DEV Community: Anas Chehbouni

Plan a Photo Shoot With AI Image Prompts: Aspect-Ratio Limits and a 185-Credit Budget

Anas Chehbouni — Sat, 24 Oct 2026 18:43:20 +0000

Most advice about AI photo prompts is about wording. That matters, but we kept running into a second problem: choosing the wrong aspect ratio or resolution and paying for a re-run. We build Omnely, a multi-model AI workspace that offers GPT Image 2. Disclosure: that's our product, and the numbers below are how GPT Image 2 is priced and constrained on Omnely, not in ChatGPT.

This post treats prompts like a shot list. First a checklist for each prompt, then the limits that decide your settings, then a worked budget.

A prompt is a brief, not a tag pile

The phrasing that works best is a photographer briefing an assistant: full sentences, one subject, one light source, and explicit "keep this, avoid that" rules. Here is the checklist we use. Our ChatGPT photo prompts library uses the same nine parts.

Part	What to write
Shot type	"Overhead flat lay", "environmental portrait"
Subject	Concrete details, such as materials or age
Action / pose	One thing the subject is doing
Setting	Where, in one clause
Light	Direction, quality, colour temperature
Lens feel	"85mm look at f/2.8"
Colour and texture	White balance, skin or material detail
Keep / avoid	"No retouching, no text"
Use	What it's for, such as "4:5 feed post"

The light line is the one to get right. Compare these two briefs for the same bakery photo. They're our own examples, so we aren't claiming any particular output.

Tag pile: bakery, croissant, 8k, masterpiece, ultra realistic

Brief: Overhead flat lay of three butter croissants on a cream linen cloth beside a small white cup of coffee. Soft daylight from a window at the top of the frame, faint natural shadows, neutral white balance, 50mm lens look. Visible flaky texture, no text, no watermark. Intended use: feed post.

The second gives the model a shot type, light, lens feel and exclusions. The first gives it nothing to disambiguate.

Settings are part of the plan

On Omnely, GPT Image 2 is priced by resolution only. It costs the same for text-to-image and for edits on an uploaded photo.

Resolution	Credits
1K	10
2K	15
4K	20

Aspect ratio doesn't change the price, but it limits which resolutions you can pick:

1K only: auto, 4:5, 5:4, 3:1, 1:3 and 9:21.
Up to 2K: 1:1.
Up to 4K: 3:2, 2:3, 4:3, 3:4, 16:9, 9:16, 21:9, 2:1 and 1:2.

This catches people out. A 4:5 portrait looks like the natural feed format, but it can't go past 1K. If you need a larger portrait, you'd move to a ratio such as 3:4 or 2:3, which allow 4K.

A worked budget: four shots for a bakery launch

Suppose we need four images: a 4:5 headshot of the owner, a 1:1 feed post, a 9:16 story and a 16:9 web banner. Using the rules above, the highest allowed resolution for each is:

Shot	Ratio	Final setting	Credits
Owner headshot	4:5	1K (the cap)	10
Feed post	1:1	2K (the cap)	15
Story	9:16	4K	20
Web banner	16:9	4K	20
One pass of all four			65

The totals from here on are our own arithmetic, not figures from a page.

Strategy A: iterate at final settings. Say each shot takes four attempts. That's 4 × 65 = 260 credits.

Strategy B: draft at 1K, finish once. Do three 1K drafts per shot (10 credits each), then one final at the target setting.

Headshot: it's already 1K, so 4 × 10 = 40.
Feed post: 3 × 10 + 15 = 45.
Story: 3 × 10 + 20 = 50.
Banner: 3 × 10 + 20 = 50.

Total: 40 + 45 + 50 + 50 = 185 credits. That saves 75 credits, about 29%. The headshot saves nothing because there's no cheaper size to draft at.

One caveat of our own: a 1K draft is good for composition, light and wording, but it won't tell you everything about fine detail at 4K. Budget for the occasional second final.

For a single image the Omnely guide gives a simpler rule of thumb: ten 1K drafts plus one 4K final is 120 credits.

Three habits that kept the budget down

Put the aspect ratio in settings, not the prompt. Only mention the intended use in the text so the composition leans the right way.
Change one thing between drafts. If you change the light and the lens together, you won't know which one helped.
Use reference images for real products and people. GPT Image 2 on Omnely accepts up to 16 references per run, and references don't add to the credit price.

What to check before you rely on any of this

Rates and limits can change. The model page on Omnely shows the current options for GPT Image 2. Omnely image models also need a paid plan after the free sign-up credits, and we haven't covered plan prices here, so treat the credit numbers above as per-image costs only.

What a Kling 3.0 Clip Really Costs: A Per-Second Credit Breakdown

Anas Chehbouni — Sat, 24 Oct 2026 18:37:25 +0000

AI video pricing is usually quoted in plans and monthly buckets, which makes it hard to answer a simple question: what does one clip cost? We build Omnely, a multi-model AI workspace, and we offer Kling 3.0 there, so we had to work this out per second. Disclosure: this is our own product, and everything below is about how Kling 3.0 is billed on Omnely, not on Kling's own site.

The unit: credits, and what they're worth

On Omnely, 1 credit equals $0.01. Kling 3.0 is billed per second of output, and the rate depends on only two toggles: mode (std or pro) and whether sound is on.

Mode	Sound	Credits / second	USD / second
Std	Off	12	$0.12
Std	On	18	$0.18
Pro	Off	17	$0.17
Pro	On	24	$0.24

Clips run from 3 to 15 seconds. That puts the floor at 36 credits ($0.36) for a 3-second silent std clip. The ceiling is 360 credits ($3.60) for 15 seconds of pro with sound. Sound is on by default, so the default 5-second std clip is 90 credits ($0.90).

Totals for common lengths

The formula is seconds × rate. Here are a few totals:

Clip	Std, silent	Std + sound	Pro, silent	Pro + sound
3 s	36 ($0.36)	54 ($0.54)	51 ($0.51)	72 ($0.72)
5 s	60 ($0.60)	90 ($0.90)	85 ($0.85)	120 ($1.20)
10 s	120 ($1.20)	180 ($1.80)	170 ($1.70)	240 ($2.40)

Aspect ratio (16:9, 9:16 or 1:1) and prompt length (up to 2,500 characters) don't change the price. Neither do reference images. Kling 3.0 accepts up to two, and there is no per-image surcharge.

A worked example: draft cheap, finish once

Say you want a single 8-second hero shot for a social post, with sound. The tempting approach is to iterate at the final settings. Eight-second pro with sound costs 8 × 24 = 192 credits ($1.92) per attempt. Six attempts would be 1,152 credits, or $11.52.

Here's a cheaper workflow that uses only the rates above:

Draft the idea in 3-second std silent clips: 36 credits ($0.36) each. Run six of them to settle composition and prompt wording: 216 credits ($2.16).
When one works, render the final once at 8 seconds, pro with sound: 192 credits ($1.92).

Total: 408 credits, or $4.08. That's roughly a third of the cost of iterating at full settings. The caveat is that a 3-second std silent draft won't show you everything. Pro mode may change motion and faces, so you might still spend one extra pro attempt. Even so, you'd still come out well ahead.

Four ways to cut the bill

1. Duration is the biggest lever. Each extra second adds exactly one per-second rate. Going from 5 to 10 seconds doubles the cost. Trim your shot list to the seconds you'll actually keep.

2. Switch sound off if you'll replace it. Sound adds 6 credits per second in std and 7 in pro. If a voiceover or licensed track is going on top anyway, a 5-second std clip drops from 90 to 60 credits, and a 5-second pro clip from 120 to 85.

3. Treat pro as a finishing mode. By our arithmetic from the table, pro costs about 42% more than std when silent (17 vs 12) and about 33% more with sound (24 vs 18). Use std for loops, mood cuts and iteration, and pro when a shot needs tighter motion or cleaner faces.

4. Read the total before you generate. The credit total is shown on the model page before you run anything. If you nudged the duration slider from 5 to 7 seconds without noticing, the number on the page is the one you'll be charged.

Things to know before you try it

Credits are one wallet across chat, image, video and audio on Omnely, so unused video credits aren't stranded. Purchased top-up credits don't expire.
New users get free credits on sign-up, but video models require a paid Omnely plan afterwards. We haven't covered plan prices here.
Omnely isn't Kling and doesn't resell Kling's own memberships. Kling 4.0 is not available on Omnely; only Kling 3.0 is. If you need 4.0-only features, you'd use Kling's own membership.

If you want the full ladder with more worked totals (3, 5, 8 and 10 seconds, plus a six-clip example), we wrote it up in our Kling 3.0 price-in-credits breakdown. You can check live numbers by adjusting mode, duration and sound on the Kling 3.0 model page.

Rates can change over time. Treat the page total as the source of truth rather than any number in this article, including ours.