Essentials
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Before Releasing your Project
Things you should do in preparation for the release of your project.
After you’ve created a beautiful piece of generative art, tested it extensively, and made sure that it works properly, it is now time to release your project on fxhash and get it into your collectors' wallets.
Whether it's your first time, or you've already got a dozen projects under your belt, this is always a daunting step of the process; it takes careful preparation as there are many things that we need to consider. Here are some of the things that should be considered prior to releasing your project.
Assessing if your Project is Ready
Generative artworks are every changing beasts - sometimes it can be difficult to decide on a clear cutoff point. A quote from Zach Liebermann captures this very beautifully:
I feel like I am a wildlife photographer trying to capture the best moments of some wild thing that keeps changing / evolving (that I created)
Some strategies and ideas for deciding if your project is ready:
- Asking other artists for feedback and their opinions
- Generating mock collections to assess if the project has enough variety
- It is also a good idea to set personal deadlines
- Taking a break from and returning with fresh eyes. It can happen
A stellar resource for this is Bruce Studio Yorktown's article on the topic in which he condenses his invaluable knowledge in written form, illuminating several aspect
A Note on Sharing WIPs
Throughout the process of developing your project it is always a good idea to share WIP posts on your socials, short for Work in Progress it is a good way to build anticipation and excitement for your project. Sharing WIP posts has several benefits:
- It's a great way to visually document the development process of your project.
- It shows your collectors and followers that you're dedicating time to your art practice and continuously aiming to improve
- It informs social media algorithms that you're active and helps you reach new audiences
- Your social following can provide early and important feedback on your ideas, which in turn can help nudge the artwork towards its final form
There really aren't strict guidelines as to how many WIPs you should share, it's better to share more than to not share any WIPs at all. As a rule of thumb, it's a good idea to check in once a day, put on the content creator pants and share something you've been working on. It tells the algorithm that you're maintaining forward momentum and helps maintain your social outreach.
Consistency is key here, and building a strong social profile is not something that should be neglected as a digital artist.
Announcement and Release Timing
Announcing your project prior to release is always a good idea. Informing your followers on your socials, and letting your past collectors and potential future collectors know about a potential release frame in advance is usually a good idea. Ideally you schedule a release and share a link to your GENTK's project page ahead of time.
Some things to consider here:
- The date and time of day can play a huge factor on how many of your collectors can be digitally present to participate in the mint.
- Other events that might be happening at the same time can also affect the initial minting period of your project.
Creating a Write-up
Creating a write-up that details the motivations, inspirations and technical aspects of your project can be very valuable to collectors and other artists. You'd be surprised how many of your ideas might resonate with others.
Telling the story of how your piece came together from initial conception to final implementation helps your collectors connect with your art on an emotional level. From a technical point of view, explaining some parts of the code that are involved in the creation of your piece can provide great educational value for those interested in learning more, especially to generative art enthusiasts that don't necessarily come from a programming background.
Detailing some of the technical aspects can also be of value to other artists that are searching for new inspirations and techniques to implement in their own projects. And besides being a vehicle for keeping the conversation going over longer periods of time, it can also serve as a good reference point for your future self, that you can look back to, allowing you to see how you've progressed since then.
The best way for creating such a write-up/article/post is fx(text), where you can natively showcase GENTKs and even mint the text itself as a collectible digital token.