How To Create A Character Profile (Template and Worksheet Included!)

What is a Character Profile?

A character profile is a repository of information on an original character that features information essential to understanding the character by its creator. What is considered significant or not varies from creator to creator, but profiles offer insight into original characters' history, statistics, and personalities.

Profiles can often include art and design information too. For example, reference images are often part of different character profiles to help viewers understand how the character appears. Some character profiles may include a color key of specific hex-color codes for a character’s key design features.

When you get down to it, this makes a detailed character profile template a resource for understanding a character for the creator and potential collaborators. I know that the more information I have on a character, the much more compelled I am to put my all into fan art or an art exchange, that’s for sure.

Why are Character Profiles Important?

The importance of a character profile falls under two camps. The first is for referencing. A strong character profile should serve as a guide to what is essential to a character along with a reference sheet. Every original character should have an excellent example of character stats and profiles, even if your setting doesn’t have gaming elements. For comparison purposes, many creators like to look at their characters in terms of game mechanics and statistics, especially in the role-playing sense. And yes, that applies to the creator of the OC, in addition to other creators who may want to play around with someone else’s OC.

The second important reason for having a character profile is that it helps further develop a character. As we will see in some detailed character profile templates later, different templates raise different questions and perspectives on a character that may not initially seem all that useful.

An Example: Weird Questions and Character Memes

Let’s look at an example. Hypothetically, say you have an OC from a fantasy setting, and his name is Fang (yes, this is a character of mine). He is a wandering warrior afflicted with an irreversible lycanthropic transformation, forced to survive a gothic fantasy setting as a perpetual werewolf.

Now, say that I found a fun character meme asking, “What toppings do your OC put on their pizza?” Initially, a question like this may not be valuable to understanding a wandering werewolf warrior. There’s no such thing as pizza in the fallen kingdom of Triseria. Believe me, I made the place up.

But it is all a matter of perspective. While Fang will never try a slice of a delicious pizza, what if he had the chance? What sort of flavor profile might he prefer, and what does that say about him in a larger sense? 

The answer, by the way, is sausage, bell peppers, and onions. What does this tell me about Fang? His tastes aren’t far removed from what might of been a typical peasant dish in Triseria. Sausage, peppers, and onions have a very comforting quality and are pretty practical. He probably would be accustomed to such a meal as a warrior when he isn’t munching on hard tack and dried meat.

And as you can see, we pull characterization from something as patently silly as the question, “What pizza toppings does your OC like?” Just another example of why a character profiling template can be helpful.

Learning from a Master: The Tezuka Star System

One inspiration in my OC design that I would like to discuss in the future, which helped me clarify my thoughts on OCs and characterization, is the Tezuka Star System. 

For a quick overview, here is what you need to know: Tezuka Osamu was a legendary mangaka in Japan who was born in November 1928 and ultimately passed in February 1989. He is a foundational figure in the creation of manga and anime. He is responsible for iconic characters such as Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, Black Jack, and Dororo, among countless other characters.

To begin with, Tezuka had a hell of a career, but I want to dive into his Star System. From the Tezuka Osamu website:

The term was originally coined in Hollywood. Charlie Chaplin and fellow actors started up a new movie company with the aim of producing movies that revolved around planning for the star actors; they dubbed this practice the "star system". Since then, it has become customary to refer to the film-making system that centers on top stars using this expression.

So how is this applying to original characters, and how to create a character profile? Here was Tezuka’s spin on the concept, pulled from the same source:

Nonetheless, Tezuka Osamu thought of his characters as real live actors and actresses and took great pleasure in his role as director in assigning roles to them. Readers who spotted Atom in the guise of the son of a kidnapper in another work would smile with delight.

What I am getting at here, and I want to explore in a future article, is that your characters can be fully-rounded individuals who a creator can transplant into other works and play roles informed by their personalities - following expectations of them and sometimes against type. You wouldn’t necessarily cast Dwayne Johnson and Othello, but Nicholas Hoult could play Hamlet.

But all of this is informed by what you know of the character and expect of them, which comes from working with a detailed character profile template.

Finally, before we leave Tezuka behind (for now), I also want to highlight the adorable idea that he developed “appearance fees” for his characters as a thought experiment. Shikishima Kenichi, a megastar in Tezuka’s system, commands a mighty price. Talk about loving and understanding your characters, right? 

He may not have worked with a character profile worksheet as we know them today - but he indeed had a lot of notes, and we can learn from that.

Essential Information for How to Write a Character Profile

With a character profile encompassing potentially every weird-ass question you might have about a character, the challenge lies: Where do you start? How do you write an OC profile, and are there any character profiling templates that can help?

Free Character Profiling Templates

People who create original characters bring unique ideas and approaches to the party. They also are not shy about sharing them and often develop templates that other creators can use.

Here are some character profiling templates you can use right now.

Tabletop Gaming Character Profile Worksheets

Tabletop gaming presents one of the original character's most popular and iconic forms. Games like Dungeons & Dragons and Shadowrun, among countless others, focus on creating original characters and backstories for gameplay. However, you can easily use these sheets to build information about your character in a general sense as well. You would also have the advantage of playing them in a game, which is a nice bonus.

It may not be immediately apparent what the value is regarding taking a character and making them work in the setting of Pathfinder. But keep in mind the idea of “recasting” characters like Tezuka Osamu, and you’ll start to see the value of clarifying an OC by putting them in divergent situations and allowing them to develop.

As for where to start, you can find many gaming character templates through a rudimentary Google search. However, I also found a few worth sharing here to help you get started.

• Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition Character Sheet
• Shadowrun Third Edition Character Sheet
• Neceros’ Pathfinder RPG Character Sheet

While these are ultimately resources geared toward gaming, many OC creators like to think about their characters in a mechanical sense, such as balancing them against others in a setting. These sheets can be a great way to establish character stats and profiles.

Templates from Other Creators

Many creators love to share approaches to character creation through templates and worksheets. For example, here is a fun one pulled from the ancient archives of Gaia Online titled “Extremely detailed character sheet template,” which poses all sorts of interesting questions and points of interest.

Similarly, if you like to use Google Docs, here is a template you can work with. There are many, many examples of OC templates on Tumblr as well. Some may focus on specific settings, which, if we go by the Star System thinking from earlier, could prove interesting in adapting your OCs to new settings and contexts.

You might find yourself rewarded by plugging in a fandom and “OC template” into a search engine and seeing how you might squeeze your characters in.

Character Memes

One of the best ways to find weird angles to approach your character’s histories and characteristics, for lack of a better word, is through character memes. A rudimentary search of DeviantArt for ‘character meme’ turns out a trove of potential options. 

There are thousands upon thousands of options that can help you create detailed character profile templates. Here is a whole host that I found exciting with some description. Your mileage may vary, so I hope you’ll dive into the collection of memes on DeviantArt yourself.

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WeAreAllMadsHere’s “Draw Me! OC Edition MEME”

This all-purpose meme has many visual elements, but the emphasis on alternative looks is inspiring.

ThirdPotato’s “Character Balance Meme”

ThirdPotato’s meme is purely information based and uses a table to rank a character’s traits across several categories.

Schandmaeulchen’s “OC meme”

This meme is another visual-based meme but presents fun prompts, such as showing off particular characteristics.

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As you can see, these are only three different memes out of hundreds of thousands, but they all present exciting options for understanding an OC and developing details about them. These memes are not DeviantArt exclusive, either. Seeing OC memes on social media is not unusual, so take advantage of them when possible.

Cobbling together OC details from different templates and memes can prove fun but can also feel a little disorganized. Sometimes you want a singular location where you can type information up consistently without installing a Wiki on a server and dealing with markup code. Plus, there is the challenge of formatting your character stats and profiles. There are many options for that sort of thing, such as CharacterHub.

CharacterHub: The Simple Yet Detailed Character Profile Creator

The biggest takeaway I hope to convey in this article is that CharacterHub is the excellent character profile worksheet you have been looking for. Allow me to illustrate how CharacterHub can be incredibly useful.

We will stick with my OC, Anda Bandit, from my previous article. I only had a placeholder profile at the time of writing that. The intention is to flesh out her profile to illustrate how helpful CharacterHub can be.

The Basics: The Key Info Section

When you first start character creation on CharacterHub, you have a few initial options, which we’ll call the basics. You’ll want a character profile image for sure. If that is something you draw yourself or commission from someone, it doesn’t matter. Just be sure it’s an eye-catching profile image. Something that focuses on the face is a smart move - based loosely on the psychology of profile photos. You also may want to highlight a distinguishing feature.

From there, you’ll need to fill in your crucial info. Consider the combination of the profile image and this section as your OC's “business card” - a sort of at-a-glance introduction to who they are and your chance to sell others on them. We have a name, character quote, and tags to fill out. While these are pretty obvious, there is some specific thinking to consider regarding the character quote and tags.

When dealing with a character quote, your goal should be to embody the character's spirit as best you can. In the case of Anda Bandit, I went with “Never know when I might need it,” which is how she might justify her stealing throughout her adventures - especially some of the odder things she might take. I am pretty happy with it, but I am sure I could always try something in the future.

As for the tags, it makes sense to include genres, settings, and species as they correspond to your character. My character comes from a video game setting, so video game tags are helpful here.

The Character Description Section

The description is a somewhat open-ended part of the profile on CharacterHub, and on my first run, I put some of her backstory in. I would eventually move that. Instead, my approach shifted to developing more of a generalized description of Anda Bandit, her abilities, and her attitude, mainly as the next section featured some options for specific details.

The About, Color Palette, and Background Story Sections

The “About” section is an exciting part of the worksheet on CharacterHub, allowing for dozens of customizable points ranging from relationships to worldview to powers and abilities. This section is excellent for creating focus, at-a-glance characterization for your OCs. 

Next, the color palette feature is beneficial if you want to land some fan art in the future, or at the very least, it makes commissions much more manageable. This feature allows you to create a list of hex color codes of colors associated with your characters. 

Specifically, this could be useful for skin tones, hair color, and eye color. Generally, this might be for consistent elements in a design, especially if you are open to your character drawn in varying outfits.

The background story section is the one that might be easy to get carried away with. While you probably shouldn’t write a novel, a substantial backstory is a smart move, especially one that sets up character motivation and where they are at the point in the story your OC occupies.

The Images Section

The images section is instrumental for character profiling templates and features plenty of organizational options for providing image references of your OC. For example, While you can bulk upload images, you can also create folders, which opens up many possibilities.

Case in point: As Anda gets disguises and outfits on her adventure in the comic, I can open up a gallery that features these alternative looks. I also created a “fan art” folder that includes drawings sent to me from friends and in exchanges. I can also create a gallery for “story moments” as well.

Adding Extra Info

Lastly, a few other detailed character profile template features are found on CharacterHub. Keeping in line with the earlier About section, CharacterHub offers additional sections such as Creator’s Notes, Music, Stats, and a Moodboard, among other options. You can also set your character filters, whether they are NSFW, affiliated with a collection, or require Trigger Warnings.

What is a Character Profile? It Puts OCs in Context 

While there are plenty of options and inspiration for how to develop a character profile, it can sometimes be overwhelming. Thankfully, plenty of character profile worksheets are floating around on the web, including character memes to help you approach your OCs uniquely.

It is also nice to know that websites like CharacterHub provide helpful organizational tools for developing your OC’s stats and profiles. It’s even more fun that it makes it easy to show off your characters too.