Cardano differentiates itself from competitors by providing an environmentally-friendly and sustainable blockchain that utilizes a much more energy-efficient algorithm to power and secure its blockchain. As of August 2022, Cardano has more than 3.8 million active ADA cryptocurrency addresses and more than 56,000 NFT collections that have been launched on its blockchain.
On August 4th, 2022, Cardano NFT marketplace Fibo hosted a Twitter Space with exclusive guest BrightLeaf Labs, a social initiative born out of the Cardano community to harness the financial power of the Cardano blockchain and mobilize ecological relief projects around the world using Cardano NFTs.
What is BrightLeaf Labs and Why Their Guardian NFTs are Gaining Traction
BrightLeaf Laboratories is well-known for its Guardians NFT collection with 4,509 currently minted Cardano NFTs, 1147 unique wallet owners, and nearly 210,000 ADA in total trading volume.
Holders of a Guardian NFT receive voting power over future Brightleaf decisions and its collection. The profits from its Guardian NFT sales will go directly towards environmental preservation, starting with one tree planted for each Guardian NFT sold. More NFT options will be rolled out for the Cardano community including exclusive NFT collections and metaverse land purchases.
A Recap of Fibo’s Twitter Space with BrightLeaf Labs
During the Q&A conversation, BrightLeaf Labs discussed why they chose Cardano, the strength of the Cardano community, the future of NFT art and games in general, their plans for dropping NFT collections, and tips on how to build an online NFT community for creators and other Web3 startup projects.
The following Q&A transcript has been edited for clarity and length.
Fibo: How did BrightLeaf choose the Cardano blockchain for the Guardians NFT project?
Brightleaf: When we got started in our Web3 journey, there was a lot of movement going on inside the Cardano community. The more we looked into it, the more we understood how die-hard these people were. Not only the builders but also the investors; the Cardano community are true believers.
So, it did not take much to convince the entire team to build BrightLeaf on Cardano as it was the most suitable option for an NFT project like this. As soon as we launched our Twitter and Discord channels, the Cardano community showed up right away and we were impressed by that. As a team that had never done this before, we would have struggled a lot more in the beginning if it wasn’t for the support of the Cardano community.
Also aside from more reasonable transaction fees, Cardano felt a lot safer for us to do our first Web3 project as opposed to other blockchains.
Fibo: How did Cardano community members assist you exactly?
Brightleaf: We had the opportunity to jump on calls to learn about how to build blockchain metadata correctly, ask questions about minting processes, and so on. Sometimes the information is very specific, for example, if our Policy ID was locked, we would not be able to build our NFTs as how we intended them to be.
We want our Guardians (Brightleaf’s NFT characters) to be customizable in the future, so people can merge body parts and create their own Guardian NFT. These things are very easy for people to miss when developing an NFT. We got the right information from Cardano people that have built projects before to make sure that our NFT collections are prepared for future developments.
Fibo: How do you see the future of NFT art & games?
Brightleaf: We are making sure that our Guardians are prepared for metaverse integration when the time comes. But at the moment, we are not particularly planning to build a full game ourselves. So the objective is to keep bringing game-related utilities to our Guardians by partnering with other companies and projects.
NFTs and blockchain technology will act as the solutions for in-game asset ownership for gamers. It is a gigantic industry and gamers are already accustomed to tokenizations or virtual currency. NFTs will also tie the in-game assets to gamers, instead of the game company or developers, which will protect the gamers’ investment of the time and money that they have put into these games.
Owning accessories or in-game assets is not necessarily a new thing, but the interesting concept about blockchain is you could carry your in-game asset throughout different platforms, thus giving you more security on your in-game investments. This will also give more value to in-game assets.
Fibo: Community is the heart & soul of any NFT project. Could you share with us tips on how to build an NFT community?
Brightleaf: We announced our Guardians NFT collection through Twitter. At that time, I felt like the whole NFT and crypto ecosystem was very saturated with a lot of projects launching. How the public responded to our NFT community back then would be very different from anybody who is just about to launch their projects right now, simply because of the different amount of attention in the NFT space compared to now.
We gained attention right away by uploading teasers about our upcoming project, starting from the artwork itself. Our artist, Oto, has had professional experience in designing cars for a major brand, therefore we emphasized the artwork itself. The artwork stood out, and it brought people in. Once we got their attention, then people could learn more about the project and decide if this is something that they are interested in.
We started with a vague image that showed the quality of our 3D artwork, and then we followed up with a teaser video of how Guardians would look. That captured a lot of attention from the NFT community. We spent a lot of time identifying the influencers of the space and talking to them to preview our work-in-progress to get their feedback. So as soon as we launched our project, we also had important influencers supporting us.
That would be our message to anyone who is thinking about starting their own NFT project: Familiarize yourself with the community first, see what is going on, and make your way from there.
Also, use time wisely. Plan for the first one or two months. Plan out what you want to show on your social media and Discord. Prepare the images and content you want to share and schedule your postings in advance. Spend time on other projects’ Twitter and Discord to look at what they are doing, what works, and what doesn’t. Study how you can give people reason to buy what you are selling first, and structure that in a way that will help you come up with new ideas even after you launched your NFT project to the public.
Join our EMURGO and Fibo NFT Community on Discord
A Cardano NFT marketplace, Fibo empowers artists and collectors for a positive social impact.
Developed by a founding entity of Cardano, EMURGO, Fibo leverages Cardano’s environmentally-sustainable and open-source blockchain technology to offer an all-in-one NFT platform including Yoroi wallet integration, minting, and buying, and selling Cardano NFTs.
To get started on Fibo, please download Yoroi Wallet Google Chrome Extension and send some Cardano ADA to your account.
Follow Fibo on Twitter and Discord using the links below.
About Fibo
- Fibo Homepage: https://fibo.art
- Fibo Twitter: @fiboNFT
- Fibo Discord: Fibo Community
