14 vertical ad variants at 9 s: upscale costs $1.13, 1080p costs $179

Video upscale on Sume is $0.009 per input second, so 14 variants of 9 seconds each (126 seconds) cost 126 x $0.009 = $1.134 to upscale. If the drafts come from Seedance 2.5 at 480p, the whole job costs $34.99. Rendering the same 14 clips at native 1080p costs $179.12 at the listed price.

The two routes, priced

Seedance 2.5 bills per output second and the price rises sharply by resolution. At 480p it is $0.268677 per second, so a 9-second clip is 9 x $0.268677 = $2.418093. At 1080p it is $1.42155 per second, so the same clip is 9 x $1.42155 = $12.79395.

What the saving does not tell you

An upscale makes a clip larger. It does not recreate the detail that a native 1080p render would produce, so the two outputs are not the same thing at two prices. The table compares cost only. Whether a 480p clip upscaled looks good enough for your ad is a visual call that you should make on one pilot clip before you commit 14.

The sensible use is a split plan. Render all 14 variants at 480p, review them, then send only the winners to upscale, or to a native 1080p render if the upscale does not hold up. If 4 of the 14 win, the upscale step is 4 x 9 x $0.009 = $0.324.

Limits to keep in mind

Video upscale takes at most 30 seconds of input, so a 9-second ad is well inside the limit. Pass duration_seconds so the hold matches the clip. If you omit it, Sume reserves 5 seconds, which is why the post on the 5-second hold recommends setting it. The multiplier is upscale_factor, from 1.1 to 4.

For clips longer than 30 seconds, trim first and upscale the parts.

A pilot before the batch

Run one variant through both routes. Render a 9-second clip at 480p ($2.418093), upscale it ($0.081), and render the same prompt at 1080p ($12.79395) if you want a reference. The pilot costs $15.29 and tells you whether the 14-clip plan holds. If the upscaled clip passes, you have saved roughly $144 on the batch.

Check text and faces first. Small on-screen text and fine facial detail are where a low-resolution draft is most likely to disappoint after upscaling.

• Set upscale_factor explicitly and note it in your sheet.
• Set duration_seconds to the real clip length.
• Keep the 480p originals so you can re-upscale with another factor.

Where the 14 variants come from

Fourteen is a typical set: two hooks, two offers, and a few cuts of each. Because the prompts differ, you cannot reuse one render for all of them. That is why the draft price matters. Fourteen drafts at 480p is $33.85, and the cheap tier lets you throw away the weak hooks before any upscale money is spent.

Name each file with the hook, the offer and the seed so that the winners can be traced back to a prompt. When a variant wins, the upscale step costs $0.081 and takes no new prompt.