User blog:Chariot Dude/OC Name Help Hotline!

If there's one thing that bothers me about this wiki, it's the surplus of OCs that are given "meaningful" names using google translate. A lot of people argue that they don't want to give their OCs dull and basic names - which I fully understand - and say that google translate gives meaning to their name. However, there's a difference between naming your astronaut OC "Hoshiko" and naming them "Asutoronoto."

Preface
Before I start, let me just say that I am by no means an expert at this. I'm not Japanese, nor am I fluent in the language, yet if you want a unique name, you're better off using this method than something like google translate.

I'll start by looking at an actual Japanese name: Kimiko, or 貴美子. Notice there are 3 kanji characters in this name:

貴 - ki - valuable

美 - mi - beautiful

子 - ko - child (a very common ending to feminine names in Japanese)

That's just one spelling of the name. Another spelling could be 君子, for example (君 - kimi - lord, noble). However, we'll focus on the former for now.

There are 2 different types of readings for kanji: KUNyomi and ONyomi, or just kun and on. Kun is the Japanese pronunciation, while on is the Chinese pronunciation. The kun reading is usually how the word is pronounced when it's being used as a word is a sentence (the 貴 in "貴い" would be pronounced "touto") while the on is how it is pronounced as a seperate character (貴 would just be pronounced "ki"). You can really use either, yet the on pronunciation is generally more reliable.

One more thing I should mention: remember that a name is a NOUN. You wouldn't name someone "Loud" or "Fast." You can, however, incorperate adjectives into names (Fast Horse, for example, maybe?). You also want to make sure that you don't have any verbs, adverbs etc. in your name. You might name something "Clear Jewel," but not "A jewel that is clear." You don't want to make your OC's name a phrase.

With that said, let's begin!

Creating a name
Let's say you have a character with black hair. Hopefully there is more to the character than just their hair color, but let's just say that the black hair is an important part of their design. Maybe you want a part of their name to be "Black." However, that isn't too descriptive... try to think of something a little more creative. Maybe their hair is black like ashes, for example. There we go! We'll go with "ash" for the first character of the name, as it isn't an adjective.

Open up your kanji dictionary and look for the character. You'll find something like...

灰 - kun: hai - on: kai

Remember - we're sticking mainly to the on reading. The on reading for 灰 is kai, according to the dictionary. Keep that in the back of your mind.

What's another defining trait of your character? Well, perhaps our ashy-black-haired character is an amazing cook. Let's go with... flavor. Once more, open up your kanji dictionary and find the character for flavor...

味 - kun: aji - on: mi

Let's take the on pronunciation of 味 and add it on to the end of our first character. We'll get 灰味, or "Kaimi." If you'd rather have "Mikai," you can flip them to get 味灰. There you go! You just created a Japanese name! If you want it to sound a little more feminine, you might add the afformentioned 子, or "ko" to the end of the name. 灰味子, or "Kaimiko." If you want something more masculine, you might add 郎, or "rou" to get 灰味郎, or "Kaimirou."

Useful characters
While making your name, here are a few characters to keep in mind - all of which are fully optional, of course!

子 / ko - This character, meaning child, is often placed at the end of many feminine names (such as Mariko / 真里子).

美 / mi - This character, meaning beauty, is also often placed at the end of feminine names (such as Naomi / 直美).

郎 / rou / ro - This character, meaning son, is often placed at the end of many masculine names (such as Taro / 太郎).

太 / ta - this character, meaning thick/big, is often placed at the end of many masculine names (such as Kenta / 健太).

々- this character has no pronunciation on its own, yet is used to indicate the repetition of the kanji before it (such as in Nanako / 菜々子).