: Re: Ways of describing new characters? What are some good ways to describe the looks of a new character presented in a story? I generally mention eye and hair color, physical build and maybe if

@RJPawlick285

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Personally, I dislike police lineup style listings for characters. After all, who wants to read blocks of text telling you about every intrinsic detail about a character in an almost list-like format? Most of it will be irrelevant anyways.
The following example* is something that I barely pass off as 'okay':

Towering like a giant at 6'5" John stood in the metro wearing a pair of stinking Denim Jeans topped off with his favorite Metallica T-shirt. Having slouched against guard rail - evidently after a hard day's work, he didn't care if the white-collared busybodies around him moved away because of the putrid smell that radiated from his body.
He looked completely out of place, a blonde caucasian male that looked like he had barely broken 30 in the middle of a crowd of Asian businessmen, however, he had some place to be.
"Excuse me." His gruff voice scared those standing in front of the doorway as the metro came to a stop in one of the flashiest districts in town.

*Note I used Lauren Ipsum's list as a checklist for ideas here.
Did you notice what I did here? Instead of going ahead, listing off one by one details about a person - I resorted to revealing information that was necessary for leading on the story. Does John have Blue eyes? What kind of Jeans is he wearing? Does he have a beard? What is his job? You can leave all of that up to the character's imagination.
When you define a character, remember that the audience only needs information that is necessary for driving the plot, and can assume the rest. In this example, his clothing and out of place appearance creates mystery and gets the reader wanting to know why John is in Asia, and why he is in such a place. His height and his appearance shown here instantly makes the audience assume things, he's most likely a manual worker or blue collared worker based on his opinions towards white collars he likes Metallica, and is instantly portrayed as someone that is strong based on his voice and height.
So why don't I like this?
To put it plainly, it's still a list and a lot of it could be interpreted in other ways. Him being caucasian could be told through him standing out in a crowd of Asians based on his ethnicity, perhaps his height could be subjugated through this same comparison. If it is absolutely necessary that the character's hair style is told to the audience for example for a reoccurring joke that plays later on, or for some reason he joins a 'Afro club', then sure you can tell that directly. However, you could also introduce him as being a proud member of the Afro Club and that instantly conveys to the audience that your character has an Afro. The same thing applies to appearances, it's highly unlikely that your audience will remember every single detail about a character's face - unless your character has something unique like they look middle eastern and that will help them get into a terrorist camp - it's completely unnecessary to go into details and is just plain bulky.

Side note: In the case of presenting characters midway in a story this is very important, as you don't want to go: "The [gender of person] standing before him had [haircolor and style] and was dressed in [clothes] with [eye color]." Hinting at the character's description is far more effective, and helps the audience remember. If some character is very affluent about his Afro Club and other characters joke about him being in it a lot, you will instantly remember this charcter has an afro.

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