It’s really simple. It’s that simple in fact, that hundreds of people have already jumped on the bandwagon (including me), and have already started selling their AI generated photos and art online. The market is slowly starting to get saturated, so don’t wait around! Which marketplaces to use? Which stock photo websites accept AI-generated content? You will learn every single step of the process in this tutorial. Read on and thank us later!
I’ve been selling stock photos for over 5 years now, and I’ve earned over $10,000 doing it as a side hustle. Let me introduce you to my new side job I’m taking up now – selling AI generated images online!
TL;DR – For The Impatient
First – Where Can You Sell AI Generated Images (And Where You Should)
Second – How Can You Start Generating Images For Free
Third – What Sells, And How Not To Waste Your Time
Fourth – How Much Can You Earn Realistically?
How To Upload AI Images To Freepik
How To Upload AI Images To Wirestock
How To Upload AI Images To Adobe Stock
Tips & Tricks For Starting Out
Check out also: Stable Diffusion WebUI Settings Explained – Beginners Guide
TL;DR – For The Impatient
Here is the overall TL;DR workflow that is described in detail in this very article. Each step is explained down below, so scroll down if you want to learn more.
Apply to the following stock photo selling websites which allow uploading AI images: Freepik, Adobe Stock and Wirestock.
Generate high quality AI images using either free, or paid tools and upscale them afterwards.
Title and keyword your images, submit them to the stock agencies you’ve signed up to and wait for them to be reviewed and come up in your image portfolio. You will earn money each time someone purchases your image.
Repeat the step 3 until you have a sufficient amount of accepted high quality images in your portfolio to generate satisfying income. That’s it!
So that’s the general idea! – Read on to learn more.
First – Where Can You Sell AI Generated Images (And Where You Should)
The very first thing we should briefly talk about is the exact places online where you can actually earn money by selling your AI generated photos and images. What you should know, is that not all stock photo websites and online stock agencies out there support selling contributor-generated AI imagery.
Some websites and platforms will allow AI generated content to be sold freely, albeit not many. If you attempt to upload AI generated works to a stock website which does not officially let you sell AI images your files either won’t get accepted at all, or will later get removed from your portfolio and you’ll risk your account getting permanently banned.
If you know which sites are alright with selling and promoting AI-generated content, you can safely upload all your works and let them generate some passive income for you.
There are 3 main stock photo agencies that allow for a simple and almost effortless AI pictures upload: Freepik, Adobe Stock and Wirestock. The last one is a little bit different from the first two, but we’re gonna explain that a bit later on. The well-known agencies that do not accept such images are to name a few; Shutterstock, iStock and Alamy.
And here is the most important thing: there is no good reason not to be selling your works on all 3 of these platforms. As a stock photographer with a few thousand photos in my portfolio, I’m selling these photos in over 6 different stock photo agencies, each of which gives me some additional income each month. When you’ve done your work generating your quality images, not submitting them on all the sites that can present them to buyers is a waste of your energy, your time, and most importantly – your earning potential.
- Sign Up On Wirestock
- Sign Up On Freepik
- Sign Up On Adobe Stock
Let us quickly run you through all the ways that we tested with a short characteristic of each method to help you quickly pick one to try first!
Using Free/Paid Online Tools – There are a lot of websites that allow you to generate images using AI, and each of them has different free trials and paid plans available. For us, two of these stand our from the crowd.
Leonardo.ai – Quite a new player in the game with their revolutionary Alchemy ultra-realistic models which has one of the most affordable plans available if you wish to go for the paid option, and a great free trial with daily renewing generation tokens that you can use to create high quality AI images without spending a dime!
If you want to know the best of secrets in this article,
Midjourney – This one, which you most probably already know, has neat trial options and quite affordable monthly subscription plans. Check it out if you want to create your images quicker and you care about quality the most.
Generating Images Locally On Your System For Free – you can do this by making use of the free open-source Stable Diffusion WebUI clients if only you have a PC/GPU that can handle the image generation process reliably.
We have lots of useful guides for this here on our site, and the best one to start with would be the one showing you how to install the Stable Diffusion WebUI on a Windows PC.
Give Leonardo.ai a Try For Free Here!
Or learn how to use Stable Diffusion locally here: How To Install Automatic1111 On Windows – Easier & Quicker Way!
Regardless of the way of generating images you’ll decide to go with, two things are the most important. First – the model/image generation tool you’re using should (and all listed above do).
Second – the stock agency you’re uploading your generated images to should accept AI imagery and you should adhere to their specific quality and intellectual property rules when submitting your files.
And always remember: the image quality matters a lot. Buyers won’t buy low-quality content, even if it somehow makes it through the review process. Avoid any kinds of deformation, unnatural looking objects and multiple limbs in your creations and keep your content high quality!
For me personally, the best way and the way I go with is local image generation. Just keep in mind that if you decide to go that way, you need to have a sufficiently powerful GPU and be able to set up the image generation software by yourself. Refer to our tutorials for more info!
A Word On Upscaling
When you generate images using AI, with most models your output won’t be of sufficient resolution to be uploaded to compatible stock photo marketplaces. You will need to upscale them.
How to do this? Well, almost every AI image generation tool out there has some kind of a built-in upscaler that is able to up the resolution of your chosen image without, or with minimal quality loss.
Most of the online tools have a streamlined way of upscaling your images right after generation without getting into any advanced settings or terminology. All in all, you just need to be mindful of the fact that in most cases you will have to upscale your works after generating them to submit them to stock websites.
If you’re not satisfied with the upscaling results from your chosen tool, check out the Topaz AI Gigapixel software – this is the one we use both for our actual photos and AI generations. It’s really worth its price!
Third – What Sells, And How Not To Waste Your Time
One of the most important questions when it comes to selling both traditional stock photography and AI generated images alike is: what kind of images to make that will eventually sell. After all, market trends are what moves the royalty-free image selling market.
So, how to know what sells and what does not? There are three ways you can save your time by doing just a little bit of research before you start generating your images.
Research where stock images in general are mostly used – this is one of the most vital tips here. Blogs, websites, online display ads, book covers and magazines and much more. Stock photos are everywhere, and hundreds of thousands of them are bought every day.
Search for topics that are in demand, but are not yet saturated – for instance you probably have little to no chances competing with the large amount of images of “fruits isolated on white background” photos. But maybe, you have better chances to compete within the more specific “dragonfruit on a wooden table” niche. It’s really similar as the long-tail keyword methodology in SEO. Do your research!
Generate images and visualize concepts that are impossible to capture using a regular camera and would require a lot of 3D modeling work or photo editing to create. Using AI you have many advantages over traditional photographers! Animals in suits, abstract futuristic cities, complex 3D graphics – there are so many topics you can tackle here, just make sure that they are in demand.
Keeping these things in mind you will be able to boost your chances of selling your content. After all, no one will buy images that can’t really be used in any way.
Fourth – How Much Can You Earn Realistically?
So, what about the actual earnings? - Here is my experience.
So, what about the actual earnings? – Here is my experience.
In all honesty, the earning potential here depends solely on three things: the quality of your images, the demand for the images you have in your portfolio, and lastly, the sheer amount of images in your portfolio.
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