Kling Motion Control on a 7.2-second driving clip bills 8 s: $1.26

A 7.2-second driving video on Sume's Kling 3.0 Motion Control is billed as 8 seconds, so the clip costs 8 x $0.1575 = $1.26. The catalog prices the route per output second and rounds the driving video's length up to a whole second before multiplying. A driving clip of exactly 7.0 seconds would cost 7 x $0.1575 = $1.1025.

How the 8 seconds comes about

The catalog row for kling/3.0/motion-control says the job reserves ceil(duration_seconds) x the Kling motion-control list price ($0.126 per second) after Sume's margin. $0.126 x 1.25 = $0.1575. The output length follows the driving motion video, and the accepted range is 1 to 30 seconds.

So the number you control is the length of the driving clip, not a duration field on the request. Phone footage that runs 7.2 seconds, because you pressed stop a beat late, pays for a full eighth second.

Two practical consequences follow. First, price is a step function of the driving clip, so 7.01 seconds and 8.0 seconds cost the same $1.26. If your reference footage is edited, the last frame matters more than the average length. Second, the still image does not change the price: a portrait, a mascot or a product shot all cost the same for the same driving clip.

Trim first when the overshoot is small

The overshoot on a 7.2-second clip is 0.2 s of motion you may not need. Cutting it to 7.0 s saves one billed second, $0.1575. Sume's video trim route costs a flat $0.02 per job, so the net saving is $0.1575 - $0.02 = $0.1375 on this one clip.

That only pays off when the trimmed tail is dead air. If the last 0.2 seconds hold the end of the gesture you want, keep it and pay the $0.1575.

• Trim saves money only when the cut lands on a whole-second boundary at or below the next integer.
• A 29.8-second clip and a 30.0-second clip both bill 30 seconds ($4.725), so trimming 0.2 s there saves nothing.
• Trimming does not change what Motion Control makes of your still; it only shortens the driving video.

What the catalog reserves at submit

The same row lists an estimate of 79 cents, a minimum of 16 cents and a maximum of 473 cents. The minimum is 1 second ($0.1575 rounded up to a cent) and the maximum is 30 seconds ($4.725 rounded up). The catalog says the reservation is stored in USD micros, rounded up to cents for balance, captured on completion, and refunded for failed or pre-generation canceled jobs.

For budgeting a batch, multiply the whole-second length of each driving clip by $0.1575 and add them. Do not multiply the sum of the raw lengths: ten 7.2-second clips bill 80 seconds ($12.60), not 72 seconds ($11.34).

Check before you submit

Measure each driving clip with a video inspect call or your editor, round up to the next integer, and compare with the 30-second ceiling. A driving clip over 30 seconds falls outside the accepted 1 to 30 second range; split it into two jobs instead.

If you run many clips, record the measured length and the billed seconds side by side in your own log. A column for 'seconds wasted to rounding' (billed minus measured) shows quickly whether a trim step is worth adding to the pipeline. On 7.2 seconds it is 0.8 seconds, or about $0.126 of the $1.26.

The related estimate for a whole batch is simple: sum the ceilings, multiply by $0.1575, and add $0.02 for each trim you actually run.