Here are a handful of quick tips to help you write believable characters! 

1. A character’s arc doesn’t need to grow linearly. Your protagonist doesn’t have to go from being weak to strong, shy to confident, or novice to professional in one straight line. It’s more realistic if they mess up their progress on the way and even decline a bit before reaching their goal.

2. Their past affects their present. Make their backstory matter by having their past events shape them into who they are. Growing up with strict parents might lead to a sneaky character, and a bad car accident might leave them fearful of driving.

3. Give reoccurring side characters something that makes them easily recognizable. This could be a scar, a unique hairstyle, an accent, or a location they’re always found at, etc.

4. Make sure their dialogue matches their personality. To make your characters more believable in conversation, give them speech patterns. Does the shy character mumble too low for anyone to ever hear, does the nervous one pace around and make everyone else on edge? 

5. Make your characters unpredictable. Real people do unexpected things all the time, and this can make life more exciting. The strict, straight-A student who decides to drink at a party. The pristine princess who likes to visit the muddy farm animals. When character’s decide to do things spontaneously or in the heat of the moment, it can create amazing twists and turns.

6. Give even your minor character’s a motive. This isn’t to say that all your characters need deep, intricate motives. However, every character should need or want something, and their actions should reflect that. What’s the motive behind a side character who follows your protagonist on their adventure? Perhaps they’ve always had dreams of leaving their small village or they want to protect your protagonist because of secret feelings.

So I decided to make a post of things I made for people who wanna give mimicking the art style used in the Smiling Critters character bios a go! Weather it be for fun or to make a ref sheet for an OC! Keep in mind I use Ibis paint to draw, so two of the other reasorces work best with that app.

Character Bio Templates

I made 2 versions because some bios are formatted to the left while others are formatted to the right

Ibis paint Brush

Meant to mimic the line are used for the character art

Hatching pattern

If you take a look at the character art, you'd see that some places where there are shadows it's just outlined and then inside there are a series of lines, aka hatching. Ibis paint has a feature where you can turn images into repeating patterns, so this used with this feature on can speed up the process of adding the hatching to the shadows!

Fonts

Character Name and Scents:

Cartoon Fun - https://www.dafont.com/cartoon-fun.font

Character Description:

VCR Mono OSD - https://www.dafont.com/vcr-osd-mono.font

Mališa, otherwise known as Little One, is a pet pigeon owned by a conservative butler of the Austro-Hungarian aristocracy. She is loved, and she is pampered— until her owner is murdered in cold blood, and she is left to fend for herself in Sarajevo.

In the wilds of the city, she feeds from the poor, working nationalist radicals, and the vieux riches alike.

To Mališa, there are no ethical concerns. No politics. No burgeoning nationalism.

Groove-Billed Ani

Hoatzin

currently have the lamb and narinder, both as matte stickers with a clear backing :3

they are $6 a piece, or both for $10! US shipping is $1 and worldwide is $4, both combinable! i also have sun and moon peekers and other dca stickers and prints still available 🥳

**BEWARE: SPOILERS AHEAD**

Been seeing lots of “I hope (SyaoSaku) kiss already” lately—we all know which episode to blame—and decided to voice out my opinion on this. 

Okay, so, as much as my thirst for more SyaoSaku moments is unquenchable, I’m actually pretty opposed to CCS showing a SyaoSaku kiss, and I’m referring to like lip-to-lip kiss here. Be warned that it is not my intention to spread hate or anything like that—this is nothing more and nothing less than a personal opinion, so please don’t bash me or try to fire my innocent house XD

Let’s delve into the why’s:

First of all, Even though age is just a number and people may argue that age 12-13 is when they had their first kiss, I feel like they’re too…pure for that. Not saying that kiss is a bad thing whatsoever—after all a romantic and meaningful kiss can only happen between two souls truly loving and caring for each other. But if CCS decides to show a kiss scene between SyaoSaku, somehow I feel like it will destroy the whole balance of SyaoSaku relationship and degrade it into some cheap romance. CCS in its core is never about magic—it’s always about pure, unconditional love, and SyaoSaku is like the epitome of that. 

I remember reading an interview somewhere where CLAMP stated that Sakura ended up with Syaoran not because he’s the same age with her or because he’s the opposite sex, but simply because they were created (literally) for each other. CLAMP further said that even if Syaoran was born a girl (dang this has produced some ridiculous images in my mind), by the law of the infamous red string, Sakura would still end up loving her/him, because it is Syaoran’s soul that she loves. Not his appearance, not his sex, not his age. Because he is Syaoran—that’s enough reason for her to love him. And vice versa!

Seeing a canon SyaoSaku kiss would most likely leave a bitter taste in my mouth, because I just hold very much respect for their sacred relationship and I’ll feel slightly betrayed as a loyal SyaoSaku worshipper. Okay, I exaggerated too much and now I’m looking like a creepy cultist. But really, if a miracle happened and I got recruited to CLAMP (which doesn’t even happen in my wildest dream), I would strongly stand for no canon lip-to-lip SyaoSaku kiss. I’m okay if it happens in the end of the series when they’ve finally grown up though. And whatever CLAMP’s choice is, I know I can trust them because they definitely pamper SyaoSaku much more than us fans—they’re the creators which basically means they’re most probably SyaoSaku #1 fans! This must be the reason why they decided to bring SyaoSaku to another dimesion (TRC) and even gave them the provilege to become protagonists amongst other CLAMP lovely characters. 

Secondly, referring to CCS:CC #14 that loterally shook the whole CCS fandom and further set ablaze the insatiable hunger for more SyaoSaku moments from the bottom of all SyaoSaku fans’ hearts—which in the end led to the majority of them demanding and dreaming for a kiss scene (lol), I’d like to think that “The Hug” that they did in that episode would rank higher in degree of intimacy than a kiss. 

I mean… Just like how some paintings can’t be described by words and in turn, some words also can’t be depicted in paintings, a hug can oftentimes be more special than a kiss. Even in CCS:CC #9 during The DateTM, a seemingly so simple eye contact and a wordless gaze may give an impact as powerful as a kiss.

What I’m trying to say is basically, SyaoSaku don’t need a kiss to tell us they’re in a loving relationship. They’ve done so much things to show us how much they love each other: 

whether it’s tangible…

or intangible (Both are strongly dedicated to their feelings for each other…

…Both can’t cope seeing each other in pain…

…Both wanting to get stronger for each other…

…Sakura not whining to Syaoran when he clearly hid something from her which cleadly screams trust and faith).

That said though, I’m still a hopeless sucker for less steamy yet just as intimate SyaoSaku moments like holding hands, forehead kiss(es) or more hugs. And duh, I still squee whenever I see a CCS fanart or read a CCS fic in which a lip-to-lip kiss takes place.

TL;DR—Unless a kiss is essential to the story and moves the plot, I don’t think CCS needs to show a SyaoSaku kiss. 

Long live SyaoSaku, my perfect OTP.