Dynamic characterization is the process a person goes through to develop a dynamic character. A dynamic character is an integral person in a movie or piece of literature who goes through a significant change within the story. This person can go through positive or negative changes, and they can either be subtle or extreme. Ebenezer Scrooge is an excellent example of a dynamic character who underwent significant changes because of how the story’s plot unfolded.
The process of dynamic characterization involves several steps, including building a personality, lifestyle, goal, backstory, and flaws. You can start creating such characters using any element in this list. The most effectual course of action is to start with what’s easiest for you. For example, you can use careers to build a backstory and highlight the character’s skills and talents. These are some examples of careers and how to use them to flesh out a dynamic character.
Start With A Specific Occupation
The first thing to do when you’re practicing dynamic characterization is to think of an occupation for the character. You can choose from thousands of standard and non-standard occupations, and it would be best to select the occupation based on the type of story you intend to write. For example, you could assign a bartending job to someone who lives and also works in a small town.
The series ‘True Blood’ featured bar tenders, restaurant cooks, and servers in a small Louisiana town. They all worked these jobs to make a living, and each had a separate life and experienced various trials and challenges. They intermingled with the other people in the story and also got screen time where they interacted with some customers. Thus, you may want to consider an occupation along those lines.
Nursing jobs and other healthcare worker gigs are also great for dynamic characters. If you start with the medical field, you can quickly build your character’s story because of the myriad of things these workers see daily. They see illness, injury, and death consistently, which can create a powerful story.
A life coach is another interesting career you might consider weaving into your story. This type of person has great interpersonal skills and is very accommodating. The field in which this person works is vast, as a life coach can assist with general life, career choices, relationships, spirituality, or something else. Many people see life coaches for guidance because their assistance is much more casual than that of a psychologist or clinical psychiatrist.
They are there to work with their clients to aid them in making the most effective life choices. Some help to improve the quality of their clients’ lives. Thus, they talk more than analyze their clients and allow most of them to come up with their own strategies and solutions.
There are many careers you can use to build dynamic and animated characters. A good practice might be to write down a long list of occupations and careers that seem interesting, exciting, or highly intelligent in nature. Then you can proceed to the subsequent step to add personality and life experiences to the character.
Write Down The Individual’s Educational Path
You will need to establish how each character got to the place they are in their career. That might mean you must add a part in the story where your character went to some type of school and earned a degree. A perfect example of this scenario is using a performing arts academy to characterize someone with a teacher job. What kind of teacher would have gone to a performing arts academy? A dance instructor is one example. Another idea is someone who teaches a class about stage presence or video presentation.
p>Establishing a character’s learning path or credentials gives them more credibility and believability in the story. They will seem more well-rounded if you introduce the information to your script at some point. You may choose not to focus on it for too long, or you can integrate the academy or learning institution into the story.
Describe the Character’s Unique Skill Set
Dynamic characterization includes adding special talents and skill sets to your character. Every person in a story needs to be good at something, and his or her career is the best place to find skills and know-how.
For example, let’s say your character works as a mechanic. You’ve already established that this person went to an accredited college or vocational institute and passed ASE exams to get the certification. Now you need to be a tad more precise and specific about the individual’s occupation.
Thus, you might want to note that he or she is skilled in engine repair. Maybe you want this person to be someone who works on cruiser motorcycle parts. The choice is yours alone, but you’ll have to list those talents to get a bigger picture of that specific character.
Mechanics have mechanical aptitude and are typically good at math because automotive technology courses teach advanced calculations. A mechanic may also be good at handiwork or home builders duties since mechanical aptitude can apply in different realms of work.
You would use the same process if you decided to make your character a lawyer. He or she would have gone to an accredited college, done some voluntary work, and passed the bar exam. A lawyer’s talents include the gift of persuasion, a firm understanding of state and federal law, organizational skills, time management skills, etc. You can listen to all of that person’s technical and soft skills on a character breakdown sheet for times when you need to refer to them in your story. Your story’s attorney may have to do something crucial that requires them to pull something out of this hat of talents.
Perhaps you’ll want to have a minister, priest, or religious person in your story. These archetypes serve well in horror stories and coming-of-age movies. At some point, you will need to specify that this person had a Catholic education and is skilled at counseling others, educating people on faith, and guiding them through building their confidence levels.
Maybe you want to give your character more of a regular job and not a six-figure gig. You could make this person a digital marketing representative who works for a digital marketing agency. This kind of agency is a company that uses various electronic means to spread the word about their clients. Their tactics include posting website ads, sending emails to individuals, and running social media sites like Facebook and YouTube.
Digital marketing agencies may also offer SEO services, which are extremely important in the promotions, marketing, and advertising realms. SEO is a common acronym for search engine optimization, and it describes a variety of services that help a company or individual boost ratings on Google. Link building, keyword generation, video marketing, and keyword implementation are just a few of the services such a company might provide.
If you want to establish how this character got to where they are, you can say that this person took an online or college course to learn digital marketing before landing a job as an assistant. The assistant job then allowed that person to work for a digital marketing company.
Alternatively, you might want to make your character self-employed, providing services for various businesses and individuals that help them to get noticed on the internet. You can weave this occupation into a great story using dynamic characterization tactics
Think of a Workplace
Dynamic characterization processes include putting your character into a home and workplace environment and creating the world in which they operate. Thus, you need to add workplaces once you establish which careers you want your character to have, how they got their education, and which skills they possess.
A hospital is one of the most popular workplaces for people with nursing jobs, and it’s one of the most creative environments to develop. You could also opt to give your nursing characters mobile jobs where they visit their patients and care for them in their homes.
Your lawyer character can work at a small law firm or a prestigious establishment, depending on how you would like your story to unfold and where those characters fit into the story. Some characters may need to consult with the attorneys about an injury, divorce, business issue, or something completely different.
What would you do with the mechanic in your story? You have several options. You can make this person a mobile mechanic who uses nothing but a work van filled with tools to provide services to his or her customers. You could also put this person in a small automotive repair shop that operates inside an old run-down building. Alternatively, you can put the mechanic in a high-profile automotive shop that has air conditioning, high-tech equipment, and only the best tools for the people who work there. It’s up to you.
Life coaches can work just about anywhere. You can think of many creative places using dynamic characterization tactics. You can have the life coach work for a counselor’s office as an assistant or partner. You could also create a character who works from a home office and consults clients using telephonic or video chat methods. Furthermore, you may want to make this person a hustler who does life coaching as a side gig and uses an inexpensive website to market the services.
The whole thing depends on how the rest of your story unravels. Thus, you should do a bit of planning before you start your dynamic characterization. You must ask yourself what the plot of your story is and what you intend to achieve by the end of it. Using the workplace in your dynamic characterization strategy can help immensely.
Introduce the Workplace to the Story
The next step in your dynamic characterization project is to introduce your work to the story. Before you introduce the workplace, you need to close your eyes and envision the environment. Think about the type of building or dwelling you want to use, what color it is, and what type of decorations and furniture you want to add to the story.
The design of the workplace will indicate things about your character’s personality. For example, if your character is a ‘yuppy,’ he or she will want to work in only the best environments. This person will likely work at a large corporation, a huge hospital, or dentist‘s office that has only the best technologies
Have the Character Interact Using Career Skills
The final step is to build your character’s journey. In this step, you’ll take your character through various trials, tribulations, experiences, and interactions and allow the plot to change him or her from the inside out. That’s the gist of dynamic characterization
You could choose to keep your entire story confined to one location, or you could move your character about to different places to experience a variety of events and happenings. The choice is yours, and it’s your creation to master
An example of a scene could involve your priest or minister, doctor, and mechanic driving on a dark road. The priest and the mechanic could be discussing the existence of a higher power. Maybe the mechanic doesn’t believe in such an entity.
A car accident can occur, and it will allow you to use your doctor’s or nurse’s skills to save a person who gets hit in the road. The mechanic might witness this and then change his mind about his or her beliefs. This specific scenario is just an example of how your characters can interact and put your dynamic characterization to work.
Now you know about dynamic characterization and how you can use it to create characters for a story or movie. Try these steps and start with the career if it’s easy for you to do. Otherwise, you can begin your process with any other character attribute, such as personality, goals, or something else. Have fun writing your story, and take your time so that you create each character as a full-dimensional person. Sometimes, the thoroughness of character development is what makes a story a good one worth reading and investing in in the future.