Strannik's avatar

Strannik

Writer, Photographer, Explorer
16 Watchers114 Deviations
20.5K
Pageviews
I recently put up a new short story featuring April Parisotto, who I plan to make one of the recurring characters in my Ubris Arcana series. I've posted sketches of her in the scraps folder, but now, you'll get to see her in action. So to speak.

This story is a bit of a departure for me. I wanted to create something romantic. Something cute. Something that riffed on romantic misunderstandings so prevalent in the romantic comedies. But since, at the end of the day, I'm a shipper at heart, it wasn't that drastic of a departure.

I go a bit into design process behind April in the descriptions for the sketches I've linked to below. I would just add that, like many Urbis Arcana characters, April has a real-life counterpart. Well, counterparts. She's a sort of merger of two different women I knew, with a few traits from a woman I knew a bit less spliced in. It was an interesting process, trying to create a single character out of three similar, but different people. Hopefully, it worked.

As always, comments and all manner of criticsm are very much encouraged.

For more info:
Urbis Arcana character - April by Strannik Urbis Arcana Profiles - April by Strannik
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
Oh boy. Haven't posted a new Deviant journal entry in almost three years now. And while my day job has been keeping me busy, I had some time for creative works. I've posted some of the better photos I've taken recently, and I've also being writing some Chicago urban fantasy short stories. I've posted the links to some of them in the previous entry (which just goes to show you just how slow my creative progress has been).

I'm hoping to get some more work out, but for now, I wanted to share a story I posted back in January. A take on a recurring bit of Russian folklore, filtered through my sensibilities... and, let's be honest, a few social issues and things that have been bugging me.

How Vasilisa the Wise found Vasilisa the Fairest
- when in old friend asks the wisest sorceress in all of Russia to fulfill her dying wish, she drops everything to go to Chicago. but what she finds isn't something she expected.

Please leave your comments, criticisms and any and all feedback here, or in the comments section at the link about
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
It occurs to me that I never posted any stories from the "Urban Legends"* series. The series is something I've been working on since college (if you look through my scrapbook, you'll find a lot of references to them), but I haven't really posted many of them to the public until recently.  The stories are set throughout Chicago (and its suburbs) and share certain characters. Some stories have supernatural elements, others don't.

Here is the list of the stories I put up so far:



As always, comments and criticisms are very welcome and very much encouraged.
______________________________
* The name is a placeholder until I can come up with something better. I'm currently leaning towards "Urbis Arcana" or "Second City Secrets"
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
The Facebookafication of the Internet continues with the newest version of DeviantArt. And, much as I may bemoan the process, it isn't that bad (though I don't envy anyone who tries to view it on public wireless or on lower-bandwidth Internet). It's certainly not worse than what preceded it. And hey, it nowhere near as awful as the facebookafication of Wikipedia and Youtube. Especially Youtube.
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
For the past few weeks, I've been fine-tuning designs for other ex-Advent Stars characters. I kept having trouble with Layla Powell, the team's resident mystical princess. She was supposed to have a different body type than what my female characters usual end up with - stockier, more muscular and, yes, a bit more top-heavy.

Putting it all down on paper hasn't been easy. At all. I kept screwing up proportions (well, more than usual, anyway). But after weeks of struggling with it, I finally got a drawing that I am sort of happy with.

Now, all I have to do is scan and color it.

Oh boy.
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
Featured

A new Urbis Arcana short story is up by Strannik, journal

Some new creative works - of the prose kind by Strannik, journal

Urban Legends short stories by Strannik, journal

The Facebookafication of the Internet continues by Strannik, journal

Transcribing Concepts by Strannik, journal