well since i like to write myself in my stories (lol) i try to think of a name that is close to mine or a derivative of my name. i sometimes get names from games, movies, celebs or i pick names that i like...
For example in my APO story(ies), the name of the character Mia Blade is a derivative of my name: MIshA, Abalde (my last name's been mispronounced as "ABLADE" so that's where i got it from). in the same story(ies), i picked the names Ken and Ryu from the videogame Street Fighter (haha i know kinda lame but i gave them different last names from the game). For "Aundrea" who is Mia's sister in APO, i asked my sister what she wanted to be called and that's what she came up with.
As for my story EMPIRE (aka "Backstreet Mafia"), which features the Boys with Justin, JC and Joey from Nsync, i thought of the Italian versions of their names: Nick=Nico, Brian or B-Rok=Rocky, AJ=Alex (that one was easy
). For Howie i used his old stage name Tony Donetti (lol) and for Kevin, i took "Rico" from Richardson. For Justin i used "Tino", for Joey i used "Guiseppi" (Italian version of "Joseph" haha) and JC was the hardest one and i came up with Sergio...haha. as for the last names for the guys from Nsync i took "Timberlake" and made Berlacchi. (also because Justin seemed to rule Nsync
...)
i like the first names (for boys): Michael or Micah, Chris, Angel, James, Austin, Jaylin, Emile. and for girls: Aurora, Amelia, Michelle, Marianna, Angel, Maya, Jaquelyn.