I joined an international AI hackathon, formed a two-person team with a Vietnamese AI engineer, and watched him build much of our AI agent in about three hours.
Then we submitted our Idea Proposal on October 5.
So what happened next?
Somehow, I ended up tweaking a penguin's face again and again, making character sheets, and even producing little animation samples.
Wait, wasn't this supposed to be an AI agent hackathon? (Haha.)
Here's how I started contributing to the look and feel of our project, FrostLoop AI, even though I'm not the one leading its technical implementation.
After the Proposal, There Was Still a Vietnamese-Language Task
We'd submitted the Idea Proposal, and I thought I might finally get a little break.
Then my teammate sent me a request.
The hackathon had a section called Project Showcase, where people could apparently view team proposals and vote.
He wanted me to replace the English text displayed there with Vietnamese.
He sent me the replacement text, so I hurried to update it.
Apparently, submitting the proposal didn't mean the admin work was over!
I Got Access to GitHub, but Didn't Jump In Right Away
After that, my teammate said he'd share the GitHub project with me.
He invited me, and I could finally access it. He also sent me a Markdown (.md) file explaining how to work on the project.
I wasn't going to build the core agent myself, but I'd mentioned that I'd like to try adjusting the visual side—colors, fonts, and UI details.
Still, I didn't dive into GitHub immediately.
For about three days, I was busy taking care of other things.
Instead, I started preparing design ideas I could contribute.
From Logo to Color Palette—and Popup Images
When we chose the name FrostLoop AI, I made three logo ideas on my own.
My teammate picked his favorite, and that became our official logo.
Next, I used it as a starting point for a color palette.
I chose colors that felt right for FrostLoop AI and worked on how they might look in the interface.
I also made an image for a popup that would appear after a user action.
None of this was the agent's underlying functionality.
But I felt that how a product looks—and how it feels to use—matters, too.
Little by little, the project was starting to have its own visual identity.
A Polar Bear? A Penguin? Did We Even Need a Mascot?
Then I had another idea.
What if FrostLoop AI had a character?
Nobody had asked me to make one.
Honestly, my teammate might have thought a mascot was completely unnecessary.
But with a name like FrostLoop, I kept imagining a polar bear or a penguin.
In the end, I went with a penguin.
There was one thing I was particular about, though: I didn't want an overly childish character with an enormous face and huge eyes.
Something cute, yes—but a little cool and frosty, too.
So I made my first version of the penguin.
A Lesson from My AI Film Hackathon Suddenly Came Back
Once I had the character, I remembered something I'd learned at my third hackathon, an AI Film Hackathon.
Someone on that team had explained that, to animate a character naturally, you need at least a character sheet and material showing the background or environment.
At the time, I'd listened and learned.
Now I had a reason to use that lesson!
I put together eight character-sheet images for my penguin.
But when I looked at them the next day, I realized the expressions were hard to read. The penguin looked cool, though.
Hmm. That wasn't quite right.
So I revised the character and remade the sheets.
The following day, I changed it again, making the head and eyes just a little bigger.
Funny, considering that I'd originally wanted to avoid oversized eyes! (Haha.)
I also created images of the penguin in different actions and saved everything in our shared Google folder.
Would My Teammate Actually Like It?
Now came the slightly nerve-racking part.
I had no idea whether my teammate would like the penguin—or whether he even wanted a character in the project.
But I'd made it, so I decided to show him.
Along with some screenshots of the interface using my proposed colors, I sent a few penguin images and explained the idea.
And he seemed to like the colors, the mascot idea, and the penguin itself!
I was so happy. And maybe he was just being kind, too.
I also suggested a different screen layout, but that was harder to decide. The interface could still change as development continued.
Fair enough. We weren't at the final-design stage yet.
What Did We Mean by “Animation,” Exactly?
Around the same time, my teammate sent me a link that seemed to be about AI video.
I found it pretty difficult to understand.
And suddenly I started worrying about something else.
When I'd said “animation,” had he imagined something much more advanced than what I had in mind?
Oh no. What if our expectations were totally different?
So I did what felt simplest: I made a few quick samples.
I still didn't know where they'd go on the screen or what aspect ratio we'd need. But at least I could show him the kind of lightweight movement I meant.
I created four short animation pieces:
- Idling
- Raising a flipper
- Swimming
- Returning to the ice
After that, he sent a message saying the video elements should be lightweight.
What a relief!
I showed him my samples, and he seemed to like those, too.
We still hadn't finalized where or how they'd be used, though.
Then I Started Thinking About the Domain Name
Once we were talking about visuals and branding, I started thinking beyond the hackathon itself.
If we continued developing FrostLoop AI, wouldn't a domain name be useful?
I checked. Someone had already registered frostloop.com, so that wasn’t an option. But frostloopai.com was available at the time.
The price I found was ¥790 for the first year and around ¥1,980 per year afterward.
I suggested it to my teammate, and he was enthusiastic. He said he would handle the registration.
I'd also thought about trademarking “FrostLoop” even earlier.
I've registered six trademarks for my own product brands, so I wondered whether that experience might be useful here.
A friend once told me it had cost them around ¥70,000 to hire a professional to handle a five-year trademark registration. I filed mine myself, taking the paperwork to the Japan Patent Office counter, and spent less than ¥40,000. So doing it yourself can make quite a difference to the cost.
Then there’s the timing. In my experience, it can take around ten months from filing an application to getting a registration, so if we were serious about it, starting early would make sense.
But an AI software project isn't the same as a physical-product brand, and I wasn't sure the benefit justified moving ahead yet.
For now, I put the trademark idea on hold.
Still, it was funny to find myself thinking about a mascot, animation, domains, and trademarks—all while taking part in an AI hackathon!
I guess that’s what happens when you sell products under your own brand. You start thinking about these things automatically. Branding matters, and so does protecting the brand you’ve built.
You Never Know Which Experience Will Come in Handy
The best part wasn't simply making a penguin.
It was realizing that something I'd learned at the AI Film Hackathon was useful in a completely different hackathon.
I was also discovering that, even without taking charge of the technical implementation, I had ideas and skills I could bring to the team.
I don't know yet which images or animations will make it into the final product.
But sharing ideas, seeing my teammate's reaction, and shaping something together has been genuinely fun.
I can't wait to see what FrostLoop AI becomes next.
This story reflects my experience through October 13, 2026. The final UI, animation implementation, and domain registration had not all been settled at that point.