Two-person team made a 16-min AI animated episode for $16k–$24k in compute alone
emmanuelvivier · x · 2026-11-16
Henry Daubrez of OddKid shared a transparent cost breakdown of Junkyard King, their serialized AI-animated project: episodes run 10–16 minutes, produced by a team of just two in under a month.
Key numbers:
- Compute: $1,000–$1,500 per finished minute, meaning $16,000–$24,000 in generation costs alone for a 16-minute episode
- Video generation dominates costs; image generation is comparatively cheap
- Additional spending on software and subscriptions (details truncated)
Their workflow: run many cheap draft generations to lock the visual recipe, then spend heavily on final shots.
He also argues that as agentic workflows reach editing, high-end production is being end-to-end democratized — writers building their own worlds and a reshuffling of creative roles feel increasingly real.
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