Help! Help! I’m Having an Art Attack: A Celebration of ZOIA Contest Artists and a Reintroduction to the ZOIA Firmware 5 Update
Y'all are the best. Seriously.
We could not be more psyched about the response that ZOIA 10k has been getting. Within a few days we sold all the new beige Empress ZOIAs. (If you’re wondering where to buy an Empress ZOIA 10k pedal, there is still availability with our dealers, so don’t worry if you haven’t managed to grab one yet. Don’t wait too long, though…)
You may recall that we held an art contest with the prize being the 10,000th ZOIA. Artists who entered had a, shall we say, somewhat limited palette to work with, but that didn’t seem to stop anyone.
We were insanely blown away by the amount of creativity shown by the ZOIA fans who entered our pedal designer art contest and share a love of this unique and undefinable pedal. Because of how much we enjoyed every entry, we’d like to celebrate our favourite works of art from the contest here.
1. The Great Wave Off KanaZOIA – entry by kpcnsk
2. A penrose triangle – entry by turbopixelz
3. I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream – entry by dahsheg
4. A portrait of ZOIA – entry by nicola_dudich
5. An appreciation mosaic for ZOIA 10k – entry by guitarjawn
6. An homage to a favourite album – entry by unpeeledsatan
7. A ZOIA trapped in a maze – entry by wataru_naruse
8. A face melting solo within the panda enclosure – entry by ga_su_3104
9. An explosive ZOIA gif – entry by _prinzbach_
10. When one ZOIA gif is not enough – entry by _prinzbach_
Overall, we were just floored by the quality and the creativity of all the entries. We didn’t even have space to mention all the great entries (see them all by searching the #zoia10k hashtag on Instagram). Honestly, we’re just super grateful that our ZOIA pedal has such a genuine, dedicated, and artistic community. That’s what makes ZOIA so enjoyable to make: seeing what all you create with it. We do have a winner for the contest (congratulations, _prinzbach_!) but we really struggled to choose a winner because we loved all the entries so ridiculously much. Because we found it so hard to choose, we’re sending everyone who took part in the contest a limited edition ZOIA 10k t-shirt!
By the way, did you miss the chance to play around on our pedal designer pixel art? Or were you planning out a daring thousand-hour masterpiece and are afraid we’re going to take the pixelmaker down from our site for good? Don’t sweat it. We had so much fun seeing your entries and making our own designs that we’ve decided to keep the designer around. (What else are we going to do on lunch breaks?) You’ll find your new creative medium around, for probably forever, right here.
Steve Escapes Captivity to Build Our 10,000th ZOIA Pedal
Who let him loose?
Empress’s founder, Steve Bragg, went back to his roots recently to build the 10,000th ZOIA. Steve doesn’t get to work directly on building pedals too much these days (who knew there were other things involved in running a business?) but he wanted to be a part of this milestone pedal.
Steve models a perfectly ZOIA-sized carrying receptacle, for ZOIAing on the go.
It’s been almost twenty years since Steve first constructed the first Tremolo pedal that would become the basis for Empress Effects, and the fact that this company is still building new pedals like ZOIA is all thanks to you, the awesome customers and community and ZOIA creators that make all this possible.
In all its glory: the 10,000th ZOIA.
Here’s What’s Up with Empress ZOIA’s Firmware 5 and How to Download the ZOIA Update
We were so excited to talk about the ZOIA 10k and its new look that we feel we may have let the other big part of the announcement slip through the cracks: ZOIA Firmware 5! In case you have not heard, there are big advantages to getting your ZOIA fully updated and into the 10k age. We’re a little concerned that Firmware 5 could slip under the radar because it arrived so hot on the heels of 4.0, but we don’t want that to happen because we’re very proud of the changes made.
Here are just some of the benefits of Firmware 5:
- Bug fixes:
- Fixed a slight DSP increase that was introduced in firmware 4.0.
- Fixed an issue that was causing certain screens to occasionally become unresponsive.
- Fixed crashes that were happening while using the built-in sample rate converter.
- When modules with a 'rate' control are set to BPM mode, the rotary encoder now responds to acceleration. Turning the encoder quickly will cause the BPM value to adjust more rapidly.
- Fixed a bug that was causing the pedal to become stuck scrolling through preset names.
- Removed the automatic factory reset that happened upon entering LED calibration.
- User-friendly patches, our favourite patches from Patchstorage, (like these ZOIA patches we love) and new modules that basically make the Empress ZOIA more of a pedal you can play right out of the box without getting to know its devious inner workings (don’t fret though, all those who enjoy delving into ZOIA’s devious inner workings, the ZOIA remains as complex and creative and wild as you want it to be.)
- We’ve hacked into the mainframe (worked with the ZOIA code) to get 14% more processing power out of the pedal. All of which you can access just by downloading Firmware 5.
- As always, the update is available for every ZOIA pedal ever sold, not just ZOIA 10k.
If you’ve been wondering where and how to download the Empress ZOIA Firmware 5 update, your search has ended. Download 5.0 here and treat your ZOIA to a day at the firmware spa.
December 24, 2024
