nizima's buying guide licenses purchased Live2D models for VTubing

The setup

nizima is Live2D Inc.'s official marketplace for buying, selling and commissioning illustrations and Live2D character models, distinct from the Editor used to build a model or the SDK used to run one. Its documentation states the service is 'an official Live2D market where you can buy, sell and order original illustrations and Live2D models,' aimed at people who 'cannot rig their own avatar' but still want a VTubing-ready character. This entry treats that documentation as a living record of the marketplace's current terms as retrieved on 16 September 2026, since the site's current pages show no clear founding date.

What the documents show

nizima's own buying guide, titled to make its VTuber audience explicit, states that 'illustrations and Live2D works purchased at nizima are granted usage license rights' and lists 'video posting, game production, VTuber, and more' as covered uses, while flagging that individual listings can carry additional restrictions a buyer must read first. The selling guide documents the structure from the other side: sellers keep a 90 percent share, commission being 'a mere 10%,' with no monthly fee, and the platform runs primary sales of a creator's own work and secondary sales, where a buyer converts a purchased illustration into a rigged Live2D model and resells it, paying the original illustrator a royalty the illustrator sets. The same guide bars copyrighted, derivative, R-18 and R-18G works entirely. A separate overview page confirms this structure and nizima's role as an official Live2D-run service, not a fan marketplace.

The craft

This lets a performer who cannot draw or rig commission a character in stages: buy a licensed illustration, either rig it personally or wait for a secondary Live2D version another creator made from the same art, then use the result on stream under the buying guide's permissions. A creator selling their own designs can treat nizima as a channel that also pays them when someone else resells their illustration as a rigged model, provided a royalty rate is set on the listing.

Keeping the creator in control

The royalty structure is one of the few documented mechanisms here where an original illustrator keeps a financial stake in a derivative model made by someone else, rather than losing leverage after one sale. A buyer's protection is narrower: the general license grant is qualified by whatever restrictions a seller adds to a listing, so a VTuber planning commercial or agency-affiliated use should confirm terms directly with the seller rather than relying on the general language alone. This last point is editorial, not a nizima statement.

• Does this specific listing's description add restrictions beyond nizima's general buying-guide license?
• If reselling a converted Live2D model, has a royalty rate for the original illustrator been set and disclosed?
• Is the artwork being purchased an original work, or could it be an unauthorized derivative nizima's rules already prohibit?

nizima formalizes something the wider VTuber marketplace often leaves informal: a documented license grant at sale and a royalty chain that follows a design through a second creator's rigging work, which is what lets a non-artist build a VTuber persona from someone else's purchased illustration.