NFTs (Non-fungible tokens) are booming, giving digital artists a new option to make money and promote their work. This is a step-by-step tutorial to getting started in the game.
NFTs are certainly something you’ve heard about by now. If you haven’t already: An NFT is a one-of-a-kind coin that lives on a blockchain and represents (or points to) other data, such as an image or video. NFTs are easy to track because they are stored on a blockchain, usually Ethereum.
This tracking enables for the authentication of their legitimacy, as well as their previous owners and history. NFTs are smart contracts, usually ERC-721, with which users interact by calling them and receiving proof of interaction.
CryptoPunks from Larva Labs, for example, was the first NFT and ERC-721 smart contract. It’s made up of 10,000 24-by-24-pixel photographs of punk characters from all around the world.
This price is determined by the supply and demand for the network’s processing capacity required to complete the transaction.
You could no longer produce (or “mint” in crypto terminology) new CryptoPunks once 10,000 had been claimed. As a result, the smart contract capped the supply from the start. The contract became a legally binding agreement once it was placed on the blockchain, setting how many punks can exist, how much they are sold for, and how to obtain one.
The NFT market has seen tremendous growth since the end of February this year. Beeple recently sold The First 5000 Days for $69 million at Christie’s, setting a new auction record.
Digital sports collectibles are also booming, with the NBA Top Shots platform, which is based on the NFT, topping $200 million in sales last month. Clearly, this is turning into a profitable market.
Assuming you’re a digital artist who produces photographs or films. What methods can you use to monetize your content? You may use the internet to sell signed prints or other items. You could also make a painting, scan it, and then make changes to it online.
The question is then, which one is the original? Is it the original painting or the altered digital copy? Is there an original digital copy if a digital copy exists?
NFTs are useful in this situation especially for artists. An NFT is essentially a smart contract that states that this digital artists item is the original and that all others are copies (or “digital prints,” to use a real-world analogy). In other words, the NFT is made up of your digital artwork and a blockchain contract stating that you did indeed produce the piece and that it is the original.
The digital original (i.e., the NFT) can then be sold, and it will be registered on the blockchain. The transaction is also recorded on the blockchain if the individual who acquired it from you resells it. You can monitor how your work is traded on the secondary market and get access to the complete transaction history.
However, NFTs can help artists in other ways as well.
The opportunity to earn from the secondary market is a unique feature of NFT-based art that does not exist in the offline art sector. Once you sell your artwork offline, it is no longer available. If and when it resells for more, you don’t actually receive anything out of it.
However, in the crypto world, you can set up a fee (typically between 5 and 10%) that you receive every time someone resells your work. You get compensated on each resell, that’s right! So, if you sell your original work for a dollar and it is resold for $1 million ten years later, you can still make $100,000.
This feature is the single most important reason why NFTs are beneficial to artists and content creators. It allows them to concentrate on creating art rather than worrying about the first sale price. If their works become well-known, they may be able to make a living solely from the secondary market in the future.
It’s never been easier to get started in the world of NFTs than it is right now. OpenSea, Rarible, and Foundation are the three largest marketplaces right now. In a moment, we’ll look at what makes each of these unique, but first, let’s speak about how to make an NFT.
You’ll need a Metamask first. This is a Chrome extension that acts as a virtual wallet and connects you to platforms where you may buy and sell your artwork on the blockchain. It can be used as a wallet and an e-signature at the same time.
To begin, download Metamask, setup a wallet on it, and then send some ETH to it. On exchanges like Coinbase, Kraken, and Binance, you can buy ETH with your credit card. You can send it to Metamask once the transaction is complete and you’ve been validated.
This procedure can take up to five days, but it’s only necessary when you’re just getting started. Everything becomes easy once you’ve completed that task.
Now it’s time to mint and buy NFTs!
NFT markets allow users to share their original work as well as purchase other people’s work, which is a fun journey. Furthermore, looking at what other people are selling can give you a decent idea of what’s hot right now.
BEST NFT MARKETPLACE
There has never been a better way to display and sell digital creations from the standpoint of a content producer. If you’ve ever been fascinated about blockchain, NFTs, or cryptoart, this guide is a great place to start. You can enter the market and begin creating a following today for a pretty cheap investment.