Creating Your Own NFT – Choosing the Art
Some say NFTs are nothing more than jpegs hanging on the cyber wall, and that’s just wrong. NFTs also come in PNG, GIF, txt and a bunch of other file extensions.
Jokes aside, the concept of NFTs goes a little bit beyond earning crypto and even art itself even though it’s been made to seemingly center around those.
NFTs are more of a challenge to the world – sort of like a “I dare you to connect with what I just made” but intensely more subtle.
If you think you have the knack for questionable art or just aspire to monetize your ingenious doodle collection, you might want to stick around for a few.
Create a Platform for Your Art
Before opening up Microsoft Paint, there are a few things to consider.
If you’re ready to create, you must already have a vision of what the NFTs would look like. But do you only know what they look like and not what they are?
There is often meaning behind a piece of art – a message beneath the gloss. Do your NFTs stand for something? Are they representative of a societal issue or perhaps advocating for a particular community?
These are the questions you should ask yourself when creating NFTs that could potentially grow into a collection. It’s the difference between a giant yellow square and a giant yellow square made of a million tiny sticky notes. The platform will explain your creation and attach meaning to your tokens.
The platform can be a simple WordPress page or, if you’re fancy, you can use SquareSpace to add some flair to it. This page will feature copies of the art, which would be minted, and some descriptions about them. It could be a backstory or origin of your inspiration. Go wild and spice things up.
One of the most expensive NFT ever sold, the “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” had a $69 million price tag. It’s a collage featuring all the work of Mike Winkleman, the artist himself when he was an average political illustrator. The NFT became a life story and, more than that, an artistic journey. People love stories and journeys – and Winkleman mashed those together and made a casserole.
If you don’t have 5000 days to spare, maybe opt for something a bit simpler. Like the Tubby Cat, for example.
They may look fun and innocent, but this collection is worth over 13,700 ETH (just under $35 million.) The Tubby Cats don’t have a backstory for their variations, but on their page, the artists claim each of them was hand drawn.
Inventive vs Transformative Art
Inventive art is creating something completely original, like the Tubby Cats. A majority of NFTs on the market are inventive and unique in their own way.
Transformative art is creating something out of existing elements, which do not necessarily need to be artistic on any level.
I’m not saying you can take someone else’s work and “transform” it to make it yours. Transformative here means you can take photos of people or things and animate them or digitize them in some ways.
It could be the most mundane of things, like this trash can below.
This masterpiece of effortlessness was sold for over $250,000. How’s that for transformative?
Of course, this is an extremely rare case and should not be the standard of your expectations. Some artists have taken years to even sell one piece of their collection.
Do keep in mind that when it comes to NFTs, you don’t get paid for how much effort you put in. After all, art isn’t about effort. It’s about the expression – the statement you make to the beholders. The stronger your statement is, the more likely you’d get compensated.
Rarity and Stats
What NFT collectors love more than the art is how much better their tokens are compared to the others.
This is why most NFTs have various, and seemingly random, attributes and numbers on their profile. These can be rarity level, influence status, type, and everything in between.
Having special stats on NFTs gives buyers a sense of completion and keeps them on the hunt. Be mindful when creating high-rarity NFTs for those NEED to stay limited as the more rare tokens you make, the more common they become.
These numbers on this CryptoPunk NFT may make little sense to most people, but a true Punk collector would cherish every digit.
You’re Ready to Create Your First NFT
Once you’ve completed these steps, you should have a decent looking, albeit small, collection.
OpenSea allows users the absolute freedom to create their NFTs so yours should look distinguishable from the rest (I hope.)
Remember, it’s not how much work you put in, it’s how much of that work speaks to the buyer.
Stay tuned for how to manage and develop your collection, including auctioning tips.