How To Make Money With AI Art And ChatGPT

Someone on YouTube claimed there is an “infinite money glitch” using AI art, and Alston Godbolt decided to put that idea to the test. Not by blindly copying what the video said, but by walking through the entire process step by step, on screen, so you could see exactly what tools are involved, what the real costs are, and how long it actually takes to get something up and running. The result is one of the most practical AI art walkthroughs you will find because it does not skip the parts most creators leave out.

The method pairs ChatGPT-4 with Midjourney to generate digital art, then sells that art as downloadable prints on Etsy. If you are willing to put in 30 to 45 minutes a day and you can commit to posting consistently, this is a real path to semi-passive income. You do the work once, list the product, and the same file can sell over and over without you touching it again. This post breaks down every step Alston covered, with the specific tools, the real numbers, and the honest caveats included.

What You’ll Walk Out With

A clear picture of the full workflow from niche research to live Etsy listing
Exactly how to use ChatGPT-4 to write Midjourney prompts with zero art background
How to create professional product mockups for free using SmartMockups.com
The real cost breakdown to start this side hustle (it is lower than you think)
Why transparency about AI-generated art actually helps you sell more
Other platforms beyond Etsy where you can sell the same images
A free tool to find out which AI art niches are already selling before you spend a dollar, plus a way to figure out which money-making method fits you best at finder.platformproof.com

What the AI Art Side Hustle Actually Looks Like

The core idea is straightforward. You use ChatGPT-4 to generate text prompts. You paste those prompts into Midjourney, which turns them into visual art. You take that art, place it inside a realistic mockup so buyers can picture it hanging in their home, and then you list it as a digital download on Etsy. When someone buys it, Etsy delivers the file automatically. You do not print anything. You do not ship anything. The same file can sell a thousand times.

Alston is clear in the video that as of filming he has not actually launched his own shop yet. He is sharing the process he is about to test, and he commits to coming back with real results within a month or two. That honesty matters because it means you are getting a blueprint, not a polished success story with the hard parts edited out. The steps work. The tools are real. Whether it becomes your main income or a small monthly supplement depends on how consistently you execute and how well you pick your niche.

Step 1: Pick a Niche That Is Already Selling

The first thing Alston does is go to Etsy and search for what is already working. This is the right order of operations. You do not decide what you want to make and then hope buyers exist. You look at what buyers are already buying, and then you make more of that.

When he types “AI art” into Etsy, real sellers show up with real listings. Many of them are transparent in their titles, using phrases like “AI art styles for download.” They are not hiding the fact that a computer generated the images. They are selling it honestly, and people are buying. That is the market signal you need before you start creating anything.

One niche he clicks on in the video is butterfly watercolor art. Another niche he mentions is a modern boho gallery wall. He also brings up animals, specifically crows and birds, as good starting points. The common thread across all of these is that they are visual, they work as wall decor, and they have a clear buyer who already exists on Etsy.

If you want data to back up your niche choice before you start, Alston mentions a tool called Insight Factory. It gives you a clearer look at search volume and competition on Etsy so you can spot underserved niches before other sellers catch on. The combination of manual Etsy browsing and a tool like Insight Factory is a more informed starting point than guessing.

Step 2: Use ChatGPT-4 to Write Midjourney Prompts

This is where the method gets interesting. Midjourney generates images from text descriptions called prompts. The better the prompt, the better the image. If you have no background in art or design, writing good prompts from scratch is genuinely hard. That is where ChatGPT-4 comes in.

Alston opens ChatGPT-4 and asks two simple questions. First: “Are you aware of Midjourney?” ChatGPT confirms it knows what Midjourney is and what kinds of prompts it responds to. Second: “Are you able to create Midjourney prompts?” ChatGPT says yes and then starts generating them.

For the butterfly watercolor niche, he types something along the lines of “create a Midjourney prompt for beautiful butterfly art watercolors.” ChatGPT returns multiple variations of prompts, each one producing a slightly different style or mood. He specifically asks for variations, not just one prompt, because having multiple options means you end up with more product variety without doing extra creative work.

One important note: Alston uses ChatGPT-4, not an earlier version. He calls that out explicitly. The quality of the prompts depends on the model, and GPT-4 is meaningfully better at understanding what kinds of descriptions Midjourney responds well to. If you are using a free tier that defaults to an older model, the prompt quality will be lower.

Step 3: Generate Art in Midjourney

Once you have your prompts from ChatGPT-4, you copy them directly into Midjourney. Alston shows this in real time in the video. He pastes the prompt into the Midjourney interface and adds two parameters at the end: version 5 and S 750. The version parameter tells Midjourney which generation model to use, and the S parameter controls stylization strength. At S 750, the output leans toward more artistic and expressive results rather than photorealistic ones, which works well for printable wall art.

Midjourney returns four image options from a single prompt. Alston looks at the four butterfly watercolors it generates and picks one he likes. He then clicks to generate an individual, full-resolution version of that image. From there, he downloads it to his computer. The whole generation process for one set of images takes a few minutes of waiting, not hours.

The output he gets looks good. He admits he does not have a strong eye for design, so if the images look good to him, he takes that as a reasonable baseline. The honest advice here is to also run your output by a few people whose taste you trust, or compare what you generate against the bestselling listings in your niche on Etsy.

Midjourney costs $20 per month. That is your primary software cost for this entire method. There is no per-image charge after that monthly fee.

Step 4: Build Mockups That Sell the Feeling

This is the step most beginners skip, and it is one of the most important ones. When someone is browsing Etsy, they do not just want to see the image on a white background. They want to picture it on their wall, in their living room, next to their furniture. Mockups are what make that possible.

Alston’s tool of choice for this is SmartMockups.com, and he uses the free version. You go to the site, browse a library of room and frame photos, and upload your AI-generated image. SmartMockups places your art inside the frame in the photo, making it look like it is already printed and hanging. The result is a professional-looking product photo that gives buyers a realistic sense of scale and setting.

There is one practical detail worth flagging. SmartMockups requires the image to be a specific size to fit correctly inside the frame templates. If your Midjourney output does not match those dimensions, you need to resize it first. Alston uses Canva for this step, which is free. You open Canva, create a new design with a custom size of 1240 by 1650 pixels, drag your image in, adjust the position, and download it. Then you go back to SmartMockups and upload the properly sized version. It adds a few extra minutes to the workflow but it is not complicated.

Once the mockup looks right, you download it. You can also browse SmartMockups for additional frame and room styles and download multiple versions of the same image in different settings. Alston recommends putting several mockup photos in your Etsy listing so buyers can see the art in more than one context. More mockups means buyers have a better idea of what they are getting, and that directly increases your chances of making a sale.

Step 5: List Your Art on Etsy

Etsy charges 20 cents per listing. That is the fee to put a product in your shop. Each listing can stay active for four months. When someone buys the digital download, Etsy charges a transaction fee and a payment processing fee on top of that, but you do not pay per listing repeatedly. The 20 cents is a one-time charge to create the listing.

Alston mentions a link in his video description that gets you free listings to start with. The exact number he remembers is somewhere between 20 and 40 free listings. That means you can get your first batch of products live without spending the 20 cents per listing. Your only upfront cost, if you use that free listing code, is the $20 Midjourney subscription.

When setting up the listing, your title and tags matter as much as the mockup photos. Look at what the top-selling listings in your niche are using for titles and tags before you write your own. You are not copying their listings. You are learning what buyers are actually searching for when they find those products.

Alston also recommends bundling multiple images together into a single listing. If you generate several variations of butterfly watercolors, you can sell all five of them as a set instead of five separate $1 listings. Bundles tend to justify a higher price and they are a good deal for buyers, which means more reviews and better shop credibility over time.

Other Places to Sell the Same Images

Etsy is the main focus of the video, but Alston mentions several other places where the exact same digital files can go.

Creative Market is another digital product marketplace with a different audience than Etsy. Some categories of art sell better there than on Etsy, particularly things that designers and content creators use. If your art style is more graphic and versatile, Creative Market is worth testing alongside your Etsy shop.

Facebook is another channel he brings up, both through groups and through paid ads. Facebook groups focused on home decor, gallery walls, or specific art styles often welcome posts from sellers. And if you have a listing that converts well on Etsy, you can test running Facebook paid ads to a custom landing page or directly to your Etsy shop to drive additional traffic.

The underlying point is that a single piece of AI art costs you nothing to reproduce. Once the file exists, you can list it in multiple places simultaneously. You are not splitting your inventory. You are multiplying your surface area with no extra production cost.

What Does This Actually Cost to Start?

Here is the honest cost breakdown based on what Alston covers in the video:

Midjourney: $20 per month. This is your only unavoidable cost to get started.
ChatGPT-4: Requires a paid ChatGPT Plus subscription ($20/month). Alston specifically uses GPT-4, not the free version. That said, you may be able to test some prompts with the free tier to see what the method feels like before committing.
SmartMockups: Free tier available. No cost to create and download basic mockups.
Canva: Free. No cost to resize images to the 1240 x 1650 custom dimension.
Etsy listings: 20 cents each, with a free listing credit available via Alston’s referral link in the video description. You can start with free listings and avoid this cost entirely at first.

Total minimum cost to get started: $20 to $40 per month depending on whether you are already paying for ChatGPT Plus. The time investment Alston estimates is 30 to 45 minutes per day, mostly spent generating images, building mockups, and writing listings.

Be Transparent That the Art Is AI-Generated

Alston makes this point more than once, and it is worth making here too. When you list AI art on Etsy, say so in the listing. The sellers who are already doing well with this are not hiding it. Their titles and descriptions say clearly that the images are AI-generated. Some buyers will not want to purchase AI art, and that is fine. Those buyers were never going to be your customers anyway. The buyers who are happy purchasing a beautiful digital print regardless of how it was made are your actual audience, and there are a lot of them.

Being upfront also protects you from refund disputes and bad reviews. If someone buys a print thinking a human artist spent hours on it and then finds out it was generated in seconds, they feel misled. That is a bad customer experience and it is a problem you created by being vague. Transparency removes that risk entirely and builds the kind of honest shop reputation that generates repeat buyers.

Not sure if selling AI art fits your skills, interests, and schedule?

Find the method that matches who you actually are at finder.platformproof.com.

Honest Drawbacks to This Method

Alston is careful not to oversell this, and that is exactly the approach this post will take too.

It takes time to gain traction on Etsy. New shops with few listings and no reviews do not show up high in search results. You are starting from zero visibility. Consistency matters here more than almost anything else. Alston says it plainly: upload consistently and you increase your chances of being successful. The sellers who give up after posting five listings and getting no sales are not giving the method a real test. Etsy rewards shops that keep adding products over time.

The market for AI art is getting more crowded. More people are starting AI art shops on Etsy every month. The niches that were wide open two years ago have more competition now. That does not mean the opportunity is gone. It means niche selection matters more than it did before. Going after “AI art prints” is too broad. Going after “modern boho gallery wall digital download set” or “moody crow watercolor printable art” is a much better position.

Alston has not tested this himself yet. He says that directly in the video. He is sharing a method he plans to test, not a method he has personally validated. He commits to bringing back results within a month or two. That honesty is refreshing, but it also means you should treat this as a promising blueprint to test, not a guaranteed income stream. Try it. Track your numbers. Adjust based on what you actually see happening in your shop, not what you hoped would happen.

Not all AI art is good enough to sell. Midjourney is powerful, but a prompt that worked well for one style might produce something unusable for another. You will need to generate more images than you actually list. Budget time for experimenting, discarding outputs that do not meet the quality of what you see in top-performing Etsy shops, and iterating on prompts until you get something worth selling.

Find Your X

Selling AI art on Etsy is one real way to build semi-passive income online. But it is not the right fit for everyone. Some people do better with a different kind of digital product. Some people are better suited to a service. Some people have skills that translate directly into freelance work without needing any subscription tools at all. The mistake is trying to force yourself into a method that does not fit how you think or how much time you have.

If you want a faster way to find the method that actually fits your situation, go to finder.platformproof.com. Answer a few honest questions about your skills and schedule and the tool matches you with the income method most likely to work for you specifically.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need to know how to draw or design to do this?

No. Alston specifically mentions in the video that he does not have an eye for art or design and he considers that a blind spot. The whole point of using ChatGPT-4 to write Midjourney prompts is that it removes the need for creative or technical art skills. You describe what you want, the tools generate it, and you judge whether the output is good enough to sell based on what you see performing well on Etsy.

Is the free version of ChatGPT good enough for writing Midjourney prompts?

Alston specifically uses ChatGPT-4, which requires a paid subscription. He calls that out as an important detail. You can experiment with the free version to get a feel for the process, but the quality of the Midjourney prompts you get from an older free model will likely be lower than what GPT-4 produces. If you are serious about this method, budget for the GPT-4 access alongside the Midjourney subscription.

How long does it take to make one image and get it listed?

Alston estimates about 30 to 45 minutes per day for the full process from generating images to building mockups to setting up the listing. That estimate covers a normal workflow once you know what you are doing. Your first few runs through the process will take longer while you are learning the tools and figuring out what the mockup templates need.

Can I sell the same image in multiple places at once?

Yes. A digital file is not inventory. The same image can be listed on Etsy, Creative Market, and sold through your own website simultaneously. Alston mentions Etsy as the primary starting point and also brings up Creative Market and Facebook as additional channels. There is no rule against listing the same file in multiple places, and doing so increases the number of places potential buyers can find you.

What parameters does Alston use in Midjourney?

In the video he adds “version 5 S 750” to the end of each prompt before submitting to Midjourney. Version 5 specifies the generation model, and S 750 controls the stylization setting. At that stylization level, Midjourney produces more expressive and artistic-looking results rather than photorealistic images, which is generally what you want for printable wall art.

What size should I use when resizing images in Canva?

Alston uses a custom canvas size of 1240 by 1650 pixels in Canva when preparing images for SmartMockups. This is the dimension that fits correctly inside the SmartMockups frame templates. You create a new design at that custom size, drag your Midjourney image in, adjust the position so it fills the canvas, and then download it before uploading to SmartMockups.

Should I tell buyers the art was made by AI?

Yes, and Alston makes this point more than once in the video. The sellers on Etsy who are doing well with AI art are being upfront about it in their titles and descriptions. Buyers who are not comfortable with AI art will not buy from you regardless, and trying to obscure that fact only creates customer service problems and negative reviews. Honest listings build a shop reputation that holds up over time.

How quickly can I expect to make sales on Etsy?

There is no honest answer that includes a specific timeline. New Etsy shops start with no search visibility and no reviews, which means traffic is low at first. Alston emphasizes consistency as the most important factor: upload regularly and you increase your chances of getting found. Shops that give up after a few weeks with no sales are not giving the method a real test. A more realistic mindset is to treat the first 60 to 90 days as a testing and learning phase where you are refining your niche and listing quality, not expecting significant revenue.

Sources

Alston Godbolt, “How To Make Money With AI Art And ChatGPT,” alstongodbolt.com, YouTube: youtu.be/Nalg1_s3olU
Midjourney, image generation platform: midjourney.com ($20/month subscription)
SmartMockups, free mockup generation tool: smartmockups.com
Canva, free design and image resizing tool: canva.com
Insight Factory, Etsy niche research tool
Etsy, digital product marketplace: etsy.com (20 cents per listing)
Creative Market, digital product marketplace: creativemarket.com