My original idea for Prancer's character was that he was curious, which was why I chose him for this story. Now in order to flesh out the story more I have to develop his character beyond just 'curious' so that I can present him with the right obstacles. To accomplish this I thought about what he does in the story so far, and about how I'd like him to react to situations to reflect the core message of discovery. That's how I came up with the list of character traits on the left of the page below: Curious, impulsive, sensitive, brave, scatterbrained, easygoing, independent, friendly, openminded, kind, confident, strong.
From there it was easier to set up the key conflict for his character, reduced down to what he wants (to have fun and explore) vs what he needs (to keep up with the group). I also wanted to explore how he overcomes the conflict, so I reduced that down to what he knows (that he messed up) vs what he wonders (what would happen if he followed his interests).
The last character brainstorming I did was a way to tie everything together and start matching up motivations with story events. It combines things that happen to Prancer which are beyond his control with the ways he chooses to react to them. There is a lot of room to improve in this section, but thinking this way helps me maintain control over the impact the story will have on its audience.
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