Characters and locations are essential to a story. In this tutorial the following characters are used:

• Central characters

  • Amy Anderson

  • Ben Brown

  • Kate Kennedy (Police Officer)

• Minor characters

  • “The Killer”

Note that characters are split into two groups: Central characters and minor characters. If you don't know yet if a character plays an important role or not, choose “central character”. The character group can be changed anytime.

• Press the button “New Character” in the tool bar.
  Hint: If you leave the mouse cursor over a button for a short time, a tool tip is shown.

• The button just to the right opens the dialog for managing characters.

• All tools can be invoked over the menu, too, or – even faster – you can use the hot keys shown in the menus.
   

In the opened dialog enter the character's data:

• A green colored field indicates that the entered value is valid.

• A red colored fields indicates that the entered value is not valid, e.g. if a mandatory field (marked with *) was left empty or if a wrong date was entered. In such a case a warning is shown at the bottom of the dialog.

• The abbreviation is filled out automatically but can be overwritten with an own.

• Switch to the tab “Description” or “Notes” if you want to enter additional information about your character.“Description” is meant for a detailed description, where "Notes" hold your thought about the character, things that are not clear yet, stuff you have to check on etc.

Create the others characters, too. Be sure to select the category “minor character” for the killer. Since the Killer's name is not known in this story, use “The Killer” as nickname and leave the last name blank.

Now let's have a look at the object tree:

• Click on a character in the tree to show the entered data in the Quick Info area.

• Right-click on a character or a category to open the context menu. New characters can be added using that context menu as well.

Genders

A new project has only two genders: male and female. If you want to add your own genders, choose “Manage genders ...” from the menu “Characters”. These genders are symbolized with a gender-neutral icon.

Continue with Part 3