The Master Guide / 16 Tools at a glance
Each job, its tool, its label and its chapter
One tool per job (decided). Every price below shows the date it was read and names its currency: Higgsfield credits (cr), Suno credits, ElevenLabs credits or US dollars.
One tool per job (decided). Every price below shows the date it was read and names its currency: Higgsfield credits (cr), Suno credits, ElevenLabs credits or US dollars. Before each estimate, read the credit cost the Generate button shows for one job at your settings before you generate, write it with the date in your price ledger, and keep the four currencies apart (see Planning, budgets and takes → Costs and the estimate). Voice runs on your own ElevenLabs account only (decided). Tools kept out, Reframe among them, are in Tools at a glance → Not needed, and why.
The platform
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
Higgsfield | The platform for Seedance 2.5, Sync-3 and video analysis, and for the stills models: Nano Banana Pro, GPT Image and Seedream 5.0 Pro | A paid plan (Seedream needs one). About $0.05 a Higgsfield credit (read Aug–Sep 2026), for context only: credits and dollars are never added. Check the balance before each stage's first job and before any job over about 200 cr; after a timeout, check the job list before you resubmit |
Stills
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
Nano Banana Pro | Every photoreal still [proven] | 2K by default, 4K for identity close-ups, label checks and full-bleed hero pages; the aspect always set; up to 14 references: 5 characters, 6 objects, 3 style. About 2 cr an image at 1K or 2K, 4 cr at 4K (read Oct 2026) | |
Seedream 5.0 Pro | Every still of a stylised film (decided); the role [proven] | Always 2K (its maximum); the aspect always set, no 4:5 and no "auto"; up to 10 references, aim for 3–5. About 1.25 cr at 1K or 1.5K and 2.5 cr at 2K (read 8 Oct 2026); needs a paid Higgsfield plan | |
GPT Image, the project's version | Two jobs (decided): transparent cut-outs [official guidance], and graphics with text, which include every staging map and position image (staging maps [best available, not yet validated]) | A new project takes the latest version (2.6 today) and keeps it (decided). Quality high; 2K; transparent background for cut-outs only; PNG. 2.5: about 2.75 cr at 2K high, 4.25 cr at 4K (read Oct 2026); 2.6: no price recorded yet; before its first use, read the credit cost the Generate button shows for one job at the project's settings before you generate, and write it with the date in your price ledger |
Video
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
Seedance 2.5 | All video, in omni-reference mode with the approved anchors [proven]; a 480p draft, then that draft finished at 1080p [official guidance]; draft first (decided); in-shot sound, effects only [proven] | Duration in whole seconds, 4–30; the aspect never "auto"; audio always set; media limits: 30 images (frames counted), 10 video and 10 audio clips, 50 in all; 24 fps, no native 4K. 3, 7 and 16 cr/s at 480p, 720p and 1080p (read Oct 2026) | |
Risk bands | The budget per generation | Low: about 31 cr/s expected, 62 cr/s at the ceiling. High: about 62 cr/s expected, 123 cr/s at the ceiling (from the Seedance prices read Oct 2026) |
Voice and sync
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
ElevenLabs Eleven v4, on your own ElevenLabs account only (decided) | Arabic voice [best available, not yet validated], a native voice artist behind it [proven]; English voice [official guidance] on v4 | Output wav_48000 or pcm_48000, never the default mp3_44100_128; Stability from 0.5; no Speed, Style or SSML on v4; at least two generations per line. $0.08 per 1,000 characters on the API (read 19 Oct 2026) | |
ElevenLabs Scribe v2, on your own ElevenLabs account | Voice notes, the back-check of every take, word timings [official guidance] | Keyterms up to 1,000; speaker labels on; word-level timestamps. About $0.22 an hour of audio, plus $0.05 an hour for keyterms (read 19 Oct 2026) | |
Gemini 3.5 Transcribe | The Egyptian cross-check on every Egyptian take | Set to Egyptian Arabic; for words, not timing (its custom vocabulary can't be combined with timestamps); on a paid key only. About $0.005 a minute (read 19 Oct 2026) | |
Sync-3, on Higgsfield | Lip sync [best available, not yet validated] | The 1080p finish as the video, the plate-length file as the audio, sync mode cut_off (the default, bounce, plays the video back and forth). About 3.86 cr/s (read Sep 2026) | |
Seedance's own voice | Option: use it when a principal line is in English or another language Seedance speaks well and you choose it for the project [proven]. Never Arabic (decided) | The voice approved by the client from a sample |
Music
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
Suno, the latest model (v6) | All music, hero tracks included (decided); [proven, thinly: Suno as the source, finished outside Suno] | Advanced mode; v6, with v6-wild for at most one option of three; Duration set to the cut length; Max Mode off at 60 s or under. One Create makes two clips: 10 Suno credits, 20 with Max Mode. Pro: 2,500 Suno credits and 20 downloads a month (read Oct 2026) |
Sound
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
ElevenLabs Sound Effects, on your own ElevenLabs account | Designed effects [official guidance] | eleven_text_to_sound_v3; 0.1–30 s per row; loop on for beds and ambiences, off for one-shots; 48 kHz WAV for non-loops. The API price page lists about $0.12 a minute (read 19 Oct 2026); the app quotes 40 ElevenLabs credits a second. Confirm the real charge on the first job | |
Openverse | Real recordings [best available, not yet validated] | CC0 only (decided). Free | |
earshot | A listening aid; your ear decides [best available, not yet validated] | Free and open source | |
A loudness meter | Integrated loudness, short-term loudness and true peak on every file | Any EBU R 128 meter |
Edit and checks
Tool | Job | Key settings and price | Home |
HyperFrames | Supers, end cards, label moments and Arabic on screen, built in code [best available, not yet validated] | One pinned version per film; ProRes 4444 with straight alpha for overlays, opaque ProRes 422 HQ for end cards and full-frame graphics | |
Gemini, then Higgsfield's video analysis | Reading motion, acting and sound in a take [best available, not yet validated] | One take per request; Gemini on a paid key only. Gemini about $0.06 per 60 s on Gemini 3.8 Flash at 5 fps and high resolution, about $0.16 on 3.1 Pro (read 19 Oct 2026; Flash prices double on 1 January 2027); Higgsfield up to about 2.3 cr (read Oct 2026) | |
Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, After Effects | The timeline, scopes, the free tracker for the camera dose, the look as a LUT | — | |
Audition, ffmpeg, ffprobe | The placed voice, the noise floor, mono and the phone band; frame exports and the delivery check | — | |
Photoshop or Affinity | Images at 100% for the full-size check; colour samplers for the balance report; a cut-out's edge over plain colours | — | |
Audacity | The beats of a reference's music, with its Beat Finder | Free | |
A word-compare tool | The Arabic spelling check and the back-check, word by word: Word's Compare, or a word diff in a terminal | — | |
Adobe Color | Five colours per reference still, with Extract Theme | — |
What a whole 30-second film costs, line by line and currency by currency: Planning, budgets and takes → Costs and the estimate ("The same film, all in").
Every tool step in the Guide is listed, by stage, in Tools at a glance → Every "Do it yourself" block.