Darkblock just wrapped up a project with Jungle Cats, a PFP project on Solana, that yielded the creation of more than 110,000 unique 3D assets. Using Darkblock’s protocol for decentralized unlockable content, each of these 3D assets was encrypted, stored in a darkblock that was minted on Arweave, and immutably attached to one of the 5,585 NFTs in the Jungle Cats collection.

This morning, holders of each Jungle Cats NFT has exclusive access to 10 unique 3D frames that showcase their iconic lion PFP. These frames vary in shape and color, ensuring that every asset is a truly one-of-a-kind addition to the NFT holder’s collection. NFT holders can now showcase their framed Jungle Cats PFP in virtual reality environments or explore augmented reality experiences. The possibilities are limited only by the imagination of the Jungle Cats community.

In addition to the Darkblock protocol’s ability to turn NFTs into decentralized vaults for encrypted digital assets, this project was also made possible by PFP Content Factory, Darkblock’s content-generation and bulk-upgrade tool. PFP Content Factory allows project founders to quickly generate unique images derived from all the PFPs in their collection, then upload the entire batch of newly generated images and have each one automatically attach to the correct corresponding NFT within the collection.

This partnership exemplifies the power of Darkblock’s decentralized unlockable content technology and its ability to enhance and add value to NFT projects. By providing Jungle Cats NFT holders with unique and exclusive 3D assets, Darkblock enriches the community’s experience and solidifies the value of owning a Jungle Cats NFT.

Jungle Cats holders can access and download their 3D assets by visiting the Darkblock app and following these steps:

• Connect your wallet
• Select “My NFTs” from the main nav bar
• Select the “Unlockables” tab to view your NFTs that have decentralized unlockable content attached
• Click on your Jungle Cat PFP
• To the right, under the description, you should see the Darkblock Viewer with some content visible, but still inaccessible. Click the button that says “Authenticate Ownership”
• Sign the message to confirm you own the wallet that contains this NFT
• Once the content is decrypted, select the file and download!
• Show it off in AR or VR environments

While Jungle Cats holders can access their 3D assets via the Darkblock app, the unlockable content is accessible from anywhere that integrates the protocol. Darkblock’s mission is to decentralize content and make it accessible anywhere someone interacts with their NFTs, whether it’s an ebook, videos, PDFs, or metaverse assets.

If you have a PFP project and are interested in doing something similar for your community, check out PFP Content Factory and/or email Whit, who leads communications and partnerships at Darkblock. 

Attendees needed an NFT (which we airdropped to people who completed a form on our website) in order to enter the virtual space.

Following the event, a goodie bag of content—or as we call it, an “unlockable party pack” (UPP)—was attached to the NFTs that holders needed to access the event. The NFT owners could access the gifted digital assets by visiting app.darkblock.io, verifying their wallet, and then utilizing the Darkblock Viewer to display the goodies in their full glory. The UPP featured creations from @stixandjones, @WDSNFT, @j_hanL, @Polycount_io, and @Ragnar_Mari. 

For a full recap, watch the live stream here. For our favorite moments and written instructions on creating an event in the Metaverse, keep reading!

The tour

“Alright, so, let’s go walk around. We’ve got the theater room. Got some Darkblock specific art on the walls courtesy of Jayhan setting this amazing space up. Our first installation is Jayhan’s. If you’ve ever been to his ISOblock (a customization of the ISO block virtual environment), it’s next level. The guy’s a phenomenal talent and an even better human. 

Then we have WELLDRESSEDSOCIETY. They were kind enough to give us a model of some of the high end fashion that they’re building. One of the challenges in the metaverse is future proofing. As resolutions increase on our browsers, bandwidth increases, what looks good on a 4k TV won’t look good on the 8K TV. These guys are building fashion at such a high resolution that whatever NFT you buy from them in the future, it’ll last. Amazing work.

Head on over here to the deck, Angie Jones. If you haven’t watched the office hours a couple weeks ago (link) with Angie, she’s an artist, an animator, a genius, a goddess. Her work, it’s got whimsy, it’s got darkness, it’s at such a high level of execution. She’s been kind enough to let us have something for the goody bag today. She has a project launching in the fall, Beast Mob, amazing looking art pieces that we can all own.

Heading on over to our candle area. Polycount guys, these talented designers and architects, I was lucky enough to visit their location. It’s in the future. I don’t know what century they live in, but it’s far away from where we are right now.  They’re the creators of this beautiful penthouse that we’re standing in right now as well as some other high end luxury items. And they’ve gifted us something unique, one of a kind that, they haven’t done before for the UPP.”

The mission

“All of you had to have an NFT in your wallet to get into this room. I think part of the future for events is having a ticket, especially these metaverse events. The idea of NFT token gating, having people have an NFT in their wallet to allow access, not only kind of gives you the ability to check roll and know who attended/have some permanence there, but it also could be a money making opportunity. What I do for a living, I work at Darkblock. We are not an NFT creation company. We’re not a creative company per se. We’re a bunch of plumbers writing software for the future. We have a protocol and a ton of software that enables decentralized unlockables that are associated with NFTs. Our goal is to marry NFT access. I own an NFT, therefore I should be able to watch the Mandalorian, or any movie, or consume 3D content instead of renting everything. Rental and NFTs will be a thing, but today, I’ll have a sense of ownership where I own access to a given asset for hundreds of years instead of it being stored in a temporary space.”

How to host in the metaverse

“What we’re gonna do is break down how and what we did to make this event happen. The creation, the NFT, the distribution…all the steps we did to enable tokengating here in spatial. First, the NFT that you all have in your wallet, it was purchased for $18 on Videohive (Videohive or other template tools allow you to put up something very sexy very quickly). So I spent eighteen bucks, added our logo to the premier file, rendered it, and then used that Mp4 file as the asset when I generated the Open Sea NFT. I created NFT. Next step, NFT distribution. You all were sent a link. It was either socially via Discord/Twitter or via email (which all wound up in the spam folder…lesson learned). We used a site called linkdrop.io, where you create the NFT, log into their tool, connect your wallet, create a campaign, step through their process, and the output is a list of custom URLs that when a person clicks it connects their wallet, they’ll be able to claim. That’s on the ethereum polygon side. There are some other tools on the Solana side. Once you have your NFT created and you’ve figured out a way to distribute this NFT via links or  you get somebody’s address and drop it in their wallet, the next step is creating your metaverse environment here in spatial. There are a number of hosting tools inside spatial. You will need a Spatial Pro account ($25/mo). You click hosting tools, set to token gated access, and then you add the contract ID to that contract address field. That’s pretty much it. 

The next step is setting up your metaverse space. This is the easy part because you get professionals involved. Get yourself a high end NFT and then hire someone like @j_hanL. He’ll help you set up the space.

The last piece…let’s say you run your event. It’s in a high end, beautiful place. You’ve gotten people to attend the event via NFT token gating. What is the memory? What is the leave behind that you give your audience?…”

UPPs

“When you mint on Open Sea, you’ll see a little unlockable toggle and it’ll be just a URL.  What I see a lot of 3D artists do is they provide a link to their Google drive and that’s where they store that 3D asset that I just spent $500 on. Our [Darkblock’s] goal is letting people have true unlockables with 200 years of storage associated with the NFT. Not right click save, a true kind of ownership. That is what Darkblock is all about.

Any of you right now, as an NFT creator, you can go to the ‘DAPP’ tab on app.darkblock.io,  connect your wallet, and view any NFT you’ve created. You can also add unlockables to it. Right now, we [Darkblock] pay the bill to store it forever in Arweave. We allow multiple content types,

3D artists, movies, audio, JPEGs of various sizes, ping files, etc.. We don’t care what you put in the Darkblock, just that the only person who can open it is that NFT owner.” 

Oprah moment

“So all of you have an NFT.  So if you look under your [figurative] chair, this is my Oprah moment, you’ve got a goodie bag. Every NFT for this event has unlockables associated with it. Go to app.darkblock.io, connect with your wallet. All we’re doing there is verify that you are indeed the owner of this NFT. Then there are some goodie items from @stixandjones, @WDSNFT, @j_hanL, @Polycount_io, and @Ragnar_Mari. You have the ability to download any of these and see details about the art.”

Big thanks to all of our event attendees for being engaged, asking questions, and sharing their work! And a huge shout out to @stixandjones, @WDSNFT, @j_hanL, @Polycount_io, and @Ragnar_Mari for contributing to our UPPs! Go follow these amazing creators on their various socials and stay updated…you won’t want to miss their next drops…

Tune into our office hours every Thursday on Youtube Live and make sure to send us your questions, topics, and guest suggestions! As always, we are reachable on twitter and discord.