Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with characters

Speak the speech trippingly. Or pitched low. Or with a mumble.

grumblebee — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 09:07:15 -0800

Is there a resource that lists and explains the various effects one can use to accessorized speech, such as altering pitch, speeding up, slowing down, etc.? As a director, I often have to help actors make vocal choices. My company regularly employs doubling -- that is using one actor to play multiple parts. So that the audience doesn't get confused, it's great if the actor makes each of his characters sound different.

Some actors are naturally gifted this way. Others need help.

Note: like most modern actors and directors, I take a psychological approach to character work. So I would never simply tell an actor something like "speak more quickly" or "raise your pitch." But once we've done the psychological work, it would be awesome to see an array of choices from which you could pick an appropriate set of effects.

The vocal instrument is flexible but not infinite. There are only so many things one can do while speaking: add gruffness/gravel, change the pitch, change the speed, change the degree of annunciation, try an accent, etc.

I would like a complete list. The perfect list would include effect, example (e.g. an actor who naturally talks with that effect, such as George C. Scott for gravel) and any hints/pitfalls to help create the effect without hurting your voice.

I have a bunch of Voice-For-The-Actor books, but none has the list I'm looking for. If such a list doesn't exist, maybe we could compile one together here.

How did you get to know the characters in your novel?

2oh1 — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:40:20 -0800

How did you get to know the characters in your novel? I tried writing a novel but crashed and burned around chapter three. I realize that is common to the point of being cliche. The main problem was that I have (what I think is) a great story, but I don't know my characters very well. In fact, at one point, I asked myself if I cared about these people, and the answer was "no." I didn't care about them because I didn't know them well enough to really care about them.

How did you get to know the characters in your novel? Do you care about them? How much did you know about your characters when you started plotting your novel? What tips and tricks for character development have you learned along the way?

Türkçe....!

ryanbryan — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 03:52:02 -0800

How do you program foreign (namely the Turkish ones - ı, ş, and ğ) characters into a laptop keyboard....? I currently have my laptop keyboard set to United States-International, which allows me to type, for example:

: + o for ö
' + a for á
Ctrl + Alt + W for å

It seems however, that the Turkish characters ı, ş, and ğ (and their capital equivalents) are not programmed into this keyboard layout as standard. Does anyone know of the key combination for them, or any other alternative for programming these characters into similar keyboard shortcuts? Would be happy for a solution that required installing supplementary software, but before anyone suggests, installing the Turkish keyboard is out of the question.

Where's the sci-fi with actual characters?

colinmarshall — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 14:04:18 -0800

What are some or how can one best find science-fiction novels that are good by general literary standards? Bemoaning the disappointment I've repeatedly endured at the hands of science fiction is, to those who know me well enough, a well-worn leitmotif. You'd think I'd be at least as smart as children who refrain from touching red-hot burners twice, but no: I pick up a sci-fi novel, more often than not get burned by it, and no sooner have the blisters subsided than I'm back at the shelf. My problem perhaps reduces to desire for speculative stories featuring actual characters. It's not that the sci-fi novels I've read are literally missing invoked human (or alien, or robot) entities; it's that they present these entities as lists of traits rather than as nuanced, thinking (as distinct from simply speaking), changing beings whose lives extend beyond the page.

I've found this disease pervasive in and crippling to the genre, but the diehard fans I talk to don't seem to notice it. And if they do notice it, they don't mind. I once read a forum-dweller grumble about his wish that sci-fi's lack of character depth just stop being considered a weakness already. At a panel, I heard one veteran sci-fi novelist pronounce that, in the genre, character is necessarily subordinated to speculation. But can't character and speculation sit on the same tier? This may seem a matter of wanting to have my cake and eat it too, but I'd say I simply want to eat my cake in the context of an actual meal. Isn't complaining that weak characterization is regarded as a flaw like complaining that a computer's inability to accept input is regarded as flaw? You can junk speculation, plot, aesthetics, form, comedy and tragedy and your work will still come out a lot better than if you'd played loose with character.

Beyond science fiction, I suppose I'm generally long for novels of ideas whose ideas don't displace their people. Perhaps no genre is flexible enough to provide this combination, and I'd do better to camp out in the categorical borderlands.

Not Tinkerbell again...

Artw — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 16:09:02 -0800

What animated movies star awesome female characters? Bonus points if it's appropriate for a younger children (a 3 year old and a 6 year old), extra special bonus points if it's not utterly irritating to adults. Scary bits may need a certain amount of skipping over.

Transliterate Greek Written in the Latin Alphabet into the Greek Alphabet

zzazazz — Fri, 22 May 2009 12:26:08 -0800

I work in a public library and I have a library user that comes in and she wants to be able to type an email to her family in Greek using the regular keys on our keyboard and then transliterate the text into Greek characters. Any ideas about an application web or otherwise that will do that for her?

Formation of chinese characters

red_rika — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 03:06:01 -0800

How chinese characters are formed? Hi there, I am looking for a list of chinese characters on how its formed. Its something in the website below but I need a longer list.
Thank you in advance

http://www.zein.se/patrick/chinen9p.html

Looking for movies with stock comic characters!

rawredmeat — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:52:02 -0800

I'm directing a farce with a bunch of high-schoolers, and would love to give them some movie suggestions to look at for characters. They are pretty classic comic archetypes, but my brain is reeling a bit trying to think of all of them, and though I'd put it out to the hive mind. The only catch is that I can't really suggest any R-Rated movies, because most of them aren't old enough to watch them... I'm looking for non-R-Rated movies with these types of comic characters:
-An over-emotional young woman (cries at the drop of the hat, gets really excited about other things...)
-A very happy-go-lucky person who ends up being the mastermind of an evil plot
-A young, bright eyed all-american honeymooning couple (a la the couple in Rocky Horror)
-an overdramatic fortune teller
-the ultimate hollywood agent- a real ball buster
-a completely oblivious older woman, who is unruffled by just about anything
-a self-important high society rich woman
-an over-the-top, over dramatic Frenchman
-a totally over-extended and over worked servant

Thanks, everybody!

Looking for Booklists

Lord Fancy Pants — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 07:58:42 -0800

I'm writing a novel. Help me research characters! I'm writing a SF novel (I'm unpublished) chronicling humanity's expansion to the stars. It will be a revenge novel (but very different from "The Stars My Destination") and would like your help in generating a few reading lists that will help flesh out the main characters. I'm looking for novels or movies of any genre with characters that have similar characteristics as mentioned below. Plot similarities are not as important as character similarities. The novel is set in the future about a hundred years.

Protagonist: A young twenty-something "Everyman" who is targeted for assassination by the World Government (WG) for his ability to provide the missing link to a method of space transportation that will come in direct competition with the WG's currently existing method. His wife, however, is caught in the cross fire and dies instead. He vows revenge. A good example of his story arc would be if AJ Soprano over the seasons started off a little nicer and devolved, fight by fight, murder by murder into a real murdering sociopath like Christopher. His character will have the fire of Gully Foil (The Stars My Destination), the murderous intent of Josey Wales, and the torment of Hamlet.

Mentor: On the surface he is a mediocre old professor. But dig a little deeper and you'll find he has deep connections not only with the WG but with individuals of highly questionable character. Ultimately he turns out to be a key player in the underground revolution (UR). In fact, he is a double agent accepting grants for WG research and reporting his findings to the UR. He also serves as a valuable recruiter for the UR. He is in a sense the project manager for the creation of this competitive means of transportation. He has deep connections with influential people in the United States of North America (a severely diminished descendant of the USA). He is one part Obiwan three parts Gordon Gecko.

Supporting Character: On the surface she is as gorgeous as she is . . .mature? This comes from the fact that she used to be an executive in the space transportation company placed there surreptitiously by a clandestine WG organization. As she made her way up through the ranks she began to disagree strongly with the intentions of the WG org. At the peak of her career both in space transportation and espionage she disappeared, changed her appearance and identity and now spies for the Mentor. As a teenager she was raped. She never found justice and as a result has lived her life seeking justice and inner peace hence her original motivations for joining WG and ultimately for leaving WG. She works with Protagonist a lot and since she has no justice for herself becomes irresistibly attracted to him only after he makes his first kill in his own quest for vengeance. Her own story arc will long outlive that of the protagonist's. In fact, she will be the protagonist of the sequel. She should be as gorgeous as Megan Kelly, as ruthless as Tony Soprano with just a hint of vulnerability as deep and fragile as Linsey Lohan.

Antagonist: He is a WG spy and the murderer of the protagonist's wife. He screwed up and has to finish the job--very difficult now as the protagonist is very hard to find. He is not an "evil" character but is very practical. World government is what people want. It has produced no wars in the time it has risen to power and he will do what he can to preserve that peace. He is Fiedler in "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold."

Let me know what your recommendations are for books containing characters like these. Thanks in advance.

Vietnamese Website Character Issue

Timen — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 20:29:16 -0800

I am developing a English/Vietnamese site but some characters in Vietnamese don't go over well, especially on Windows. For other sites there is no problem: what do I need to change to make it work? I am developing a site and the baby beta is here. I am having problems with the Vietnamese characters as they seem to be not transferring properly from the server to the browser. The problem only comes up when using Windows and is especially clear when I look at the source code; somehow the rendered text looks fine most of the time. The exception is that the Georgia font should support VNese characters, but doesn't look right in IE6 (see the sidebar newsletter subscribe form). I think this is a related problem.

I think there is a problem with Apache, and have tried modifying the charset through .htaccess but that didn't work (AddDefaultCharset utf-8). I don't see what I'm doing differently in the source code, which makes me think it's a server issue. Any ideas?

My name is...Tonto Kowalski.

razdrez — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 09:43:01 -0800

What are some good ethnic-neutral last names? When writing fiction, I'd like to be able to name my main character with a name that doesn't betray their ethnicity. However, it'd be strange to name all of my characters with the last name of "Lee", so what are some other last names that could work? Is there a word for "ethnic-neutral" that I could use to search for more?

Character-driven books

salvia — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 00:23:06 -0800

I'm looking for some relatively modern fiction that is mostly about how people think, or see the world, or become who they are. Currently, my favorite authors are Jim Harrison, Robertson Davies, and (I've read less of his work) Phillip Roth.

Davies' books have a whole cast of characters, and he often explains the life story that made each person who they are. Harrison has fewer characters, but not much happens in the book -- the entire book is about how people see and think about the few things that happen.

The central point of the books is not "this is a suspenseful turn of events" or "this war was absurd" or "here is what it is like to live through this oppressive situation [or this historical period]" or "how cool would it be to be an elite programmer [or have these magical powers]." (Not that I'm against any of those as secondary themes.)

The books feel very real to me. People sometimes feel confident and sometimes feel insecure, they worry if they're doing the right thing, they have interpersonal dramas, their pride can get injured, and they want their lives to mean something in the long run.

I'm not sure if what I'm trying to explain makes any sense. But if you have any good fiction recommendations along these lines, I'd love to hear them.

Help me achieve catharsis through reading

brandnew — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 08:11:47 -0800

Fiction or film recommendations with characters that undergo serious catharsis I've been having some rough times lately, emotionally. My life has suddenly become very strange and foreign after years of stability. I'm doubting all kinds of things and solid relationships are being turned upside down. I want to read my pain away. Are there any novels or films where the protagonist suddenly questions everything in their life and finds that they're not living the life they were meant to live? I'm looking for books highly character-driven, relationship-oriented,with difficult life-changing decisions to be made (or not made). modern, if possible. A lot of books these days seem to be highly clever, which is ok, but I'm more interested in empathy and emotional resonance. Surrealism and magical realism ok, but I'm looking to identify in realistic ways. Something that will hit me harder than a dose of MDMA

Foreign Firefox

ryanbryan — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 03:23:05 -0800

Whenever I try to type ä's, ö's and å's (or any character that requires Alt + x), my tabs in Firefox go crazy, and no character results. I presume this is because Alt + x is a preprogrammed shortcut in Firefox to switch tabs. Any idea how I can turn this off?

Brains and Brawn...

ElmerFishpaw — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 15:19:26 -0800

Character Study. The mean little weakling mastermind and the big tough goon who does the dirty work. I need film reference or specific TV episodes. Kinda blocked and need inspiration for these archetypes. Can you think of a movie that contains this pair of characters? Was there a relationship like this in the Sopranos at any point? A good example would be maybe an older more powerful mob-boss and the younger, bigger, dumber brute that beats people up for him. It seems like a common thing but for the life of me I cant come up with any other specific movies Ive seen this in.

I just can't go through another anthology...

gursky — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 14:38:16 -0800

Short Story Suggestions: I need a short story for a specific lesson. Criteria inside. I need a short story (no more than 12 pages) that has at least 4 main characters. I am teaching a lesson on characterization and need to have examples of 4 well-described people. The story should be appropriate for grade 10 students (no inappropriate subject matter or language). If the setting of the story is fairly obvious or is also explicitly described, that would be wonderful.

I have been going through old binders but I am finding nothing useful. Bonus points if the story is available somewhere online.

Many thanks in advance!

Why (and how) do we identify with characters?

LucretiusJones — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 07:49:17 -0800

I'm looking for theoretical / psychological explanations of how and why people identify themselves with characters in books or with pop cultural figures. One of my students last year regularly wore an "I am Hermione" shirt to class. I've met an Elvis impersonator who took the bond to religious levels. I want to understand what makes identification tick in a sounder or more theoretical way than I've found so far. I'm currently going on Hayakawa's model that identification goes according to

1) Recognizing yourself in a depiction
2) Having a character that fulfills some wish or fantasy

Can anyone get me more insight from any field? I'm particularly interested in how short-term identification may help make or change long-term identity. Personal anecdotes on works you've identified with strongly are welcome.

FEMA-related dramatic tales

np312 — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:54:00 -0800

Please recommend some interesting media (specifically articles, books, movies, documentaries, mini-series) about the people working for FEMA. It can be about the search-and-rescue teams, the Washington corruption angle, the legal or environmental aspects, whatever-- I just want to be captivated by dramatic issues involving the world of Federal Emergency Management.

Just to clarify-- I'm not looking for stories of the victims of natural disasters, but the stories of the people who are attempting to HELP the victims, even on a bureaucratic, Washington DC level. Bonus points for articles/other media that focus on any interesting people working for them! (Hero-types and villain-types are good too.)

Thanks!

Please help me sort my vocabulary list in Excel!

Vorteks — Tue, 27 May 2008 13:34:08 -0800

Complicated Excel formula question involving text-search and Japanese characters. Can you help? I have two spreadsheets.

Spreadsheet A contains a list of Japanese vocabulary words I need to learn for the JLPT this year. Spreadsheet B contains a list of Japanese characters in one column along with the characters "Heisig number" (an ordinal number indicating where that character appears in the book "Remembering The Kanji" by James Heisig).

I want to add a column to Spreadsheet A that will contain the highest Heisig number among the characters that make up the vocabulary word. The purpose of this is to sort the words in Spreadsheet A so that I can memorize only the words that can be written using the Kanji I've learned so far.

Confused? Here's an example: Spreadsheet A, cell 57A contains the word "朝寝坊". Using Spreadsheet B to looking up the 3 characters in that word, I find the Heisig number for 朝 is 52, 寝 is 1150, and 坊 is 492. 1150 is the highest of those 3 numbers, so I'd like Spreadsheet A, cell 57B to read "1150". Is there a way to set up a formula to do this? I've never pushed Excel this far before.

Thank you in advance, Hive Mind!

Celebrity Pixel Art?

stevil — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 17:02:18 -0800

Who created those 8-bit pixel art graphics of many famous characters? This was a big blogosphere thing maybe 2 or 3 years ago? An artist created this huge number of blocky front-view representations of all sorts of famous people and it was almost a game to see if you could figure out who it was. And the fun part was that you COULD tell who they were, even though they were really minimal. I remember some of them were individual characters (I'm figuring Star Wars characters) and some were groups (I remember Kiss and Guns 'n Roses).

I looked here and boingboing under any variation of 8-bit, pixel-art, icon, celebrity, etc. and I can't find it.

I think this even ended up in the mainstream media at one point. I'm sure this is an easy one but my mind is totally blank and my Google-mojo seems to have left me.

Sleepy characters?

kepano — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 11:22:15 -0800

What fictional characters or real people would you say are defined by their sleepiness or tiredness? My Google-fu was failing me. Is there an obvious source for this kind of information?

Portrayals of friendship and social circles in books, movies, or essays

salvia — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 21:01:55 -0800

Can you recommend books, movies, or essays with good portrayals of friendships or people's social circles? I'd like to read or watch things with realistic, complex examinations of friendships and people's social circles.

I've been thinking through my idea of friendship (is it too fairytale? is it too detached?), and about how to maintain friendships amidst life's complications (people moving, starting families, getting busy), and about how to make new friends. I've also been struggling with one friendship that is difficult for me right now.

I realized it would help to see how other people saw friendship and their social circle. Can you recommend things to read or watch? Books, short stories, movies, or nonfiction essays are all great.

To spark ideas, here are a few questions I'm interested in -- What does it mean to be friends? What are people's close friendships like? How do people stay friends over the years through ups and downs? What if one person moves away or friends grow apart? What about groups of friends, what are those like? How do other people look at their full circle of both acquaintances and friends? What is it like to be new in town and trying to build a new social network?

Can you read the signs?

Glitter Ninja — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 20:43:27 -0800

What non-letter character sets would translate well into tattoos? I'm getting my first general-public visual tattoos soon (I have one already, on my hip). I'm getting two anklets- each of a different saying that is important to me, or helps me get through the day. I want to have a reminder of these things everywhere I go.

Problem is, I think it's incredibly easy for text in tattoos to end up looking tacky. I've been entertaining the idea of either getting the tattoo in Morse or Braille- I'll know what it means, and it'll always be there, but the general public doesn't have to know. What other "languages" do you all think would translate well into a tattoo? Bonus points for the very simple, with non-intricate characters- height-wise, thsi tattoo will be rather small.

How do I make Acrobat show nonprinting characters?

fiercecupcake — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 10:17:37 -0800

Adobe Acrobat question: Is it possible to show nonprinting (invisible, hidden) characters? How? I have searched Google high and low and tried every search term on the very-unhelpful Acrobat Help feature. I want to see paragraph marks, spacing, tabs, etc. I am using Acrobat 8 Standard edition. I hate using my question on this but it is driving me CRAZY!

borrowed characters in movies

luser — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 19:55:46 -0800

What are some movies that feature a character from another movie, played by the same actor -- but the movies do not have sequel or spinoff relationships, and are not written or directed by the same person? Does this ever happen? For example, if Judd Apatow made a movie that included the character Ronnie Dobbs, played by David Cross. My wife and I can't think of this ever happening. Are we missing something obvious?