Jasper Smith

I Built an AI Video Generator with Next.js and Got My First Paid User in 3 Months

I'm a frontend developer working at a bank in Shenzhen. By day I write React components. By night, I've been building Froging AI — an AI video generator that turns images and text into videos in minutes.

Three months ago I knew nothing about AI video APIs. Last week, I got my first paid order. Here’s how it happened.

The Stack

I wanted to ship fast and keep costs low. My stack:

  • Next.js 14 (App Router) — frontend + API routes in one repo
  • Supabase — Auth, PostgreSQL, and storage
  • Vercel — deployment, zero DevOps
  • Creem — payments (one-time + subscriptions)
  • Replicate / Minimax / 海螺AI — video generation APIs

Why not Python? I'm a frontend dev. Next.js API routes handle async queueing just fine. I didn't want to learn a new deployment pipeline. Ship fast, iterate faster.

What It Does

Froging AI has two core features:

Image to Video
Upload a photo, add a prompt, and the AI animates it into a short video clip. Good for product demos, social content, and creative experiments.

Text to Video
Describe a scene in plain English and get a generated video back in minutes. No camera, no editing software.

Under the hood, I'm routing requests to different providers based on model availability and cost. Replicate's open-source models (Wan-2.1, etc.) for cheap experiments. Minimax and 海螺AI for higher-quality outputs. The user doesn’t pick the model — the system optimizes for speed and quality automatically.

The First Dollar

On July 13th, I woke up to an email from Creem: "You received a payment."

It was $4.99. One user bought the Starter plan.

That small amount changed everything. Before that, I was optimizing SEO, tweaking landing page colors, and watching Google Analytics like a hawk. After that, I realized: the only metric that matters is whether someone is willing to pay.

The user came from organic search. I had spent weeks writing blog posts, submitting to AI directories, and building backlinks. No ads. Just content and patience.

3 Things I Learned

1. Start with one feature, not ten

My original plan was an "all-in-one AI creative suite" — image generation, video generation, editing tools, the works. I stripped it down to video only. If I had waited for the full vision, I'd still be coding instead of charging.

2. SEO is a patience game

I stopped Google Ads after burning through budget with zero conversions. Switched to long-tail SEO: "image to video AI free", "text to video generator no signup". Slow traffic, but free and compounding.

3. Payment integration is part of the product

I spent too much time perfecting the UI before integrating Creem. The moment payments went live, my mindset shifted from "hobby project" to "business." Do it early. Even if nobody pays, the infrastructure being ready changes how you build.

What's Next

  • Image generation is on the roadmap (finally expanding beyond video)
  • Better mobile experience (most traffic is mobile)
  • More video models — I'm watching Kling 2.6 and Veo-3 closely

Try It

If you're curious, Froging AI is live. You can generate a few videos for free without signing up.

If you're also building a side project, drop a comment. I read every one.

Tags: #ai #webdev #nextjs #saas #sideproject #startup #indiedev