The speaker series and training workshop was kicked off by Assistant professor Dr. Malcolm Duerod who gave a short introduction and went on to present his talk entitled: What are NFTs?.
Dr. Duerod gave an overview of the history trends, and current narratives dominating the NFT industry. He used examples and showed a few videos of artists Refik Adanol and Beeples Christie's auction fame. In addition he detailed how many of the top founders in the NFT space came from video game development backgrounds due to the crossover with art, animation, and character identity as well as how this background in video game development is an important component of success in this new industry of digital collectibles.
There was a short coffee break where a fair bit of networking took place. The next speaker was IBU Alumni Sulejman Sarajlija. Sulejman is a two time founder, software developer, and teacher of the Blockchain Fundamentals course at IBU. He discussed the specifics of the technology that underpins NFTs, PFPs and digital collectibles. He helped explain to students how to use open source software tools for creating NFTs.
Last but not least The founders of Cubic Studios were on stage to present their journey as entrepreneurs in the NFT space. IBU graphic alumni Rijad and Vedad are two brothers who co-founded, along with lead designer and fellow IBU alumni Tarik create a visual studio that helps brands bring NFTs to life in the Sandbox game metaverse. Cubic is a Sandbox certified partner and is focused on building out lands for clients in that play to earn game / metaverse.
After lunch students joined the team from Cubic in the Graphic design in the Graphic Design computer lab which is outfitted with 22 high power graphic computers. The workshop went well and students were able to create NFT assets for the Sandbox game metaverse.
