Credits, explained: what each render costs and why

There are two meters on your account and they do not convert into each other. That is the single fact that makes the rest of this page make sense, and it is a deliberate choice rather than an implementation detail.

Two meters, not one

• Credits. Spent on images. Two credits per image, every time, regardless of what is in it.
• Video allowance. Spent on video. One unit per clip, whether that clip is four seconds or ten.

They are separate so that a month of heavy image work cannot quietly eat the video allowance you were saving, and so that a video-heavy month does not leave you unable to generate a reference still. If it were one pooled balance, every plan would have to be priced for the worst case and everyone would pay for it.

What is free, and why it is actually free

Voice and script generation cost nothing. Not as a promotion — they cost us nothing per generation. Voice runs on a public synthesis endpoint and script generation is text. We would rather say that plainly than invent a token price for something we are not paying for.

Take that literally when you work. Generate eight narration takes and pick one. There is no meter running.

Long-form projects are metered differently

A Director project does not charge you per generation. The casting stills, the hundreds of shot renders, the assembly — none of it draws on credits or on the video allowance. The project is metered on the minutes of finished video that come out of it.

This is a statement about what you are buying. You are buying finished minutes, not attempts. It also means the shot list can afford proper coverage — a wide, two singles and a cutaway — instead of rationing shots to keep a per-generation bill down, which is the thing that would make the films worse.

Batches multiply, they do not discount

Seven images in one batch is fourteen credits, exactly as seven separate images would be. A batch is a scheduling convenience, not a price break; charging one image for a batch of seven would make the batch path a way to get six free generations, and that would end with batches being restricted rather than encouraged.

The whole batch is checked against both balances before anything is submitted. You will be told you are short before the run starts, never halfway through it.

What happens when a render fails

You get it back. A generation that fails is refunded to the meter it came from, automatically, as a visible line on the ledger rather than as a silent adjustment. A batch where three of a hundred failed is charged for ninety-seven.

A generation you cancel while it is still queued is not charged at all. One that has already started is charged and then refunded when it resolves, so the ledger tells the truth about what ran even when the outcome was nothing.

Reading your balance

The balance in the top bar is a count of things you can make, not a percentage of something. Every deduction and every refund is on the ledger with the job that caused it, so any number on the account page can be traced to a generation you can still open.

If a charge does not look right, the ledger row links to the job. That is usually faster than asking us, and when it is not, send us the row.