Ten drafts and three finals a week: 30-second projects, wallet need

Ten 30-second drafts and three finals cost $48.05 a week on Sume list prices: $2.35 per draft and $8.20 per final. Drafts run wan-3.0 at 480p with 0.5K stills; finals run wan-3.0 at 1080p with 2K stills. About half of that weekly money is the three finals, so the wallet has to be sized for the finals first; the ten drafts are the other half.

Cost per tier

Both tiers use six 5-second shots, 450 characters of voice at $0.0475 per 1,000, one $0.125 music bed and a one-minute render at $0.10. Only the video resolution and the still size change. Rates are from the Sume catalog (read 2026-10-08).

The week

Drafts: 10 x $2.3464 = $23.4638. Finals: 3 x $8.1964 = $24.5891. Week total: $48.0529. The finals are 51 percent of it, and one final costs as much as 3.5 drafts.

If you also allow one redo of a failed final shot per week (a 5-second 1080p shot is $1.2500), add $1.2500. A failed shot is refunded, so this is only an allowance for a successful redo of a clip you rejected, not for the failed attempt.

Sizing the wallet

Reserves are taken at submit, so a wallet that covers the week on average can still 402 mid-batch. Submit the three finals first in the week while the balance is full: $24.5891 is the largest block. If you top up weekly, set the top-up at $49.00 or more, and check the balance before each batch rather than after the first 402.

Drafts exist to kill bad ideas cheaply. Each extra draft adds $2.3464, so ten more drafts add $23.4638; the arithmetic is the same table with a different count.

Caveats

The draft tier is a stand-in, not a preview of the final. A 480p wan-3.0 clip and a 1080p one are different generations from the same prompt, so a draft that looks right can still need a redo at 1080p. If you want the final to match a chosen draft, price the final as a fresh generation, as done here, and do not assume the draft is reusable.

A second caveat is the top-up rhythm. A weekly top-up that equals the week's total leaves no room for a rejected final, and Sume reserves at submit, so a balance that sits close to zero at the end of the week will return 402 on the first Monday submit if the top-up is late. Keep one final's cost in reserve after the top-up lands.

The numbers also assume one render minute and default options. Longer voice-overs, extra music beds and a different video model each move their own line; change the constants and rerun the arithmetic.