learn skills that she hasn't in the past, like stealth, compartmentalization of emotions, and self reliance. Examples of these events can be:
Abandonment
Becoming stranded in nature (different than abandonment)
Coming of age
          That's basically it! Background is important, so make sure that you take plenty of time to flesh it out! If you have any questions, feel free to contact me. Next time, we'll go over the finishing touches of your OC, or anything that I haven't covered yet. If you have any suggestions for what those things are, feel free to put them in the discussion and I'll do my best to give you an overview!