Could the Wirestock Platform be the Way to Monetize Your AI Art?

Create your images in one place and have them distributed to all of the major players in the marketplace.

Nice people at Wirestock gave me a free month of Premium AI and asked me to write a review. Further temptations are that I can get a referral fee if you use my link at the bottom of the page. However, be assured I am much more interested in you continuing to read my articles than I am in a few colourful beans that may be thrown in my direction. So, as always, I will write my unbiased opinion.

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WIRESTOCK

The main aim of Wirestock is content distribution.

Wirestock distributes content for sale to renowned marketplaces including Adobe Stock, 123RF, Depositphotos, Freepik, Miricanvas, IMAGO, and many others.

I have spent a few days fooling around with the various tools, wondering if they would be useful to me. Currently, I sell an image every other day on Adobe stock. This is my only marketplace, and it's not my biggest priority in life. It creates a tiny trickle of income.

Uploading

Below is my Wirestock portfolio page. I uploaded four pictures to see how it compared to adding things to Adobe stock.

Our platform provides creators with individual portfolios at no extra cost. These portfolios allow creators to not only sell their content but also offer prints and create unique collections for their audience.

This is a major selling point. It is very quick and simple. You don't have to tag each image, as that appears to be automated. It is a simple form, and at the bottom, you get to enter the image for one of the challenges if you so wish.

There is a limit on the number of submissions to 200 per month for Premium AI, and the cost is $19.99 per month. Without AI, it is $12.99, and the limit is 100 per month.

This compares with going direct to Adobe Stock, which is free and unlimited.

Inbuilt Upscaler

If you try to submit an image which is low-resolution, Wirestock offers to upscale it for you. I compared this upscaling with Midjourney, which is certainly on par. However, it is not in any way controllable, so if you already have a quality upscaling method, you would be unlikely to need this.

Royalties:

Creators can earn anywhere from 65% to 100% in royalties for each sale.

I am unsure what this means, but I feel uncomfortable being charged a monthly fee and losing a cut of my royalties.

A note about submitting AI work.

If you have not submitted your AI work for sale before, you must be clear about what you can or cannot submit. Loads of AI images get posted on social media that are breaking basic rules. If you use a prompt or image of a recognisable person or place, you will need a model or property release.

Most platforms will refuse such content.

I asked ChatGpt to outline the possible legal infringements.

Rule of thumb: in your prompts, do not use any person’s name. Do not use artists' names. Use a general description of style instead. Do not use brand names or specific buildings.

Daily AI Challenges:

Creators have the opportunity to participate in daily AI challenges. These challenges present an exciting chance to win cash prizes. For a detailed look at our challenges, you can visit our Challenge’s page.

If you want some motivation to create images to a brief, then check out these challenges. As I write, prize money ranges from $100 to $500.

Built-in AI Generation

The market is currently flooded with AI-generation tools. Wirestock, like many others, are using these tools to draw people onto their platform. It is fairly basic but is well-tuned for the stock photo market.

I can see times when I would use it in preference to Midjourney. Although brilliant, MJ tends to go over the top, and I constantly try to dial down the stylisation. So, I appreciate the simplicity of the Wirestock model.

The downside is you have none of the zoom, pan, inpainting or 4x upscale capabilities. As part of this package, though, it is reasonable enough.

The same prompt in Midjourney gave me this:

Discord integration

I brought Wirestock into the same Discord server as Midjourney, making comparison very easy.

Create an AI image in Wirestock, press that blue button, and ping! It is part of your portfolio. No form filling, no fuss.

Size makes a difference

The original generation is 512x512, and the standard upscale is 2048x2048. This is 50% smaller than most major players.

Conclusions

If you are an artist with little experience in AI, then Wirestock is a good place to start to create and monetise your work. You don’t have to learn a complicated new language. The platform holds your hand and leads you through the process.

If you are already creating AI art on other platforms, you probably won't want to be bothered with the AI part and simply use content distribution. The income I get from online sales would not cover the monthly subscription, so it may be a leap of faith requiring hard work to get yourself established in the field.

Whichever you are, it is worth looking at and seeing which parts suit you.

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