Jan 21, 2026
Sona Poghosyan
The creator landscape has changed A LOT in the past few years, and as you probably guessed, AI is leading the charge. In just a few years, it has evolved from a productivity tool into a legit profitable creative assistant.
Creators use specialized AI for content creators to cut time spent on the duller parts of their work, to brainstorm, and to find new revenue streams.
Paid AI Training Projects
One new way to earn is by helping train AI models. Companies pay for skilled creative work like shooting original footage or editing photos. And here’s where we have to get a little meta because Wirestock connects digital creators with these AI revenue streams.
What Do AI Training Projects Look Like?
These projects cover almost any visual medium, but here are some examples to paint a clearer picture:
Original Photography/Video: You might be asked to shoot custom photos or footage for a specific theme. For instance, an AI for self-driving cars might need tons of pictures of city streets in rain and shine. As a photographer, you could find yourself out on a rainy evening, camera in hand, capturing reflections and headlights. The same goes for videographers.
Image Editing: If you’re skilled at Photoshop or other editing tools, there are projects where you transform or retouch images to create an example for the AI model.
Design and Illustration: AI models also need to learn from original graphics, illustrations, and designs. A project could ask digital artists to reimagine existing images in a new art style or create elements from scratch.
How the Application Process Works
Getting started with these projects usually means applying through the platform for a specific gig. Each project listing will tell you what kind of content is needed and any requirements. To apply, you often need to do a small test submission. For instance, if it’s a photo editing project, you might download a sample image and perform a couple of edits on it as a test.
This test shows the project reviewers that you have the right skills and style for the job. If your test submission is approved, you get paid for that test and then invited to join the full project.
Getting Paid
The payment for AI training projects can vary depending on the scope and difficulty. For simpler contributions that are bought in bulk (say hundreds of stock images for a dataset), the pay might be smaller per piece.
But for specific, high-need content, creators can earn significantly more, often on the order of $15 to $20 per image or artwork when a client really needs that piece.
It’s worth mentioning that Wirestock offers multiple AI revenue streams, such as AI editing challenges and licensing of users' portfolios through paid downloads.
Creating and Selling AI-Powered Products
Visual artists are also turning their skills into sellable AI-powered products. They package their expertise and artistic style into tools that others can use, and earn passively each time those are acquired.
For example, an artist might develop a collection of curated prompts designed for use with popular AI image generators like Midjourney or DALL·E. These prompts can help users produce artwork in specific themes or aesthetics, and are commonly sold as downloadable guides or PDFs on platforms such as Gumroad, Ko-fi, or Etsy.
Use the list of ideas below as a springboard to start making your own sellable assets:
AI-assisted texture and background packs
Stylized character pose references
Icon and sticker sets created using generative tools
Editable design templates enhanced with AI features
Subscription Models Enhanced by AI Personalization
Lots of creators earn through subscriptions on platforms like Patreon, YouTube Memberships, or Substack. AI is helping make these subscription models even more profitable by personalizing the experience for each subscriber.
With tools like ChatGPT, ConvertKit, and Make.com, you can now personalize welcome messages, suggest specific content, or even generate AI-made bonus perks based on each subscriber’s interests.
Examples of Personalization
Custom Content Suggestions: AI can help recommend content that each subscriber might like. For instance, if you run a Patreon with a library of posts or videos, an AI could learn a member’s preferences and suggest relevant content.
Niche Newsletters or Updates: If you publish newsletters or regular updates, AI can help customize them for different segments of your audience. For example, suppose you write about cooking, and some subscribers care more about vegan recipes while others love desserts. You could use AI to create slightly different newsletter versions: one that always includes a new vegan tip for the plant-based folks, and another that highlights a dessert recipe for the sweet-tooths.
Launching AI Personas and Virtual Influencers
One of the wildest trends in 2025 is the rise of AI personas, also known as virtual influencers. These are lifelike digital characters powered by AI that can have social media accounts and fan followings. Some creators are making virtual versions of themselves, or entirely new characters, that live online and act like influencers.
These AI personas can post content, respond to comments, and even host live streams. You might’ve heard of Lil Miquela, an Instagram influencer who has around 2,5 million followers on Instagram despite being entirely virtual.
Creating Your Own AI Persona
Creating a persona like this might sound high-tech, but it’s pretty doable for anyone with at least a little bit of knowledge about digital creation. Here’s a step-by-step roadmap:
Imagine Your Character: Start by planning who your virtual persona is. Treat it like creating a character for a story. Decide on basics like name, age or whether they’re human, robot, alien, etc. Are they friendly and funny? Smart and techy? Perhaps edgy and adventurous? Many successful virtual influencers have unique backstories and styles that make them stand out.
Design the Look: Next, bring your character’s appearance to life. You have a few options here like using an AI art tool to create the avatar’s face and body. Generators like Midjourney, DALL·E, or Stable Diffusion let you input prompts describing the character. You might need to experiment with prompts and styles to get the look right. If you prefer, you can use apps to craft a 3D model. Tools like Zepeto, VRoid Studio, or Blender allow you to customize a full 3D avatar.
Keep Appearance Consistent: One challenge with AI-generated images is that your character might look slightly different in each picture. Consistency is important and to achieve this you should train a custom model. There are services that let you train an AI on your character’s images. For example, platforms like Photo AI or DreamBooth allow you to upload 20-30 images of a character or person, and then the AI learns to generate that person in various poses.
Develop Their Content Style: As you’re building the visuals, also refine how your persona behaves and communicates. Clarify what topics they post about. A virtual influencer, like any influencer, should have a focus. It could be a broad lifestyle or a specific niche like travel, makeup tutorials, tech gadgets, fitness, art tutorials.
For the first time, artists and creators are being paid not just for end products, but for their eye, their edits, their style, their curation. There are emerging
hasn’t replaced creativity. It expanded what creativity is. And for creators willing to work with that reality—not against it—there’s serious money on the table.
AI for content creators isn’t about efficiency anymore. It’s a shift in ownership. The people shaping datasets, building tools, and wrapping AI in personality are quietly defining the creative economy’s next chapter. And they’re doing it on their own terms.
