THE MOTORCYCLE 

Steve McQueen had an intense passion for riding motorcycles, as exemplified many times on screen and in his personal life where he competed in a variety of desert races and endurance races such as the 1964 International Six Day Trial event. Steve’s garage included many Triumph motorcycles such as the ’62 TR6 Trophy used in the film of The Great Escape, a ’66 Bonneville 650 ridden in San Francisco while filming the movie Bullitt, and a ’63 Bonneville which McQueen converted into a Desert Sled.

The latter was the inspiration for the bike used by Kalish, which was a 2022 Triumph Bonneville T100 in Jet Black. Following the completion of painting Kalish adorned the motorcycle with the same colors laid down on the canvas using a splatter technique. The result is a truly distinct one of one Michael Kalish painted Triumph modern classic with bright splashes of white, light blue and yellow starkly contrasting the original jet-black scheme.

The Process

Chase McQueen has racing in his veins. Following in the footsteps of his grandfather Steve, and father Chad McQueen, who enjoyed a long career racing cars, Chase has been racing on both four and two wheels since his childhood. Confident in his skills from years of riding and racing, Chase agreed to ride the Bonneville on his most difficult surface yet, a giant canvas covered in wet paint.

To fully prepare the canvas for the final portrait, McQueen and Kalish spent hours laying down fresh layers of paint. Kalish would throw a gallon at a time of white, light blue and yellow paint onto the canvas, and McQueen would ride the T100 over it to spread the paint. After hours of application, the canvas was perfectly coated in the blend of colors, with care to ensure plenty of tire treads were noticeable in the paint.

With the paint full applied, Kalish meticulously peeled back layers of previously masked and scored sections of canvas to reveal an instantly recognizable and stunning portrait of Steve McQueen.

“KING OF COOL RACING TEAM” DIGITAL COLLECTIBLES

Following the incredible result of Kalish’s vision for an artistic tribute to iconic actor and motorcycle rider Steve McQueen, the family of Steve along with Kalish and Triumph Motorcycles were inspired to create a similarly premium artistic tribute that could be available for McQueen, Triumph, and Kalish enthusiasts. By creating a set of generative Web3 digital collectIbles, 1,000 fans worldwide will be able to own a unique piece of digital art which authentically represents the timeless style and boundary pushing spirit of Triumph, McQueen, and Kalish, all at an accessible initial price point of $99 USD.

 

Boundary Breaking Legacy in a Modern Medium

While Triumph and Steve McQueen are well known for timeless style, they’re also known to push boundaries and often being ahead of their time. Kalish follows suit as he famously created a new genre of art by converting used license plates into impressive masterpieces celebrating pop culture and Americana. When embarking on a project to create a set of digital collectibles, it was important to do so in a way which celebrated the innovative spirit of the trio.

An award winning Web3 partner, Verified Labs, was trusted to help deliver a boundary breaking collection of digital art. At their recommendation, the final set will be a set of 1,000 unique generative, interactive, and fully 3D 360 degree NFT’s, the first of its kind ever released on the ThetaDrop platform.

To bring the innovative concept to life Web3 animation studio, Immersive Enterprise Laboratories (IEL), first designed a fully three-dimensional virtual garage where owners will discover a Triumph Bonneville T100 motorcycle, rider, and digital recreation of the original Kalish portrait of Steve McQueen. IEL used Unreal Engine to build the garage and each of the elements within, making the collection truly 3D from 360 degrees, which can be viewed within virtual reality headsets or proudly showcased in spatial reality displays via a FBX file.

Then to make the collectibles interactive, IEL produced an engaging animation which can be triggered by the NFT’s owner. Upon interacting with the T100 sitting on a pool of paint in the center of the garage, bike’s rider starts the engine, puts the motorcycle in gear, and begins to do a burnout, which sprays paint against the wall of the garage which reveals a portrait of Steve McQueen just like the real-life Kalish original as the paint drips off the wall.

Finally, to make each of the 1,000 unique, IEL used a generative process to assign color variations on a handful of elements within the garage, making no two NFTs from the collection the same. Elements that change range from the bike paint scheme or a splatter effect on it, to the color of the rider’s Triumph Bradden Air Jacket and color of the McQueen portrait. The combinations of color variants make certain NFTs from the collection more or less rare, depending on how many in the collection share attributes for each of the elements.

1,000 Unique Digital Collectibles

To ensure a high variety of uniqueness in each collectible, and to allow for some to be more common or more rare than others, 7 elements from within the garage have been produced with anywhere from 3 to 10 distinct attributes per element. With a total of 42 total unique attributes, which are broken down below, it would have been possible to create a total of 141,120 unique generative NFTs.

Unique elements and attributes include:

• Motorcycle Color: 10 Total (5 colors with splatter paint and 5 without)
• Rider Jacket Color: 8 (Blue, Green, Red, Orange, Grey, Bradden Air Race Blue, Bradden Air Race Green, and splatter painted)
• Rider Glove Color: 3 (Black, Red, White)
• Rider Helmet Color: 7 (Blue, Green, Red, Orange, Black, Grey, splatter painted)
• Goggles: 7(Blue, Green, Red, Orange, Black, Grey, splatter painted)
• Neck Tube:3(Black, Checkered, Union Jack Flag)
• Portrait Color:4

EASY TO ACQUIRE AND INCENTIVES FOR COLLECTORS

An important consideration of the project was for the collection was both accessible to interested enthusiasts, and that each of the collectibles also presented value for its owner.

To ensure that any interested fan around the world could secure their very own “King of Cool Racing Team” digital collectible, ThetaDrop was selected as the marketplace for the initial drop. Key advantages of the ThetaDrop marketplace are that it is user friendly and does not require cryptocurrency to purchase or trade NFTs. Those key benefits will more easily allow first time NFT buys to join the “King of Cool Racing Team”, with a much lower barrier to entry that other marketplaces.

To support the long-term value proposition, the collection will be limited to only 1,000 unique versions of the NFT. Also, to incentivize trading of the collectible, which supports an increase in value for owners, there will be a trio of challenges with high-value prizes attached to each challenge.

Trading Challenges and Prizes

Following the initial drop of the “King of Cool Racing Team” collection, a series of challenges and prizes will be made available to owners.

Challenge Name: “The Race to 100”

Challenge Prize: The Ultimate Motorcycle Rider Kit

Prize Description: Rider apparel kit consisting of black Triumph Bradden Air Racing leather jacket, black Triumph Sulby leather glove, and black Bell Moto3 helmet, all covered in splatter paint by Michael Kalish consistent with the splatter paint design scheme which adorns the 1:1 Bonneville T100 used for the original portrait.

Challenge Requirements: Be the first to collect a total of 100 “King of Cool Racing Team” NFTs

Challenge Name: “Luck of the Draw”

Challenge Prize: 5’ x 5’ Michael Kalish portrait of Steve McQueen

Prize Description: A one of its kind 5’x5’ recreation of the original 25’x25’ portrait of Steve McQueen, created by Michael Kalish using a similar technique as the original.

Challenge Requirement: At the time of initial sales, One of the 1,000 NFTs will be randomly identified at the one paired with this prize. The owner will know their NFT is the prize-winning asset, and may be kept or re-sold to an interested buyer. Prize will be awarded to the owner of the identified NFT at the end of the two-week period.

Challenge Name: “Survival of the Rarest”

Challenge Prize: Sony 15.6” 4k Spatial Reality Display

Prize Description: Made with Sony's Eye-Sensing Light Field Display (ELFD) technology, the Sony 15.6" 4K Spatial Reality Display delivers an immersive 3D optical experience without 3D glasses or a VR headset. The 15.6" display features a 3840 x 2160 resolution and is combined with Sony's own proprietary high-speed vision sensor. The sensor follows your eyes in vertical, horizontal, and depth axes simultaneously. Monitoring your eye movement down to the millisecond, the sensor can render the image instantaneously. The result is a realistic, virtual 3D environment that can be seen from any angle without the need of additional hardware.

Challenge Requirements: At the end of a two-week period be the owner of with a combination of the most 10 rare NFTs compared to other owners.

OWN THE ULTIMATE COLLECTIBLE

For only the most enthusiastic fan, there will be the most rare version of the “King of Cool Racing Team” collectibles paired with the actual 2022 Triumph Bonneville T100 with original splatter paint design which was ridden by Chase McQueen to create the original large format Michael Kalish portrait of Steve McQueen available for auction.

The “most rare” version of the digital collectible in fact brings the set to a total of 1,001 unique NFTs and will be the only one in the set with the motorcycle in black with the splatter paint design which matches the real-world motorcycle. This most rare version also features the exact reproduction of the original Kalish portrait.

This ultimate collectible combination will be auctioned for a two-week period on ThetaDrop. The starting bid for this priceless one of one Michael Kalish painted motorcycle ridden by Chase McQueen paired with the most rare “King of Cool Racing Team” will be $15,000 USD. The pair will be awarded to the highest bidder of the virtual open auction at the end of the two-week period.