Arts and Entertainment Culture Technology

“Astro Boy” Is Being Auctioned as an NFT!

Tezuka Production’s official NFT project “From the Fragments of Tezuka Osamu” starts up.

The first series of the digital art NFT project, “Astro Boy” are auctioned and sold from December 13, 2021, and a portion of the proceeds will be donated for charity.

<From the Fragments of Tezuka Osamu>

Osamu Tezuka was a Japanese manga artist, cartoonist, and animator

His prolific output, pioneering techniques, and innovative redefinitions of genres earned him such titles as “the Father of Manga”, “the Godfather of Manga” and “the God of Manga

Now, “From the Fragments of Tezuka Osamu”, the digital NFT art project based on numerous manga manuscripts by Tezuka Osamu, is finally revealed as the official NFT works authorized by Tezuka Productions. The project consists of two categories, “Mosaic Art NFT” and “Generative Art NFT”, both in motif of Tezuka Osamu’s representative works. The first series features “Astro Boy”, followed by “Black Jack”, and “Phoenix” continuously.

The project also has an aspect of a charity. Tezuka Osamu always thought of children. He kept writing manga for boy’s manga magazines even when his works targeted for adults were well received. He believed manga should be the thing for children. If Tezuka experienced today’s pandemic once in 100 years, he would surely do something to help children suffering.

Therefore, it’s decided that Tezuka Productions donates 20 percent of the net revenues arising from the project to certain public interest organizations such as UNICEF and the like.

<Mosaic Art NFT>

– Background –

For the creation of the art pieces, massive numbers of Tezuka’s manuscripts were exploited. Most of them were in black and white while about five percent of them were in color. In terms of the backgrounds, not only well-known scenes but also frontispieces not contained in the comic books as well as rare manuscripts hard to obtain were selected, and a total of 840 color manuscripts with another layer consisting of eight color frontispieces unique to each comic were arranged. No excess adjustment was made in order to keep the taste of the original manuscripts and to avoid ruining his brushwork. What’s seen on the background is a variety of his works and characters, from heroes to heart-warming scenes to seductive women.

– Character –

Over 4000 sheets of black and white manuscripts excerpt from the manga: Astro Boy were used to form Astro Boy as the motif. All manuscripts were cut into more than 40,000 fragments, and over 6000 of them were placed as mosaic materials. The tone of the character was set based on the original colors of the magazine pages used then. To realize the original tone, the engineers manually adjusted the tone piece by piece. Literally, this art piece can be enjoyed in various ways. Seen from distance, it appeals to audience as a powerful integrated picture. Seen up close, each tiny piece gives off Tezuka’s exceptional enthusiasm for manga creation. This is one and only one art piece in the world. Only the owner can experience the overwhelming world of Tezuka Osamu.

<Generative Art NFT>

Generative Art NFT is a randomly generated artwork based on the image materials used in Mosaic Art NFT. Each artwork consists of the following image materials.

[Large]
– 25 images carefully selected from color manuscripts of the target title
– 1 image placed randomly for each artwork

[Medium]
– More than 900 images carefully selected from color manuscripts of Osamu Tezuka’s works other than the target title
– 4 images placed randomly for each artwork.

[Small]
– 3,200 images carefully selected from fragments of black-and-white manuscripts of the target title
– 32 images placed randomly for each artwork.
– 4 colors replicating the original image of the magazine series applied

In the category, 1050 pieces are prepared for each target title. 1,000 pieces of them are for sale, and the remaining 50 pieces of them are exploited for marketing and other purposes.

The pieces not purchased during the sales period will not be sold again.

< “Astro Boy” Sales Schedule >
– Mosaic Art NFT –
Sales Format: English Auction
Auction site: OpenSea
Period (UTC): From 3:00am on December 15 to 3:00am on December 18
(*The period above will be extended for another 10 minutes if any new bid is made within 10 minutes before the end of the auction)
Number of items: 1

– Generative Art NFT –
Sales format: Fixed price sales
Sales location: Official website
Period (UTC): From 3:00 am on December 13 to 3:00 am on December 20
Number of items: 1000
Scheduled sales price: 0.08 ETH

<Official Website>
https://tezuka-art.nftplus.io

<Copyright notice>
© 2021 Tezuka Productions, All Rights Reserved.Produced by double jump.tokyo Inc.

<NFT>

NFT (non-fungible token), developed based on blockchain technologies emerging around 2017, certifies the authenticity of “one-of-a-kind data”.

Now digital art authenticated with NFT became transferable to third parson readily and freely.

Company Name: double jump.tokyo inc.
Address: 4–34–7, Nishi-Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 160–0023, JAPAN
Representative: Hironobu Ueno, CEO
Business: Development, operation and sales of games and assets using blockchain technology
Official Website:https://www.doublejump.tokyo/
Mail:info@doublejump.tokyo