Cost per image
Also called per-image cost · image generation cost
What a provider charges to generate a single still image, the smallest billable unit in an AI-assisted visual pipeline.
In more detail
Image generation is usually billed per image rather than per token, at a flat rate that can vary by model, resolution, and whether the request is a first generation or a re-roll. Because the unit is a whole image rather than a fraction of one, the arithmetic is simpler than token-based text billing: a script needing forty scene images at a known per-image rate has a cost you can multiply out before generating anything.
Example
At a rate of a few cents per image, a documentary needing forty distinct visuals costs a small, fixed, predictable amount regardless of how long the accompanying script runs, which is a different cost shape from the script itself, where a longer video means proportionally more tokens.
Why it matters
Because this cost is flat per image rather than scaling with video length, it rewards reusing and varying a smaller set of generated images over generating a new one for every scene. It is also why a production stack that mixes stock footage with a modest number of AI-generated stills can come in far cheaper than one that generates every frame.