Zinggia Art Scholarship 2015-2016 & a new website!

It’s the second year for the Zinggia Art Scholarship for Ohio high school seniors who wish to pursue a college degree in the visual arts field. The scholarship is only available to students in Ohio, but they can go to any art school or 2-4 year college as long as it’s in the US. The scholarship award is $2,000 for the 2015-2016 academic school year. The application deadline is Saturday, March 7, 2015. Please help spread the word to art students, guidance counselors, and teachers. Please contact us with any questions. The full details & downloadable PDF application are on our website for review.

Also, let us know what you think of the shiny new website! We'll no longer be updating this blogspot blog since the new WordPress website has its own blog.

Our Custom Unbreakable Mr. Glass Action Figure

I'm notoriously bad at getting Jason Christmas presents. Every year I think I've nailed it and have finally gotten him something amazing and cool. And every year I fail. Like the year I got him a t-shirt of a monkey on a toilet holding an ice pick saying "Go bananas." I'm not sure why he was holding an ice pick instead of a banana, but it was hard not to make the split decision to purchase that gem. Jason was perplexed to say the least.

Years ago I came up with the PERFECT gift. I put together a case filled with everything he'd need to customize his own action figures since he's a big toy collector...files, modeling compound, dremels... and a Samuel L. Jackson Unbreakable Mr. Glass head. It was an unpainted, sculpted head I found on Ebay. Jason dubbed him "Butter Head" since it looked like he was carved out of butter. The case was a big hit. He declared that I finally got him an awesome present. Then the case sat untouched in the basement for years.

Jason's toy customization kit is made from an 80's cassette tape case. Sweet.

Until I decided to make him another cool Christmas gift (after all, I had to make up for the box of packaging tape I gave him the year before for Christmas). So I made him a custom Mr. Glass action figure!!!

I did a bit of research to figure out how to proceed and won a few auctions for bits and pieces to compile Mr. Glass. The main components were a 12" GI Joe body and a vintage Wheelchair Becky Barbie Doll wheelchair. The pants and boots came with the Joe figure, but I made the coat and shirt by hand. The coat is a soft purple fabric on the inside and a black satin on the outside, complete with pockets to stash his comics in. I found a glass cocktail drink stirrer at a flea market and molded the top and bottom of the cane to it. And of course I hand painted his face, hands, and wheelchair.

Speaking of the comics, I'm embarrassed to say that I didn't realize Action Comics were real. I assumed  that was just fictional for the movie. So instead of going to google to grab comic images, I watched Unbreakable, then paused the movie so I could take a photograph of the TV screen so that I could print out tiny duplicates of the actual comics from the movie. I feel a bit daft and old school knowing there was probably an easier way to do that, and perhaps the quality would be better too, but hey, Jason liked it all the same. And the process of making the mini comics still amuses him.

"This is an art gallery, my friend, and this is a piece of art." 

I wasn't done being clever after I finished the figure. A Limited Edition card was taped to a purple wrapped box with the figure inside. So I think this is the best present I've ever gotten Jason at this point. Although it would've been cooler if he had been surprised. He kinda figured what I was up to when 1. We watched Unbreakable the week before, 2. I purchased purple and black fabric the next day, 3. I had ebay packages delivered that he wasn't allowed to see.

Halloween Monster Stickers, costume award badges, & coloring postcards

I quit my full time design job so I can stay home and draw monsters all day! So far it's pretty cool :) We  thought it would be great to get more use out of the illustrations from our first monster coloring book by making stickers and Halloween costume award badges!

Every year for Halloween we give out fun treat bags filled with candy, toys, and stickers! Treat bags are great for me because I have portion control issues on Halloween. The first year we gave out candy, we ran out in 15 minutes, then we had to turn into the people who turn their porch lights off & don't answer the door. ugh, I didn't like those people when I was trick-or-treating as a kid.

So this year we'll be giving out treat bags filled with a bunch of these cool monster stickers. We thought it would be fun to do a color version but then another version that's just black & white so the little ghouls can color the stickers in! I loved getting stickers at Halloween, so hopefully kids today still go for that sort of thing. Of course I also liked the one house in our neighborhood that gave out popcorn balls...years later I learned that I was the only one who dug that!

AND... we just did a set of monster postcards using some of our favorite scenes from the coloring book. These would be great for kids to color and mail or to keep and frame.

All these cool goodies can be bought on our Etsy shop now.

Halloween Stickers

Halloween Award Badges

Monster postcards

Desert Rose Dragon screenprints for sale

Now that the Pinchflat Poster show is officially over for 2014, we'll be selling our remaining "Desert Rose Dragon" prints in our Etsy shop. Some stats on 2014 Pinchflat: The show was on display for 121 days at 5 different locations and sold 275 total posters! Yeah!

"Desert Rose Dragon" is a 12" x 24", 3-color silkscreen print on black French paper. We had Shout Out Loud Prints silkscreen them for us.

24 Monster Coloring Pages with games and masks, cryptozoology, greek mythology, legendary creatures

Monster masks, and mazes, and coloring pages…oh my! FINALLY, our first coloring book is finished!

This super fun set of coloring pages is filled with cryptozoology, greek mythology, and legendary monster games, mazes, word searches, and more!!! It's not just a boring old coloring book! Crypto & mythology facts will be spread throughout so your little ones can learn about some of the most famous monsters like Nessie, Bigfoot, & the chupacabra. It's a kid-friendly book though, so the artwork won't induce nightmares! At least we tried to draw monsters that wouldn't have scared us when we were kids.

You'll get 24 monsterific, 8.5" x 11" loose coloring pages printed on one side on thick cardstock on a high end laser printer. Cardstock is great for crayons, colored pencils, and markers. Included in the 24 pages are 3 masks that kids can cut, color, wear & scare! Pages will be shipped in an acetate bag with color cover to make it great for gift giving.

Monsters included: Witch, Roc, Minotaur, Bunyip, Vampire, Charon, Medusa, Chupacabra, Bigfoot, Jotun Troll, Cockatrice, Devil, Chimera, Werewolf, The Monster, Loch Ness Monster, Herne the Hunter, and Mothman.

The coloring book can be purchased in our Etsy shop. Thanks for your support!

Monster Coloring Pages

All illustrations are copyright Zinggia (Alison Hess & Jason Salisbury). All rights reserved. 

More Pages from our first Monster Coloring Book!

Here's another sneak peek at a few other coloring book pages from our first monster coloring book! Like I mentioned in the last post, this won't just be a plain coloring book. We have mazes, puzzles, and paper masks.

We just finished 2 pages of super fun memory cards and a color & cut out dracula mask. So the kids can color, cut, wear, & SCARE!

Zinggia Monster Coloring book & activity pages

Our first Monster Coloring Book!

We've been hard at work on our first coloring & activity book for the past few months. I used to work on kids' arts & craft products like coloring books, paint-by-number kits, & velvet books professionally for several large craft companies & realized that I missed that type of work. So we decided to create a coloring and activity book of our own that we both would've loved to have when we were young... coloring pages filled with monsters...cryptozoology, greek mythology, and movie monsters! Who doesn't like monsters? I think every project Zinggia has worked on thus far has had monsters.

No, this won't just be a plain coloring book. We have mazes, puzzles, and masks that kids can cut, color, and wear! AND crypto & mythology facts will be spread throughout so your little ones can learn about some of the most famous monsters like Nessie, Bigfoot, & the chupacabra. It's a kid-friendly book though, so the artwork won't induce nightmares! At least we tried to draw monsters that wouldn't have scared us when we were kids.

I'll be posting sneak peeks on the blog of pages as we work on them. Once the art is complete, we'll list it in our Etsy shop as a PDF download and a printed book.

Werewolf & Chupacabra Cryptozoology & Monster Coloring Book Pages