This article will show you how to generate your own NFT Collection without writing any line of code.

It is written for brands, creators, geeks, and technical and non-technical people who want to launch their NFT collection.

Skeptical? Don't worry, I'll guide you through the process!

You will also learn how to allow people to purchase your NFTs from your website so that they can be traded later on marketplaces like Opensea and Rarible.

What You Need Before Starting:

• An image editing tool - We’ll be using canva.com as it is free and powerful
• A background removing tool - We’ll be using remove.bg as it is free and works well
• A Metamask wallet - If you don't have it, you can get the app or chrome extension here.
• Flume online app

What You Will Learn

• How to prepare the artwork
• How to generate thousands (10,000) of unique images with Flume
• How to generate the metadata
• How to deploy to a blockchain (Ethereum or Polygon)
• How to allow minting from your website

How to Prepare the Artwork

The Basics

If you have a look at any NFT collections out on the web, you’ll notice that all the images within the same collection are kind of similar to each other.

This happens because each NFT collection will be made of different layers.

For example, each image may be composed of:

• background
• outline
• eyes
• mouth
• glasses
• hat

The layers (just as in Adobe Products) work from bottom to top - Imagine them being stacked on top of each other to produce one final image.

Each NFT is generated through a random combination of these layers, based on how rare you set each layer to be.

For each layer, we’ll be designing a set of different images, called traits, in order to allow many unique combinations.

The Rules

You can design image layers in any image editing app.

The important thing is to make sure that all images have:

• transparent background

• PNG format

• same size/dimensions

Don’t forget that your images must line up properly.

I (or we?) recommend the size for your image layers to be 400x400, and in general to keep them squared.

Example of the “Ugly Fishes” NFT Collection

Here is how I prepared the artworks with Canva.com for my NFT collection: Ugly Fish.

1. I created a project in Canva with dimensions 400X400.
2. I created a final and complete example of NFT that I’d like to create, including all traits disposed in the right order.
3. I duplicated this page within the same project many times; as much as I wanted the traits to be.
4. I left the copied pages with only one specific trait of the artwork, which is always the same.
5. I downloaded all images in format PNG.
6. I chose a different color of the trait for each page.
   

Now, since I am using the free version of Canva, I am not allowed to download them with a transparent background.

If you happen to have the paid version, just download all images with transparent backgrounds, and skip the following paragraph.

To make the background of my images transparent, I found a free online tool that worked perfectly: Remove.bg.

I just dragged and dropped all my images into this tool and downloaded them again, this time with a transparent background.

Once I got here, I’ve just repeated this process again and again for each trait of my NFT (you just need to make copies of your project in Canva, as much as the traits are).

My advice is to keep things organized.

In the end, you should get something like this in Canva:

And something like this in your PC’s folder:

I'm sure your NFTs will look way better than my ugly fish :)

How to Generate Thousands of Unique Images With Flume (10,000+)

Connect Your Wallet

To create an NFT collection, you will need to have a Crypto Wallet. I recommend using MetaMask for desktop browsers if you don't yet have one.

Go then to www.getflume.app, click on "Connect Wallet", and start playing with Flume.

Upload Your Content in Flume

We’ll land directly on the home page of the Flume app. Hit the purple 'Create a New NFT Collection' button, and we'll jump to the Artwork Editor page.

Let’s give a title to our collection, specify the image format and the number of NFTs we want to create, and then we can start configuring the layers.

Uploading Images Into Layers

For the upload, we should go by the following logic: group the images we upload in each layer by the trait.

For example, all "Backgrounds" should be uploaded to the same layer, all "Eyes" together into another layer, same for "Mouths" into another, and so on.

By clicking on the “Randomize” button, we’ll be able to get a random preview of the layer combo and check if it’s what we want.

The system will process the layers following the same order we configured into the Artwork Editor - left to right, up to down.

We can even collapse the frame of the layers to keep the workspace clean and ordered.

Don’t forget, from time to time, to hit the ‘Save’ button. Just in case you close the tab, you do not lose the progress done so far.

Setting Rarities and Generating the Metadata

Something we should not forget is to give a name to each layer and each image uploaded - this info will be used by the system to automatically generate the metadata of the NFTs.

Also, for each image, we must specify the “rarity”.

Rarity means the percentage of times we would like the trait to appear in the collection.

It’s possible to choose the rarity of each trait by selecting in the dropdown one of the following options:

• Popular

• Unpopular

• Rare

• Super Rare

The default values for rarity are based on fixed ratios.

How to Deploy the Collection to a Blockchain (Ethereum or Polygon)

Once we've successfully:

• Uploaded all the images

• Given a title and specified the amount of NFTs to be generated

• Configured the metadata and rarities

• … and we're happy with the images shown in the preview box

Let’s hit the 'Generate Collection' button!

The engine behind Flume will start randomly mixing all layers in order to generate the amount of unique NFTs we previously selected.

We now quickly check the final images generated in the preview section. If all is good, we click on the 'Add Collection to the Blockchain' button, select the chain, fill the requested fields and start the deployment.

Flume currently supports Ethereum and Polygon blockchain, each of them with pros and cons.

For the purpose of this article, we’ll be using the Polygon network as Flume won’t charge anything.

Though, we'll be requested at this phase to pay gas fees (not controlled by Flume) for deploying the smart contract.

We now just need to wait and then BAAAAAAM -  COLLECTION DEPLOYED AND WE ARE THE OWNERS OF THE CONTRACT!!!

How to Allow the Minting From Your Website

We are now officially owners of the collection - yes, but what to do now?

Minting Button

The first thing is that we need the users to be able to mint the NFTs.

Flume helps us in this by providing a small piece of code we can copy and paste into any website to make a “minting button” appear.

We have to acknowledge that everything has been free and NO-CODE so far.

Adding a minting button to a webpage may seem more tricky and technical but it is not that difficult, even though a bit of technicality is required.

If You Have a WordPress Site

To add your minting button, you need to install a plug-in for embedding code.

This is the one most of our users install to embed the mint button into their site: "Code Embed" by David Artiss (Link).

Once this has been done, please follow the guide written in that link, and paste your snippet code accordingly.

If You Have Any Other Website

What you have to do is just copy and paste it into your front-end code and customize it - make it beautiful and in line with your style!

The snippet code works with any front-end frameworks so no matter what you are using.

Trading on Marketplaces

Once an NFT of your collection has been minted, it will automatically be available on OpenSea, Rarible, and many other famous marketplaces ready for being traded.

The owner simply has to sign into the marketplace with the same wallet used for the minting, and the NFTs will automatically be synced.

Verify Your Smart Contract

The correctness and security of the smart contracts are required as smart contract failures may cause millions of dollars of lost funds - I warmly advise you to proceed with the verification!

Thus, blockchain applications based on smart contracts should be checked and verified to ensure the correctness, security, and safety of the smart contract implementations.

A verified smart contract is a synonym for transparency and trust.

Luckily, Flume deploys smart contracts that are already verified, so you don’t have to worry about doing it.

I hope you had fun doing this as much as I did - I also created a video guide on YouTube related to this article. For any questions/doubts, just leave a comment or reach out to me at tusamarco1995@gmail.com, and feel free to join the Flume discord server to find a community of creators like you!