When the world's top concept artists meet NFT, the irresistible crypto art boom

Bitcoin live streaming < When the world's top concept artists meet NFT, there is an irresistible crypto art boom. Text review, collated by walking.

Host: Good evening everyone, our first guest today is Daniel Podaru, co-founder and CEO of Viv3, a Flat-based NFT trading platform. The other is Ben Mauro, one of the world's top concept artists and a very senior art director. If you design or play video games, you'll be familiar with him. His credits include The Hobbit, The Amazing Spider-Man, Call of Duty, and more.

The other two are guests from China. Teacher Cao Yin is a KOL. She entered the NFT field very early and has participated in many projects. Kai works for SNZ, the investment arm of FLOW, and is the investment management director of SNZ.

First, please introduce yourself to all the distinguished guests.

Ben:For the past 12 years, I have been working on concept art design, and I have extensive experience in game and film art design, including Metal Gear Solid, Spider-Man, The Hobbit, Call of Duty, and most recently Halo.

I'm also the designer of Evolution, a limited collection that will soon be available on Viv3, the Flow-based NFT trading platform.

Daniel Podaru:I am the co-founder and CEO of Viv3, an NFT trading platform based on Flow. On the one hand, this platform serves artists. Artists can create their own works of art on this platform and sell their own works of art; On the other hand, as collectors can buy on the platform, collect or resell.

Cao Yin:I'm managing director of the Digital Renaissance Foundation. I am a collector of NFT, especially crypto art. I should be regarded as the earliest collector of crypto art in China. I began to collect crypto art from the end of 2019, and I have collected it on many NFT platforms. In addition, I also curate exhibitions with some friends. Coming up at the end of March at 798 Ullens Art Center in Beijing, BCA will be exhibiting crypto art. This is the first exhibition of crypto art in China, and many of the exhibits were sent by me.

Kai:I made an investment in SNZ. In this AMA I'm the equivalent of a host. I also hope that you can hear more from Ben, Daniel and Cao Yin. I mainly accompany you to run and learn about NFT, FLOW and cryptographic art with guests.

Host: Next, please introduce why you will become attached to NFT.

Ben:I'm a very well known artist in the traditional field. In the second half of last year, I saw some friends' NFT sales were very good, so I became interested in NFT. I think this represents the process of NFT breaking the circle. Some artists were the first to accept, spreading word of mouth among a small circle of friends, and gradually expanding.

Personally, after a lot of research and understanding, I think NFT is a revolutionary development for digital art. That's why, by the way, the collection I'm about to sell is called Evolution. As an artist, this is probably the chance I've been waiting for a lifetime. This is an opportunity to value digital art as much as real world art. Digital art, which was previously thought to be so virtual that it was hard to value, now offers such an opportunity.

Daniel Podaru:As NFT's trading platform, we want to reinvent the way digital art interacts with people and bring NFT into the mainstream. That's our vision as a platform. Some people don't know much about blockchain because they don't have access to it. But now that NFT is available, this segment of the population may become more comfortable with it.

In addition, for artists and creators, their works can be realized in this way. Ben is a good example.

Cao Yin:For me NFT is a pure interest, especially the art of encryption. My own investments are DeFi, porca, ethereum and Near. After investing in DEFI, NFT allows me to relax in the busy and tense environment, which breaks out of the fast-paced environment like DEFI. Personally, I started researching and focusing on NFT around the end of 2019. You start buying on SuperRare and you keep buying more and more.

One of the interesting things about collecting crypto art is that you and the crypto artist grow up together, especially in the early days. For example, in the early days when there were few artists on SuperRare, some crypto artists and I could become very good friends. We often discussed on Twitter and Telegram about how to create more fun things with NFT, and how to let more people know about NFT. For example, when I first met an artist, he couldn't even afford an iPad. The most expensive painting was $60. We bought all of his early works on SuperRare. We have an art gallery in Shanghai, and we have a group of our early friends. You buy this one, he buys that one and he buys all the early works of the artist. It was 3-4 Ethereum at the time. And he recently shot a picture for about $170,000.

So it was like watching crypto artists grow up, little by little, from not being able to afford an iPad to just buying a big house. This feeling is better than collecting the art itself. For us, it's not so much collecting art as collecting artists.

Host: What Mr. Cao said reminds me of what the Medici family did at that time.

For those who still look at the NFT with some hesitation, the next question is: does the NFT represent a new trend for 2021?

Daniel Podaru:Ever since the introduction of the NBA Top Shot on Flow, a lot of people have been queuing for hours to buy the NFT. This represents the attitude of everyone. Other mainstream artists, such as Elon Musk's wife, are also creating NFT artworks based on the blockchain platform. And then there are some super artists that you might not have thought of or believed could get into the field, and are looking for opportunities and possibilities to get into the field. In the future even everything virtual and digital can become NFT. For example, virtual goods on Apple can now be turned into NFT, so the future may be a sea of stars.

Cao Yin:I think NFT is going to be a very big theme in 2021 and beyond. However, the circuits on NFT are very large. For example, there are artists doing crypto art, there are also Decentraland doing virtual property, and there are NFT+Defi. For the crypto world, we need to import all kinds of assets. The original BTC and ETH will become homogenized tokens and cannot represent all assets. So NFT is a very important asset attribute.

But just how many valuable assets there are on NFT requires artists like Ben to create them. The good thing is that I see more and more top artists like Ben working in NFT. But also found that there are many problems. For example, NFT display space and scene is insufficient, there is a threshold for purchase, NFT liquidity has some problems. Including some fake NFTs. It's not that the token is fake, it's just that the works on the token can be plagiarized. There are still some problems.

Personally, I think it's still early days and it's hard to tell if NFT will be the biggest trend or theme of 2021. But what I can think of is that NFT is sure to get better and bigger in the future.

Ben:I also believe that 2021 will be a big year for NFT. It is still early days, but at least in the art world there is a trend. I have observed the artist friends around me, and we all think that the trend of NFT is already very big. If we ignore the trend, we will miss the opportunity to get on the bus.

Now for many artists, especially during the New Crown epidemic, their income has been greatly affected. Artists often go outside to perform, and these activities have been suspended by the outbreak. And NFT offers artists a new source of income. And artists no longer need to create work for a single client, they can create more freely, and the basic security of life can also be obtained.

More broadly, the benefit of NFT is that it is readily available once purchased. It's already been done in games, for example. For example, one game can offer Star Wars, Marvel, etc., but without NFT, a set of skins may only be available in one game. But with NFT, once you own the skin, you can decide to sell it, or bring it to another game. If a game without NFT is a closed system, NFT makes the game world more open.

These are the two perspectives from which I think NFT has become a trend.

Host: Next question Ben, as an artist, do you have any difficulties in bringing your work to the NFT?

Ben:There was no difficulty in creating the work itself, but there was a lot of testing before. Including the creation of a piece of work, or a one-off series. I have released work by work on the Ethereum platform before, but found that the problems on Ethereum are network inefficiency and congestion, which is very serious once the volume of transactions on the network starts to rise. For example, a transaction may take eight hours at the peak of the day. The GAS bill ran into thousands of dollars, when it would normally be five dollars. These are all bottlenecks for Ethereum.

So when I decided to work on a larger (serial) project called Evolution, I felt that Ethereum might not be the best option. Flow and Viv3's platform just contacted me. So I did some research, and the NBA Top Shot was already out, and it was doing really well. I have seen the performance of the NBA Top Shot and I have seen the ability of Flow to handle high throughput. This, coupled with the fact that Flow itself has no GAS charges, and the NBA Top Shot has set records in terms of volume and volume handled, makes me more confident.

To conclude, I started with some experiments on Ethereum. But if you want to do bigger projects with more transactions, maybe Flow is the better choice. As an artist, I also don't want users or collectors who admire me to pay unnecessary fees.

Daniel Podaru:I would like to add the gas charge on FLOW. Whether it's NBA Top Shot or Viv3, Flow pays the user fees through the project side. It is almost impossible for the company to do this. Unless you have a lot of money and you're willing to take a big hit. But it can be done on Flow because the GAS charge is very low.

Host: What is the process of buying NFT art on Viv3?

Daniel Podaru:It's easy. The first step is to create an account. It's the same as creating an account on any social network;

The second step is to generate the address of a FLOW, since all transactions are done with a FLOW token. You need to transfer the Flow token to the Viv3 address in about 40 seconds, which is very fast;

The third step is to go to Viv3's marketplace and buy something you like.

The fourth step is that the purchased NFT will be transferred to your account. The process is very clear.

For artists, the process of creating art doesn't require them to write smart contracts and code themselves. This is all done with the help of the platform.

Host: What was the inspiration for Ben's latest limited edition "Evolution" series?

Ben:I've had this idea since I started my career as a designer. More than a decade ago, we began to explore the idea of life, the universe, biological existence, etc. But at that time because of this idea did not find the most suitable target customers. So I was working on a film team like The Hobbit, but I was also spending more time exploring my ideas when I wasn't working. But there was no way to monetize it before. Now you have a platform to monetize or to turn your work into NFT.  

There are 21 designs in the "Evolution" series, which cover my thoughts on the Evolution of life, the universe, as well as my experiences as an artist in games and film.

The host:Besides Flow, what other NFT directions and projects are you optimistic about?  

Daniel  :NFT is a relatively new field, and I'll just mention a few potential directions. If you think this direction is good and acceptable, you can look for projects based on this direction.  

For example, an NBA Top Shot is a Shot that takes a classic moment in a game and turns it into an NFT. For example, if you're a fan of LeBron James, you can buy his instant NFT, or even get a star to sign it. NFT is composable. Once you have collected a lot of NFT, you can create a virtual gallery and put the entire NFT collection into the gallery. The other is games, where you can put all of your NFT characters into the game. These are all compositional directions for NFT.

The other direction is NFT+ DEFI. One possible application is to fragment ownership. For example, some people will buy up a series of works, and then tokenize the series, and then split it. There may be only 20 works in a series, and then there is the possibility of more works.  

Cao Yin:There are too many NFT directions, such as the use of DEFI in the scenario mentioned just now. For example, we see the insurance policy, the agreement of DEFI, similar to the deposit certificate of the bank to NFT, and then transfer.

AVE is also exploring how to convert some loans into NFT. Behind each NFT is the credit of a specific person. There is still a lot of room for NFT and DEFI to combine, and there are few people doing similar things.  

But right now I'm more bullish on crypto art. Today artists like Ben use digital tools naturally. It turns out that our art, painting or sculpture are physical and figurative, marble, canvas. But in the digital space, physical works of art cannot be displayed or traded. Art has a natural social nature. No one would buy a world famous painting and leave it in their house without telling anyone.  

Painting and other art collection, a very important role is to show social identity, is a show off and show off. Why do rich people want to buy expensive art works to show off their social status? The original works of art were displayed in galleries, art galleries, museums. But it doesn't show up in the digital space.  

Our social scene has moved online and become digital. Traditional works of art are out of date. Therefore, NFT and digitalization of art is an inevitable trend.  

The annual art market, the primary market plus the secondary market, is 500 billion dollars globally. It's a huge market. And that's not including derivatives on art, etc. If at least 10% of the market is NFT, it will be $50 billion, which is also a very large market.  

Not only can NFT bring the traditional art market online, but more importantly, it also unlocks many ways to collect, trade, display and collaborate new art in the digital social landscape. Cryptocat, for example, is a collaborative cryptographic work of art. This kind of thing can not be done in the traditional art space, only in the crypto art space can be done. And that unlocks a whole bunch of very social, very interactive art into our world. So NFT or the crypto art market is at least a $50 billion market. At a higher level, it can not only introduce the traditional art market, but also unlock the creation, collection, display and interaction of new art.

There should be an art platform like Binance on the NFT market, but it's not there yet. So I'm looking for the most likely Binance in the NFT space.

Ben:Let me give you some concrete examples. For example, now there are some brands that make their shoes NFT. You can imagine a pair of virtual AG. On MANA, Decentraland, a virtual shoe belongs exclusively to you.

Virtual shoes on the NFT market

For example, you have an online game equipment or accessories, can be NFT, hit the brand logo. And you buy a certain NFT, hold for a certain period of time, you can receive the brand side to send you the same money offline. The traditional way is from offline to online, but NFT can do that.

Finally, the direction of investment. It is now possible for an NFT artwork to go up in value by a factor of thousands, tens of thousands or even a hundred thousand times in a month.  

Host: The last question is about NFT valuation. The price of NFT fluctuates a lot at present. You'll be interested to know, how do you value the less liquid NFT?

Daniel  :NFT represents a class, not a specific token. That's the first thing to say.  

Valuation depends on the work itself. Just like when you buy coins, you don't do any research and you don't do anything. Surely will understand like BTC, ETH has existed for a long time, the value of the relatively stable currency, coupled with good technology, the team is also good, will decide to buy. The same is true of art. Take a look at whether the artist is unknown or has done projects before and is well known, and you can be sure his reputation will grow. So if you buy early, the future artist becomes more famous, and the value of the work goes up.

Host: I happened to visit some of the big fund houses before, and the founders of the big fund bought the artists at a very early stage. The artists became so famous that they were able to get hundreds of thousands of times the return on their art. But that's the exception.

Daniel  :Again, I want to clarify that NFT is just a formality. You should not focus on whether a work of art is NFT or not, but on whether the work itself is valuable and whether the artist is worth buying. You should focus on substance rather than form.  

Cao Yin:NFT is difficult to value all NFTs in one way. I'm going to talk about the valuation of the crypto art that I know a little bit about. My answer is that crypto art cannot be valued. Because there's no liquidity right now. Valuation needs to have a relatively active secondary market for active trading, through which the price is generated. When it is not active, it can only be the value of collection.

That's why I don't encourage people to collect and buy crypto art as an investment. Because you never know if the encrypted art will be sold in the future. Chances are, the cryptographic art will fetch a very, very high price in your hands, but it may never sell, or when it does, it may have to be sold at a 30 percent or 50 percent discount. This situation is quite common in the traditional art industry. The art I saw was highly priced, but I couldn't sell it. The real sale can only be mortgaged to a special art financing platform, offering you a 30% discount and 40% discount to provide financing amount. That's part of the deal.

Therefore, it is suggested that the attitude of investment in NFT should be put right. Instead of thinking of crypto art as an investment with a clear payoff, think of it as a hobby. If you only want to invest $100 in NFT, turn it into $10,000, then turn it into $10 million, this is very rare, only a few lucky people can resell their NFT.

For example, there are a lot of cards in NBA Top Shot that sell for a lot of money. Including crypto cats are also very expensive cats. But how many people would pay a million or hundreds of thousands of dollars to take it from someone else? There may be, but you can't be sure you're the lucky one. Only when the market is the most FOMO will someone be willing to give others to pick up the plate. My personal advice to you is to collect NFT and crypto art with the right mindset. Look at it as a player, as I do, not as an investor.  

But NFT's platform can buy its tokens and equity with an investment mindset.  

Host: Thank you, Mr. Cao, for your sensible advice. As a final note, Ben's Evolution series will launch on March 3rd at 11pm on Viv3. Thank you very much.

Welcome to join the official BlockBeats community:

Telegram Subscription Group: https://t.me/theblockbeats

Telegram Discussion Group: https://t.me/BlockBeats_App

Official Twitter Account: https://twitter.com/BlockBeatsAsia