Beebers said:
built a killer Swedish Chef which we can't use, obviously; he's identical to the real deal
Mine isn't too identical, but useful and fun. I used him at ChickFilA for kids' night for a quick segment on making a sandwich, and when he added the 'chicken' to the sandwich, a chicken (borrowed from a church) that was sitting there attacked him.
Photos of my puppets, the main one being Muley the Mule, can be seen at
www.picturetrail.com/muleythemule
As far as developing personalities and characteristics for certain characters, there's several different methods.
Charles Schulz said he never told Charlie Brown and Snoopy what to do, he would sit around and doodle until something popped up that made him think of a comic strip, so then the characters told HIM what they wanted to do.
You can base characteristics off people you know. Bill Baretta based the way Pepe talks on his wife's aunt, who ends all her sentences with "Okay?" Come to think of it, I have a Korean customer who does the same thing.
I used to have a cheat sheet I created for folks who asked me this question, and now I don't remember what I've done with it. If you have a puppet made, you can pretty much base what its personality is on the look of the character; if it's a character you plan to build, then think about these items: what would it do in a particular situation (crossing the street, trying to buy something and not enough money, being followed by an alternate species, etc); what emotions does it have toward certain items (anger, knowledge, attack). Pretty much, put the character in YOUR place throughout the day and think about what he/she might do.
Muley is his own personality stuck in the back recesses of my subconscious now. I'm me the rest of the time, but when I've got the puppet/costume on, he comes out. He's funnier, more entertaining, more outgoing, and a lot less worried about saying things than I am. He's a very VERY well developed personality, even such that everyone that knows me and knows him talks about Muley in 3rd person (even me). And that's either very talented or very crazy! LOL!!
Finally, there are books for writers about developing characters and that is always useful; not to mention that one set of audio tapes by Stephen King which discusses story telling and character development (which I've not heard but did hear that it's VERY good)!