Because it’s summer, I thought I’d run a little contest for all you talented scribblers out there.

The lingapotamus art gallery has been a great success with already 29 samples of lingapotamus fan art. But one thing I’ve yet to see is any hand-drawn hippos. I did one for the Dave Walker campaign. But I thought it would be fun to ask all of you to draw a hippo for inclusion in the lingapotamus art gallery.

Here’s the prize:

If your drawing is selected as the winner, you will receive a coffee mug or t-shirt with the lingapotamus of your choice on it. That means that you can choose any image from the lingapotamus gallery, even your own, and it will be printed on a mug or t-shirt and sent to you at the address you provide me with.

How will we select the winner?

I’m open to suggestions on how we should select a winner. I can pick a favorite or we can let people vote by visiting the pages featuring entrants and the entrant with the most visits will win. What do you think?

Who can enter?

Anyone is welcome. In fact amateurs are encouraged to submit a drawing. Here’s a drawing I did and then played with the RGB values in Irfanview to get a nice purple color:

Grab your pencil or crayons and get started!

What are the rules?

Your drawing must be hand-drawn (that means on paper or canvas) not done on a computer with software (Sorry no Paint or Photoshop). You must take a picture of your drawing and email it to me at

You retain ownership of the picture while granting me use of the picture on the lingapotamus blog and on products featured at the Lingamish cafe press store.

Entrants must be received in the next week before midnight on August 4, 2008.

So what are you waiting for? Get doodling!

Update: Here’s a sample of what the above image would look like on a coffee mug: