bpd
The Generative Index · Budget Tool

What will your
short actually cost?

The marketing math assumes every shot works on the first try. It never does. This estimates the real credit cost for your project, converts it to dollars, and shows you how many months of your plan it'll take.

Finished runtime of your project.
sec
How long each shot sits on screen in the finished edit. Shorter shots = more individual generations = higher cost. Think: Mad Max cuts at ~3s, a Sorkin walk-and-talk holds ~10s.
cr / sec
How many credits one second of generation costs — check your platform's pricing page or in-app cost preview.
The number that matters
× takes
1 · lucky4 · normal8 · picky10+
Realistic for most work. You'll nail some shots fast and fight others for a dozen takes.
Slider caps at 10 — type a higher number for heavy-iteration projects (feature-scale work can run 30–60+).
cr/mo
Monthly credits from your plan
$ / mo
What you pay per month
Buying extra credits each month?
credits
Extra credits per month
$
What they cost you
Check your provider's top-up pricing — it's often different from your plan's per-credit rate.
Total credits needed
4,013
= $157
5-minute short, 3× takes, 8s avg shots
Production timeline
4 months
at 1,200 credits/mo
Shots to cover runtime38
× regenerations per shot3×
Total generations114
Generation length per clip8s
Total seconds generated912s
× credits per second4.4 cr/s
Total credits4,013 credits
Cost per credit$0.0392/credit
Total cost$157

The reality ladder

"Takes per shot" means how many times you generate a clip before one is good enough to keep. It's the single biggest cost driver — and the one marketing pages quietly assume is 1. Here's the same project at four honesty levels:
Optimistic 1.5×takes/shot Almost every shot works first or second try. Rarely happens in practice. 2,006 cr ($78.57)
Your setting 3×takes/shot Wherever you've set the slider above — your own estimate. 4,013 cr ($157)
Realistic 5×takes/shot The honest average once you factor in misses, tweaks, and re-rolls. 6,688 cr ($262)
Final-cut polish 8×takes/shot Hero shots held to a finished standard — character consistency, complex motion, exact art direction. 10,701 cr ($419)
☠ Hell Grind 64×takes/shot Higgsfield's AI feature Hell Grind hit roughly 64 generations per finished shot on its toughest work. Feature-scale iteration is brutal. This is what "real" can cost. 85,606 cr ($3,353)
Read this before you trust the number This is a floor, not a quote. It counts only raw video generation credits — not the image generations feeding image-to-video, not upscaling, not sound, not the takes you delete without watching. Credit rates vary by model, resolution, and platform — verify against your own account for your specific setup. The honest takeaway is usually the regeneration slider: the gap between "lucky" and "picky" is where real credits burn.