An exploration of the non-traditional tools and psychological frameworks that help me construct deep, flawed character dynamics from the ground up.
Category:
Author:
Fiona Sprang
Read:
3 mins
Location:
Gran Canaria
Why character design interests me?
Since a very young age, I found myself deeply interested in the human mind, how it works, and how everybody sees the world depending on their social context and foundations. That led me to study personality typology systems and archetypal psychology tools.
Over the years, this evolved into a personal study of human behavior through pop psychology and digital communities, allowing me to map out complex relational dynamics.
In my narrative design process, I bridge these worlds to construct character psychology from the ground up. By understanding humans, I became fascinated with the idea of creating fictional people who feel real and relatable. This makes it easier to connect with an audience and leave a message behind for them, to show them they're not alone and that there are more people like them, even if fictional.
Using the enneagram to create deep and flawed characters:
The enneagram is an incredible tool to understand oneself and the people around you. It has many layers; it’s not only 9 enneatypes, but those 9 can have up to 54 combinations. This makes it complex enough to cover all kinds of differences between people, because even if you’re raised by the same parents, you can view the world differently and process emotions in your own way.
That’s why I think it’s an amazing tool to use for characters. It is complex and focuses on trauma responses, showing how childhood shapes our present, our strengths, and our flaws.
The unique value of understanding astrology:
When we hear about astrology, we tend to underestimate it for many reasons, mainly because it’s not considered a proper science, and because it's often viewed as a hobby or a job mostly for women. In our patriarchal society, it is very overlooked just because it doesn’t cater to men.
But astrology has many interesting and useful purposes. Today, I’m going to focus on what I feel is a really good strategy to create deep character personalities and backgrounds.
Astrology tells us how we react under certain circumstances, how we behave in certain contexts, and how we process the world around us, among many other interesting aspects.
So, by understanding astrology, you could basically create a complete background for a character. You can understand how they would react to something just by looking at what planets, houses, and zodiac signs are at play. This makes complete sense for the worldbuilding, for the characters themselves, and for the rest of the cast, making them even more relatable.
Other tools that help build three dimensional characters:
As I said earlier, thanks to my interest in psychology and the human mind, I’ve always drawn from lots of different sources to create characters that feel human, as flawed and gifted as we are.
Some of those sources include concepts like attachment styles, love languages, and even the Seven Deadly Sins, because even frameworks like religion can help create deeply flawed, human characters.