.ART

If you clicked on this article, you probably are looking for answers to questions you are too afraid to ask this far into the NFT-fanfare. Well, you’ve come to the right address. NFTs continue to offer a radically new way for artists to showcase and make money off of their work. If you’ve been seeing things from the outside-in, thinking of how to get started: let this be your guide to the basics of selling your work on NFT-platforms.

Let’s begin with the fundamentals. You may have heard of some of the digital asset marketplaces like OpenSea, SuperRare or Foundation and wondered what these are or how they piece together with the blockchain – or potentially your work, for that matter. So, all of these platforms mentioned are built on the Ethereum blockchain, but other examples include fxhash on the Tezos blockchain or SolSea on Solana. We’ll get more into the nitty-gritty of what that means in a sec!

Now let’s briefly get into the process of ‘tokenising’, a.k.a. making a digital token that represents ownership over something, also referred to as “minting”. For the scope of this article, this would mean your artwork. There are a bunch of different ways to go about minting an art piece, and in order to achieve a successful sale, you have to think about what best suits your profile as an artist and your work.

Fortunately, that’s precisely what this article is here to assist you in. Here are a few things to consider when minting your very first artwork:

What are you minting?
The very first thing to look at and analyze is what exactly you’d like to mint. What sort of an art piece is it? What is the nature of the work? Will you choose something that is representative of your body of work, or perhaps something that is a new foray into unexplored territory? The way in which you answer these questions will naturally impact the rest of your approach. Both in a conceptual and very practical sense.

What is your edition size?
In the traditional art world, one could reference artistic prints – copies of the same work. When tokenizing your digital art, you are also able to create a unique piece, often referred to as “1/1”, or an edition. Moreover, some platforms even allow “open editions”, so you can have for example a window of time during which as many as possible pieces can be bought. If the platform you choose doesn’t have this functionality, you can also issue a very large edition and then “burn”, or in other terms “destroy” the unsold copies after a given time.

What price should you put on your NFT?

This is a tricky one. Keep in mind that as a new artist, you may want to balance accessibility to a new audience with valuing yourself for what you’re worth. One important thing to bear in mind is that it’s always easier to increase your price than the other way round. Decreasing a price for your work may come across as a sign of decreasing demand. Some of the most successful NFT and Crypto Art creators today would sell their work for 5/10/50$ to start. That’s right! Even XCOPY, whose works fetch millions today, started like that.

Which platform should I mint on?

Once you’ve figured out what you want to mint, and in which quantity, it’s time to look at the specifics of it. What medium exactly is the work? Is it an image, video, or perhaps audio? What is the file size? Depending on how you answer, different platforms or blockchains may make more sense for you. For a genesis single edition work, and if you’re already a fairly established artist but would like extra curation on your platform, you may want a platform like SuperRare or Foundation.

If you’re just starting out as an artist, and/or aren’t interested in paying high fees for minting your work (and want to be more environmentally conscious); hic et nunc, objkt.com or versum on the Tezos blockchain may be for you. There are many environmentally-friendly platforms emerging so you may also want to keep an eye on them this year! Being early on a new platform with a solid team and vision behind it can have its early-adopter benefits.

If your work is audio-driven, you can take a look at Nina or Async Music. And if your oeuvre is centred around generative art, you may want to consider fxhash, ArtBlocks or snark.art. The options are endless, so it’s important to consider thoroughly who you are as an artist and what your work is about –  and then go exploring for the niche that you belong in!

How do I find my audience?
Building onto this, one of the most important things to remember is the ways in which community factors into the processes of the NFT world – for learning as well as promoting your work. Do you have a Twitter account, and if so, are you leveraging it to connect with the NFT-communities? Twitter is not a necessity, but it is where a majority of current artists and collectors engage in conversations about NFTs.

If you’re completely new to this social network you may want to identify artists, through NFT marketplaces or online articles, to follow and connect with. Twitter can be noisy for a beginner but among the sea of noise, you can often find very important tips from thought leaders in the community. You are also free to reach out for help from those you admire, some may be busy but many artists and collectors frequently engage in conversations.

In the end, you should have fun with it, and not be afraid to take chances. NFTs are still a relatively new phenomenon and there are new opportunities to experiment and explore each day. It is advisable, however, to practice caution, as with decentralization also comes a certain level of bad actors. As technological progress continues, it is encouraged to continue reading and learning from experts in this sector. In many ways, both the exploratory beginning and end of your journey towards your first NFT could very well happen within whatever network you place yourself in.

We hope this article has brought some new ideas for your next big step!