Instead, the artist can sell it directly to a larger audience as a non-fungible token (NFT), which also allows artists and content creators to keep a larger share of the profits from sales. In addition, artists can program or set up royalties so that they receive a percentage of sales whenever their artwork is sold on the secondary market.
More and more big companies, brands, artists, and celebrities are getting on the NFT wave: NBA Top Shot, the official NFT platform of the top US professional basketball league, allows NBA fans to buy, collect and trade NFT-based highlights of league games (packaged as digital trading cards). A single LeBron James highlight was sold as an NFT and raised over $280,000.
Taco Bell became the first food brand to enter the NFT world. NFT art (GIFs and images) was placed on the NFT Rarible marketplace and the 25 tokens sold out within half an hour. The brand also announced that the money raised would be donated to Taco Bell Foundation, Inc.
Twitter CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey put his first-ever tweetup for auction as an NFT, and it sold for $2.9 million.
The first NFT of digital artwork to be listed on auction house Christie’s was the work Everyday: the First 5000 Days by digital artist Mike Winkelmann, known as Beeple, and it sold for $69.3 million on March 11 – becoming the third-highest price ever earned by any living artist, after Jeff Koons and David Hockney.
Following the sale of Beeple’s work at traditional auction house Christie’s, auction house Sotheby’s also entered the NFT space and announced a partnership with artist Pak, who was auctioning a work as an NFT in the NFT Makersplace marketplace.
What is an NFT?
NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token and uses the same Blockchain technology as cryptocurrencies to create scarcity and authenticity for specific digital items. An NFT is a digital asset that exists only in the digital world, which means you can buy or sell it just like any other digital product. A non-fungible token can be any type of digital files such as digital art, music, video clip, photography, game items, and even a meme.
In essence, it functions as a digital certificate of authenticity. In real life, it would be like classic works of art, and other historical items and goods or real-world objects that are sold at auctions with a receipt certifying that they are real works and not copies.
What is NFT Art?
Most NFTs are digital works of art, such as illustrations, 3D digital paintings, photographs, images, music, GIFs, and memes. Briefly, Crypto Art or NFT art is digital art that is collectible and has limited edition cryptographically registered with a non-fungible token (NFT) via a speculative blockchain such as Ethereum, Wax, Flow, and Tezos.
In the world of physical art when an artist finishes a particular physical work or fine art whether it be sculpture, painting, or statue, that work of art is the only copy of it. There is only a single copy of the physical artwork of the “Mona Lisa”, which makes it easy to make the work scarce and helps increase its value over time.
What does NFT mean in Art?
Crypto art or NFT art has the potential to completely transform the art world; there are already specialized auction platforms for digital art. These NFT platforms help artists and content creators not only market their work but also protect their works and digital products with digital signatures.
Here is what NFT means for art:
Certificate of Digital Ownership.
NFTs are non-fungible tokens, or basically a digital property title that cannot be defrauded, but they are created and traded in online marketplaces efficiently and securely. With this new digital certificate technology, it is possible to buy digital artworks of art such as music, photographs, pictures, videos, tweets, memes, and game items. This represents a major revolution on the Internet, which has been able to decentralize access to information but has not yet been able to guarantee ownership over a specific digital asset or authorship and licensing of a work/product in a secure and transparent way in the digital world.
NFTs represent a great opportunity for traditional collectors and investors interested in exploring or migrating to the digital art market by acquiring rare or unique digital items with complete confidence, transparency, and security.
Royalties and Generate Income
Some of the crypto art or NFT art comes with royalties for the NFT creator or artist, which means that every time the artwork is sold on the secondary market, the NFT artist or creator can receive compensation or earn between 5 to 10% of all future sales. But these royalties may depend on which platform the artist is using.
A Global Reach
In the past, art collecting in the world of classical art, physical artifact collection, and art sales, in general, was something that usually took place in physical spaces relative to physical works of art. Artists made money through events, such as exhibitions in galleries, auction houses, and museums as well as markets. With this new technology NFT means that the collection of artifacts can now move into the digital universe, opening up a new opportunity for many artists on a global scale.
As NFT social networks, platforms, and marketplaces allow artists to have immediate access to a borderless audience, they make it easier for artists and content creators to have thousands upon thousands of followers online, thus helping them gain exposure in NFT marketplaces.
How to Make and Sell NFT art?
Anyone with a computer and Internet access can make an NFT as well as be interested in buying art or selling a specific NFT, i.e. you can create your own NFT from digital objects or products representing tangible and intangible items, including but not limited to art, music, GIFs, videos, digital collectibles, and game items, and offer it for sale on the NFT marketplace of your choice. You may also receive remuneration from your NFT, which will be paid to you whenever someone resells your piece.
As with buying NFTs, you also need to have a crypto wallet set up, and it needs to have cryptocurrencies (Ether (ETH) is the most common).
Here is a step-by-step guide to creating your first NFT:
Make a digital art file for your non-fungible token (NFT)
Basically, there is no single way to create a work of art that can be used as a non-fungible token (NFT). If the file you want to create is compatible with the NFT marketplace or platform where you are listing the content or uploading the digital file, it will function as an NFT.
This opens up a new opportunity for the content that the artist or content creator wishes to monetize. Any format or extension such as TXT, JPG, GIF, PNG, WEBP, MP4, or MP3 can be an NFT.
Set a price for your artwork or set up an auction and list it on a marketplace
NFT marketplaces allow you to upload your digital artwork and list it for sale online as an NFT. You then have the option to add a title and description to your artwork.
One thing you should consider when submitting your artwork is how many you will provide that same artwork. You have the option to choose to set it to 1/1, which means there will only be a single artwork to exist and be sold, or you can decide to create a collection of the artwork with multiple copies.
In the next step, you need to choose how you want to sell your NFT artwork depending on the NFT market of your choice. Here you have three options:
‘Fixed price’ allows you to set a price and sell to someone immediately. With an ‘Unlimited auction’, people can bid until you accept a bid. And, ‘Timed auction’ is an auction that takes place for a limited period (usually 24 hours).
Waiting for bids
Once you have uploaded and listed your artwork, any NFT marketplace user you have chosen can find it and bid on your NFT.
The ” Discover ” option may vary in the major NFT marketplaces, so you will need to promote your own listing. Most NFT markets have a Discord community built around NFTs that can help you with your marketing strategy.
How to Buy NFTs?
NFTs can be bought and sold on a wide range of online platforms, and it will depend on what you want to buy. If you want to buy baseball cards, for example, the best option would be to go to the “digitaltradingcards.com” website, but other NFT marketplaces sell NFTs as art, photographs, metaverses, or virtual worlds, and game items.
You will need a crypto wallet specific to the platform you want to buy from, and you must fill it with the cryptocurrency required by the platform.
Another example is WePlay Collectibles which are for people who want to be part of Esports events and show that they like players and talents in a different way. The WePlay Collectibles are part of a platform, where you can buy items with NFT technology – both digital and physical. They are rewards and items associated with a specific tournament. And you can buy them through the Binance NFT marketplace.
Find more information about the platform and NFTs at https://weplaycollectibles.com/
If you already have a Binance account, you can use it to buy and sell digital art in the marketplace. If you are not yet a Binance user, register today and open your digital wallet to hold cryptocurrencies, collect crypto art, and more. To buy WePlay Collectibles, you will need to have ETH, BNB, or BUSD in your Binance wallet. After crediting your wallet with any of these cryptocurrencies, you can bid on any non-fungible tokens available on the Binance NFT marketplace. And finally find the NFT you want, bid on it, win the auction, and the token will be transferred directly to your digital wallet! Now you can own unique digital items and keep, sell or exchange them according to your own taste.
Best NFT Marketplaces To Buy And Sell NFTs
More and more new NFT markets are emerging and selling NFTs every day as enthusiasm around this new technology continues to grow.
OpenSea
OpenSea, also described as the first and largest NFT marketplace for digital products and assets, features a huge library of content, products, digital goods, and digital assets at affordable NFT prices. The platform supports all types of NFTs, from crypto art to 3D collectibles, virtual worlds, metaverses, and items used in video games. OpenSea is also completely open and free for people who want to create their first NFTs.
Nifty Gateway
Nifty Gateway is an NFT marketplace with a focus on digital collectibles. Nifty work only with elite artists to release limited-edition collections of NFTs. Nifty Gateway is also one of the only major NFT marketplaces that accept credit cards, which sets it apart from all other NFT sites.
SuperRare
SuperRare is an NFT marketplace exclusively for digital artists. On this site, you will not find memes, text posts, or tweets for sale. Basically, SuperRare functions as an elite digital art gallery where prices are extremely high.
Zora
Zora allows creators and artists to upload images, videos, audio files, and even a simple text document. Because it is an open platform you can also create your own NFTs.
Rarible
Rarible is one of the most accessible NFT marketplaces for artists, creators, and collectors looking for non-fungible tokens (NFTs). This platform is also one of the NFT sites that allows new creators and artists to start selling their work from the moment they sign up, and this makes for a large amount of material, products, and digital assets on the site.
Why is NFT Art So Expensive?
Creating or transforming content into an NFT requires a new digital currency to be mined on the Ethereum blockchain. Mining this new digital currency requires a very complex task and computing power, involving a whole network of computers around the world connected to the blockchain.
Using the Ethereum network to create your own NFTs comes with a “gas fee” for the energy and effort that goes into this computational computation. The gas fee can vary or fluctuate every day, and in some cases can cost more than the selling price of the artwork itself.
This means that you can spend more than $100 per example of a gas fee to create a new NFT. But these gas fees may be insignificant if your artwork sells for thousands or millions of dollars.
Why is NFT Bad for Artists?
It’s not that NFTs are bad for artists, but there is a controversy surrounding NFTs, particularly regarding their environmental impact.
The Ethereum blockchain (where most NFTs are created), and the Bitcoin network are built on a Proof of Work (PoW) system. For these systems to work, they need to solve a series of complex puzzles to keep their users’ financial records secure and in a decentralized manner, and this system uses a lot of energy, as the blockchain requires that many computers around the world must run 24 hours, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year.
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