AI video for social
Short-form does not need a film crew, it needs volume and a hook in the first second. Both of those are cheaper to buy in credits than in production days.
What a tested spot costs
| Hook frames, 5 stillsFlux 2 Dev · 5 × 1 cr | 5 |
| Motion drafts, 5 fast clipsSeedance 2 Fast · 5 × 60 cr | 300 |
| The keeper on a premium engineKling 3.0 · 1 × 140 cr | 140 |
| Original trackSuno V5 · 1 × 80 cr | 80 |
Credit costs are live from the catalogue; the cash figure is Starter-plan pricing.
Social video is a shot business, not a sequence business, and that suits generative models exactly: five to ten seconds, one idea, vertical.
The economics only work if you draft on fast models. A 60-credit clip is roughly 17 cents at Starter pricing, so you can throw away nine of them and still be cheaper than one stock licence.
The workflow
How it actually runs.
Each step links to the part of the studio that does it.
Make the first frame
Generate the hook frame as a still — it is cheaper to iterate on a frame than on motion.
AI image generatorAnimate it
Image-to-video keeps the frame you approved and only invents the movement.
Image to videoDraft on fast, finish on premium
Find the motion on a 60-credit model, then re-run the keeper on a flagship engine.
AI video generatorScore it
An original track at 80 credits, cut to your edit rather than borrowed from a library.
AI music generatorWatch out
Where this goes wrong.
- Clips are 5 or 10 seconds. A 30-second spot is several generations cut together, not one long render.
- Vertical means generating vertical — crop the start frame to 9:16 before you animate, not after.
- Only some models generate audio. Assume silence unless the model page says otherwise.
- Fast models are for finding the shot. Do not ship the draft because it was cheap.
FAQ
What people ask.
Generate or crop your start frame at 9:16 first, then animate it — image-to-video follows the aspect ratio of the frame you hand it. Text-to-video models take the aspect ratio as a setting, so choose it before you run rather than cropping a landscape clip afterwards and losing half the composition.
A fast clip is 60 credits, about 17 cents at Starter pricing; a premium clip is 140, about 39 cents. A realistic tested spot — five hook frames, five motion drafts, one premium keeper and an original track — lands near 525 credits, roughly $1.47.
Generate an original track in the same studio for 80 credits and cut it against the clip in your editor. That avoids the licence question entirely, and on Creator and Studio the commercial licence covers using it in client work.
Sometimes, and the giveaways are consistent: hands, text, crowd faces and physics that do not quite settle. Short clips, simple motion and one clear subject hide all four. Long takes with complicated action do not.
Next door
Related jobs.
Run the first one today
22 credits a day on the free account, no card. That is enough to get through the draft stage of this workflow.