Interpreting Generative BRC-721: A New Perspective on Ordinals Inscription Collections
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Interpreting Generative BRC-721: A New Perspective on Ordinals Inscription Collections
It's no surprise that Generative BRC-721 emerged amid high fees on the Bitcoin network, reducing transaction costs and making management more convenient, yet moving one step further away from simplicity.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: xiyu
1. Background
Project address:
https://github.com/jerryfane/generative-brc-721
On-chain fees remain high; Generative BRC-721 optimizes the use of ordinals block space.
2. Introduction to Generative BRC-721
2.1
Use the "deploy" operation to create generative BRC-721 collections with unique traits stored on-chain. The "mint" operation then generates non-fungible ordinals that reference these traits from the deploy operation. This process reduces block space usage by 50% to 90%. Frontends will need to adapt to reconstruct and display images from mint inscription text data.
2.2
Base64 is a method for representing binary data using 64 printable characters. These characters are typically A-Z, a-z, 0-9, "+" and "/", with "=" used as a padding character. The Base64 encoding process works as follows: every three bytes (24 bits) of data are divided into four groups of six bits each—since 64 equals 2 to the power of 6, each 6-bit group corresponds to one Base64 character. Each 6-bit segment is then mapped to its corresponding Base64 character.
Images can be converted into Base64-encoded strings and directly embedded in HTML, eliminating the need for additional HTTP requests to load the image. However, Base64-encoded images are approximately 33% larger than the original, so this method may not be suitable for large images or frequent transmissions.
3. Operations
3.1 Creating a Generative BRC-721 Collection Using the Deploy Operation
The deploy operation is a JSON/text inscription containing general collection information and base64-encoded data of the traits that make up the collection. Unique images defining the characteristics used to generate non-fungible ordinals are stored on-chain within this inscription, serving as the authoritative reference and source. Multiple deploy inscriptions can be created for the same collection, each storing a different set of traits.
3.2 Creating a Non-Fungible Ordinal for the Collection Using the Mint Operation
The mint operation uses a JSON/text inscription that encapsulates information about the specific non-fungible ordinal being minted, along with a reference to the deploy inscription. Its purpose is to store on-chain the attribute values used to generate the image, the final image hash, and a reference to the collection's deploy inscription. This approach allows anyone to recreate the image using the on-chain engraved data.
3.3 Transferring Non-Fungible Ordinals as Inscriptions
4. Advantages
4.1 Optimized Inscription Space Usage
During deployment, components are deployed as JSON inscriptions. During minting, the system directly references information within those inscriptions, significantly reducing the size of mint inscriptions. As a result, the entire collection saves on transaction fees during on-chain deployment.
4.2 Easier Collection Management
Mint operations include labels such as IDs, making it easier for project creators to manage collections afterward—an ongoing pain point in ordinal NFTs that Generative BRC-721 conveniently addresses.
4.3 Fully On-Chain
Fully on-chain storage ensures theoretical decentralization. From a decentralization standpoint, there is no difference from regular inscriptions—only the display format differs.
5. Disadvantages
5.1
Fee savings are insufficient—the official project Ordibots only achieved a 55% reduction, which I consider somewhat low. Actual savings depend on image size: larger images yield higher savings ratios.
5.2
Requires frontend support—a difficult consensus to achieve. Wallets and marketplaces are unlikely to proactively develop compatible frontends unless the market grows significantly.
5.3
An indirect solution, similar to Ethereum layer-2 networks. Layer-2 solutions emerged due to high mainnet fees. If the mainnet remains active, layer-2 holds value; however, if mainnet usage declines, the importance of layer-2 diminishes accordingly.
6. Conclusion
It’s no surprise that Generative BRC-721 emerged amid high Bitcoin on-chain fees. It reduces costs and simplifies management but moves further away from simplicity. I see this as a trade-off—there’s no absolute better or worse option, just a choice between more intuitive on-chain NFTs versus frontend-rendered JSON NFTs.
Generative BRC-721 is logically sound and effectively solves the issue of categorizing collections—something I welcome. While it has pros and cons, it is precisely such innovations that push ordinals forward incrementally.
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