Why Jurassic Punks donned an Xsens suit and learned how to catwalk – and why dinosaurs are the most versatile creatures in the metaverse.
Jurassic Punks, or ‘JPunks’, are a unique 3D NFT collection of dinosaurs created in Unreal Engine using Movella’s Xsens Motion Capture. Unlike other NFT collections, JPunks are designed for direct application in the metaverse. The founders of Meta Labs, James Spillman, and Kevin Docherty, who both have VFX backgrounds, created the JPunks collection with an eight-person team. Meta Labs were able to make their dinosaurs ‘metaverse ready’ for the minting of the collection on the 24th of March 2022, which has already sold out.
What does it mean to be ‘metaverse-ready’? When the Meta Labs founders first decided to create an NFT series, most of the NFT collections they could see were static images, but a shift was emerging towards utility NFT projects. The Meta Labs founders decided to utilize their years of VFX experience and build their series from the ground up. Knowing that to be ‘metaverse ready’ they would need to build the fully rigged and modeled avatars before they release the collection, Docherty explained, “the key for us was to build out a series that looked equally as good and detailed animating in the metaverse as it would as a static PFP.”
The team decided that the only way to ensure their NFTs had interoperability, a feature fundamental to the metaverse, was to create their JPunks in Unreal Engine. Spillman, who had been honored with the Unreal Fellowship and, therefore, had a deep understanding of the software, felt that Unreal Engine would be an essential part of the metaverse.
Spillman explained their approach: “We prioritized making sure the look of our JPunks in Unreal Engine replicated the high quality renders our community uses for minting. We could see that by combining our knowledge of VFX with Xsens motion capture, we could create a project that would have real and instant applications in the metaverse. By showing our community the JPunks walking around in real-time, we could provide proof of work before we continued building partnerships with other projects and metaverses. One of our first partnerships was with NetVRk, who is building a metaverse and series of games within Unreal Engine 5. It was great to see that we could provide them with a scene of one of our JPunks, and they could quickly implement it within their game. We wanted to have interoperability, with characters moving across platforms, providing our community with opportunities to collaborate and access other worlds in the metaverse.” The team also has partnerships with My Pet Hooligan and Collider Craftworks– partnerships in which Meta Labs have shared its utilities and motion capture solutions.
“There are so many levels to bridge, which seem to come together with JPunks NFT’s”, explains Remco Sikkema, Senior Marcomms Manager at Movella and Xsens. “There is the virtual environment, the future metaverse itself, the engagement and the understanding that the community has about the NFTs, and then the communities and brands coming together in this space.” It’s this sense of community that’s at the forefront of JPunks’ success. The team established a strong connection with their following on Discord even before launching successfully on social media; they already have 17.5K followers on Twitter. “With our NFTs we can educate the industry as a whole about the pipeline, the software we use, and file formats. We will share our NFT models as an FBX file and teach the community how to use them so that they can create content for themselves,” explains Docherty. The owners of the NFTs or avatars can find utility in their JPunk, personalizing their JPunk when they release their fashion line, for example, or learn how to move into different metaverses.
For Docherty and Spillman, identity and self-expression are fundamental to the development of the NFTs in the metaverse. Dinosaurs, as NFTs, were used because they come in many ages, shapes, and sizes, just like people. JPunks function as avatars- using Apple ARKit, for its facial recognition software, the NFTs can be used as avatars on zoom calls.
The team shares how adding movement to the JPunks has helped the NFT community to see their JPunk ‘existing’ in the metaverse as an avatar and how they might want to develop their NFTs. Docherty commented, “We used Movella’s Xsens motion capture for our JPunks catwalk, a snippet of which was shared in the ‘mint release’ social media post. It would be great to capture individuals’ movements and match them to their avatar in the future.” Docherty refers to Movella’s Xsens ‘Motion-Print’ solution: “It would also be cool to use a celebrity’s motion for your own JPunk- so you can move like Snoop Dog, for example. As we embody digital avatars to explore the metaverse, we’re hoping to see ourselves evolve to use motion capture at a higher level.”
Sikkema defines ‘Motion-Print’ as when “an individual’s unique movements are captured digitally, the copy of their motion, their ‘Motion-Print’, can be applied to their avatar in the metaverse.” “Your motion makes you ‘you’”- Sikkema explains. When you adopt an avatar in the metaverse, one of the fundamental things which will define your identity is the way you move. Docherty is inspired by the role of motion capture in the creation of metahumans.
The role of motion capture also plays a part in accessibility and community in the metaverse. The JPunks team describes their ambitions to explore ‘Motion-Print’ technology to develop personalized movements in the metaverse: “You buy the PFP. We want to build our microverse in modules, so for example with the fashion show, we want to make it possible for the JPunks to choose a door and walk out to a live stage afterward or into another metaverse. We can build on the JPunks metaverse with the community already using it. We want to add onto it; we do not want to be a closed shop.“
There are extensive plans for JPunks’ future, including giving each JPunks a mate, staging a JPunks fashion show, launching a JPunks apparel line, and an animated series competition. Each step in their roadmap will involve the JPunks community and provide more chances to establish identity and collaborate in the metaverse.
https://opensea.io/collection/jpunks-og-rex
Cre: cgsociety
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