In mid October, I conceptualized a collection of 13 digitally painted, mugshots of fictional characters. I would finish this collection and post them on Opensea. The plan was to immerse myself in the process of selling NFTs, thereby forcing myself to learn the minutia of this emerging phenomenon, so that I could better understand where “art” was heading.
Though my opinion on NFTs was lower than sedimentary rock, I was pressured by a close friend to give it a chance. I forged ahead with the plan out of curiosity, and to prove my suspicions right; that this was a passing craze and nothing more than FOMO. I wanted to be on the peripherals of this, as many of my friends and artist contemporaries in Hong Kong were fanatic about it. But the more research I did, the more cynical I became. I was not going to sell any NFTs from this, and wrote off the time spent on this collection as procrastination from my other projects.
I compared survival in the NFT market as a boat in the ocean. The larger the boat, the easier it is to sail on the torrent of social media and be noticed; the smaller the boat... well.
And I was absolutely right.
…Until two days later.
I sold the first in the collection within 48 hours of posting to Opensea. The second on the next day and a third the day after that. A small break from sales after that, until a week later, another sale, then another. Suddenly I had sold 7. Then 9.
Then they were all gone.
Now, on the eve of 2022, I am writing a follow-up because I believe I am still right, I just made a small miscalculation.
THE SALES
I want to be transparent with how the sales went first, if you are not interested in this skip past it.
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Here is the timeline:
Nov 18 Listing all 13 NFTs onto Opensea
Nov 20 1st sale
Nov 21 2nd, 3rd sale
Nov 25 4th sale
Dec 9 5th sale
Dec 10 6th, 7th sale
Dec 12 Transferred 8th NFT to @DiziArt
Dec 22 9th sale
Dec 23 10th, 11th sale
Dec 23 Transferred 12th NFT to @Yukonomo
Dec 24 Transferred 13th NFT to @DimsumKing
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Out of all the sales, one Buyer had bought five of my NFTs and another friend had bought two.
Furthermore, I transferred three NFTs to separate friends, I will explain my reasoning later.
If you’re wondering why I’m bringing this up, it is because there were only 5 buyers, and one of them bought almost half the collection. Someone saw potential and decided to invest heavily in me.
And I do mean “invest”.
Because despite my delight and astonishment of having sold not one, but ten NFTs, I continued to believe that the purchases were made with the intent to resell at a later date.
Which is something I am 100% for, in fact, I now feel obligated to make more mugshot NFTs so that the prices will rise and these first buyers can make a killing in the process.
And this is the crux of my miscalculation. You see from the very beginning I had held NFTs with very low regard, and by proxy, did not think very much of those who were buying NFTs as well. What I have now learned is that investment is not the only endgame. My mistake is underestimating those who genuinely like art and digital art, who buy NFTs because they want to, and feel no reason to justify their purchase to anyone. I pigeon-holed NFT enthusiast because it was easier for me to digest the phenomenon, not because I was right. The irony of my current predicament is not lost on me.
SO WHAT HAPPENED?
I believe a couple things had happened:
Firstly, as I mentioned, I had miscalculated the community. In my previous post I mentioned how difficult it would be to get noticed due to the sheer amount of NFT art available. Turns out the saturation ended up helping me because it was filled to the brim with the same recycled A.I. generated art (images automatically generated by A.I. using a library of assets like sunglasses, hats, clothes etc.), and I got the feeling people were sick of it. My collection stood out because it was hand drawn and not generated from an algorithm. My series was small, and not the standard 1,000-10,000 spit out images. After posting it to r/NFT on Reddit, the response I got was inspiring to say the least. The level of congratulatory praise and positivity I received was totally unexpected. I stayed on the front page of that subreddit for about 2-3 days. Through that post I also met some amazing people and artists which I have since kept a correspondence.
Here’s the link to the Reddit post.
Secondly, I think I priced the NFTs well at 0.1-0.13 ETH (~USD350). There is a sweet spot between expensive and cheap and I think I was able to hit the exact mark on this collection, which is surprising because I tend to under price myself.
Again, the fact that there is no standard price for NFTs made it easier for me to simply follow my instinct on how much my work is worth. I based the price off a few things; the quality and time it took to create the work, the limited nature of the series, and how much I thought it would be worth if it was in a gallery. Because I was making 13 and had plans to give a few of them away, I wanted to at least have the opportunity to make 1 ETH if I were to sell all of them (~USD3500). For two months of work I thought it would be a fair price.
Thirdly, and this will sound incredibly conceited; I am insanely talented, and have the astounding ability to create gold out of eraser dust.
But seriously, I think the collection is good. Mugshots of famous fictional characters are funny. Their charges and character designs add humor and story. But the most important factor is that they’re recognizable and interesting to look at. They have the added effect of looking good compiled together as well. Overall I’m really pleased with how it’s going and I think it shows.
Finally, I made it clear that I was going to make more. Though, I am now wondering if volume is really the key here. I theorize it is the promise of more to come that is the main driving force to the popularity, but there’s more to it than that.
NFTs typically need to provide some kind of “utility” or “dividend” to its owner. This can manifest in many different ways and one of the ways is through something called “Tokenomics”. Some NFTs can generate a "token" and these tokens can be spent or be used as voting rights for new projects. You effectively become a shareholder in an NFT project.
Utility is not limited to generating tokens. Giving clout to its user can be utility; gaming assets, memorabilia etc. Even so much as having a good story can create value to its buyers. An example being the Gamestop saga a year ago. There is no telling what can be achieved when a group of individuals really put their money where their mouth is. Another example being $PEOPLE from the ConstitutionDAO just last month.
Relaying this back to my collection, “Fiction County Police Department”, the promise of more mugshots to come is the “utility”. More NFTs in a project mean more people can hold it. It means a larger community, which means it becomes more recognizable and more valuable. My guess is that when I finally complete the collection, there will be no more “utility” or “dividend” and there will be no reason for prices to rise as the realization that you simply hold an image sets in. This is where the “hot potato” side of NFTs come in; the last person holding the bill pays for it. Bear in mind I could be wrong, and in 6 months time when the collection is complete I may be eating my words yet again. But it doesn’t feel right to conclude my thoughts on a positive note, so here we are.
FUTURE PLANS
OK, since it's the eve of 2022, I should end on a positive note.
The last three months have been the most successful months I have had as an artist. And it was all through a mechanism I had initially disregarded because I didn’t understand it. The plan is to continue with this project. I’ve planned out 4 series of 13 unique mugshots for the future, where the 13th mugshot will be commissioned by a close friend and then sent to their wallet.
I decided to give NFTs away for two reasons ; firstly, they were people who had always supported me and taken a personal interest in my development. And secondly, strategically, it is better to have many people hold my collection instead of one person buying them and owning too many. I'd rather lose some on sales now, but have a collection with a more impressive ownership statistic.
And in anticipation of the coming end of the series, I am also planning out some form of game/mechanism that would give this NFT project a new direction to head in. The art is there, but the utility is lacking and I think I have a few good ideas.
This experience has given me a renewed confidence and I’m starting to assign a greater value to my artwork and abilities, which is a great feeling. Don’t worry, my wife is Eastern European and keeps my self-esteem real down in the dumps so it won’t go to my head.
The truth is I’ve not realized how much support I’ve had around me. I’ve complained a lot about artists being misunderstood and how it feels like descending a cliff a lot of the time. And while that’s true, I’ve generally kept my gaze downward and never looked up to see the ropes and apparatus above and around me. So thanks to all of you who believed in me and had to wait patiently until I realized it for myself. I’m going to keep working hard and improving myself, and if and when the time comes, I will update my NFT journey again, but who knows, I may never sell another one after this...
There, that’s better.
IG: @stevejho
Opensea: opensea.io/stevejho
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