Add BLOOM post

app/community/bloom.md

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+---
+title: "Pushing pixels at BLOOM: compsigh's first Spring hackathon"
+description: "We just wrapped up BLOOM, our first ever Spring hackathon! BLOOM was an experiment — in emphasizing collaboration across the arts & sciences, in encouraging more *human* projects, and in creating beginner-friendly spaces for hackers. Here's how it went."
+post_date: 1740988800
+authors: [
+  { name: "Edward", avatar: "/avatars/edward.png" },
+  { name: "Jake", avatar: "/avatars/jake.png" },
+  { name: "Ilce", avatar: "/avatars/ilce.jpeg" }
+]
+og_image: "/community/bloom/og.png"
+---
+
+<Mic name="Edward" avatar="/avatars/edward.png" />
+
+y'all! we just wrapped up BLOOM, our first ever spring hackathon! this one means so much to me. BLOOM was an experiment — in emphasizing collaboration across the arts & sciences, in encouraging more *human* projects, and in creating beginner-friendly spaces for hackers.
+
+here's how it went :)
+
+<Media
+  alt="Participants at BLOOM in a group photo on Presentation Day"
+  src="/community/bloom/everyone-presentation-day.jpeg"
+/>
+
+<Spacer size={32} />
+
+## how BLOOM is different
+
+we felt our past events gave an outsized advantage to technically complex projects, which is not what we're going for as a club. we experimented with addressing this on a few axes:
+
+- remove artificial barriers to entry & competition like registration deadlines
+- pick an aesthetic direction that was less intense, more cutesy & wholesome
+- discontinue rubrics & class weighting, instead trusting judges to run a vibe check & adjust on their own
+
+### :3 for beginners
+
+we wanted to make it clear that beginners are not only welcome but encouraged.
+
+### :o for people
+
+we encouraged teams to make projects unrelated to gen ai. we were worried this would turn people away, but in the end, the projects turned out so well. so much art, and *shoutout to the solo teams!!* y'all killed it.
+
+### \<3 For everyone
+
+**BLOOM is all about personal project exploration.** a low-stakes, high-quality playground for ideas. we wanted to open the space to projects from all walks of scientific & creative life.
+
+from email campaigns, to posters, to presenting in 30+ class sections, we worked to emphasize that *anyone* from usf is welcome. after all, the most interesting projects are at the intersection of art & technology.
+
+## amogus
+
+For BLOOM, we had quite the [moodboard](https://www.cosmos.so/edwardshturman/bloom):
+
+- Maximalist mixed media
+- Metal/grunge
+- ASCII/pixel art
+- Solarcore/solarpunk
+- Flowers/spring
+- 1930s rubberhose
+- Studio Ghibli
+
+We wanted to pick a mix of these that was accessible, familiar, cutesy, and could appeal to both technical & non-technical friends. Here's how we did that!
+
+<Mic name="Ilce" avatar="/avatars/ilce.jpeg" />
+
+We landed on pixel art of spring, flowers, and cottagecore. Pixel art is particularly familiar, and comfortable to interpret visually. It's also easier to animate, which was helpful in the shorter amount of time we had to bring BLOOM to life.
+
+Edward shared a recording of a [screensaver built into macOS](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnjxehheT_I) with art from Susan Kare, who was on the initial Apple graphics team. This was good inspiration for the animations being more playful, almost cartoonish. That also helped with the familiarity and cutesiness.
+
+I'd say my art has this trippy, expressive, maximalist vibe. I draw a lot of inspiration from the games Hylics and Undertale. I also had a friend who's very good at pixel art mentoring me through the process.
+
+<Mic name="Jake" avatar="/avatars/jake.png" />
+
+Totally agree with Ilce, pixel art evokes a kind of nostalgia. A lot of my art is environmental, so I loved the idea of a compsigh cottage™ in a field of flowers. also, kitty! :3
+
+Pixel art is a super flexible medium too, so it was easy to match Ilce's animation style.
+
+I'm a huge fan of indie games like Omori. it's also hella maximalist lol. mother three as well — love the 32-bit art style, lots of flowers too. great game.
+
+- simon stalenhag
+
+I love drawing clouds; any time i get the chance to draw or animate them. they're so pretty. ghibli has such pretty environments, and i love evoking that sense of beauty
+
+We both used Aseprite to craft the pixel art.
+
+> I just wanted to make smth cool :D
+
+---
+
+Outline todos:
+
+- Show off the winning projects
+- Talk about the platform: moodboard, aesthetic
+- How special it was to be able to work with USF artists
+- Our awesome judges; G promoting it
+- Where we're going next for DEPLOY/25
+- More photos