How do you make your characters come alive?

First off, no this isn't a guide or anything like that...simply a way to express just what do you enjoy most about working with your characters for the sake of giving insight or just sharing what you enjoy in particular. We all have certain strongpoints and interests when writing I believe and we also have (well I certainly do heh) weaknesses when it comes to writing as well. So the point being, what do you enjoy doing most with your characters that gets you enjoying writing about them?

Myself, I really enjoy getting into their mindsets and just trying to understand how an everyday ordinary hunt (or sometimes, not so ordinary) and surviving in general is for my characters. Goro isn't really included in this...as he just sorta sits there for eternity heh, but for Ciel I find it always to be very fun to try to get into her mindset. I find writing her hunting scenes to be very smooth and easy for me to do and it's just fun trying to imagine the motions she goes through as she sneaks around avoiding her prey's attention or that of something that could cause her trouble as well. I guess it just kind of draws me into her world very effectively heh. Oddly enough a vore scene coming after this I find rather hard for reasons I'm not sure, but I highly enjoy writing her hunt things. There's plenty more aspects of my characters I enjoy writing about, such as Goro interacting with the people he comes across, but that first one is probably my favorite.

Hmm... that's a very good question. I usually think of various scenarios and imagine how they're going to react/respond it. I think I'm doing pretty well.

Personally, I like the contrast between Nyaha, and the steryotypes most male characters fall on. I've actually modelled him after myself a little, to help me out making a well balanced character that I can use to create other characters. In contrast to Nyaha, who is a boy who was raised only by his mother, is Kira, who is a girl who was raised only by her father. There's something in there that I can't quite describe, that they're so different, yet in the same way, very similar.

I also really like Kira's boyish attitude and general toughness. I know a reader might find her similar to Anna in ways, but I want to point out that unlike her, Kira isn't a total grumpaholic.

I try and imagine how they would react to real life scenarios. That mainly forms their basic traits. From there I make the situations more fantasy related until we reach Felarya levels.

It works out alot of the time.

I try to use empathy, taking on account the personality I've defined for those characters. You have to think like them, even if they are the very opposite of yourself. It can work as a good exercise for understanding others.

You have to think of the situations you are going to put your characters in, see how they usually behave and what they should do given the new scenario. Sometimes, you prefer to have your prefixed ideas on how they'll react, but sometimes improvisation is good, and even if you might not believe it, that feels more natural. There are many times we have reacted to situations in a way we didn't expect, given how much we know about ourselves. That doesn't mean your character will always be unpredictable in odd situations, but you have to use some surprise factor to spice how your character reacts.

As I said, it's a good exercise to use empathy and imagine several situations. I actually have nothing else to say...

Depends, if I have a body I use necromancy, if I don't I use alchemy.

More seriously, I present both a characters abilities and failings. Many characters can do things well, or thing others can't, in the real world people often used this to define themselves. Take for an example an engineer with three kids, he may be proud, but many often introduce themselves as an engineer first when meeting some one. As for failings, these are every bit as important, a character who has no use of their legs yet still lives in a forest is memorable for example. Mental hangups can be every bit as impressive, after all, insanity and compulsions can stick out rather starkly.

Lets not forget about personality, but that is an obvious factor, still a bit too complex for me to go into right not given my time constraints.