[…] That’s an arbitrary choice when it comes to names. But you get bonus points if the name reflects something about the character or conveys …read more […]

I feel like I'm not strong with names. I write out the alphabet and try to come up with a name for each letter, but every time I do i feel like I'm scraping at the bottom of the barrel. I almost used two names from Alien in the project I'm playing with now... you can name a woman Kane, right? It actually does work in the cases where I have characters who pick their own names, use nicknames or titles, because they can be slightly more stylized or more true to their nature. Sometimes if I have an actor in mind, I'll free-associate to find a sound that works for their face, but if I can't find it, and the ideas come too quick, that character will be stuck with the real first name.

I hang out with my characters a while, and at some point they tell me their names. Sometimes I'm surprised. The other night, a character introduced himself as Carlos. I had no idea he was hispanic until then. Names are very important in my current rewrite. All my main characters go by nicknames and the reveal of one of the real names at the end is a major punchline. And the protagonist's entire arc is symbolized by her wanting to be called by her real name. In another of my projects, the protagonist's last name is very OTN, and his arc is about him finally going against it. In summary, it's largely subconscious, but never random.

I would agree with Matthew on that one. For me, sometimes it's research but mostly it's subconscious - once I have a story idea, I dig and dig and dig into the characters - I may throw a random name down and sometimes I only have the first letter or the first two letters but the more you ask your characters questions, the more it starts to develop until the name feels like it couldn't belong to anyone else (changing the names of some of my characters would certainly be a tough pill to swallow). Also looking up baby names, places on maps, meanings has helped me but first knowing what sort of character and archetype they are is foremost..