forum I want your opinion on: Character weights and heights

Started February 02, 2020 by @Oakiin

tune

Because in the notebook character forms, they offer a place to write this down.
Personally, I don't like to do that for a few reasons. Maybe I'll write a small description, but never numbers. Here's why.
a) Most the time, irl, we don't know people's exact heights and weights, we just think, "Tall" "Small" "Thin" "Thiccc" ect.
b) I don't personally know a lot about height to weight ratios, (and that's then on me for being lazy lol), but it can be frustrating to figure out
c) I don't usually consider it important to my plots. This might be just a me thing, I keep my character descriptions vague on purpose in my stories, and if I'm not being to detailed about hair and skin, why would I be about height and weight?

But what about you? I see a LOT of people commenting about weights and heights on character critiques, and I'm wondering what other people think of them/why they write them down. I'm interested in your thoughts!

I personally agree with you and all your points. The main two reasons why I can see that adding height/weight could be useful are 1: Visual or artistic reference, if you and others will be drawing them a lot, and/or 2: If the character's proportions are a big part of the story (for example, Tall Girl on Netflix lol).
That said, whether or not one adds the specific numbers, I think a rough description should be added as well, like you said, including descriptive adjectives. They're a lot more helpful when trying to visualize someone, seems to me. ^^

I have this website I use to compare heights, and stuff, but I am also currently looking up one for weight/height ratios.
Here's the one I use for heights:
https://www.mrinitialman.com/OddsEnds/Sizes/compsizes.xhtml

I'm not sure how accurate this is, but I also found this one, basically scroll until you see the chart (Height to weight ratio):
https://www.healthyyounaturally.com/nutrition/age-height-weight-chart.htm

Thanks so much Rainy! Those are awesome resources :) I like how the weight one includes age too, that's a really important thing ^^ Do you have any opinions on why you might consider these important details to include?

Picturing them, that's a huge thing for me. Being able to picture them with more detail, or sketch them out

For sure! :D Thanks for sharing! ^^

I always have a tough time figuring out exact weights, and so I'll usually just use a scale of underweight/below average weight/a bit below average weight/average weight/a bit above average weight/above average weight/overweight. I don't think that exact numbers are necessary, and I've seen several people advise against using exact weights in books/outright stating the MC's weight.