Every expensive mistake in a picture studio is a skipped step. The upscale bought for a frame that was never judged. The video commissioned from a still that was never proven. The swap run across a set before a single pairing was tested. Each one pays a lower step’s debt at a higher step’s prices.
The staircase makes the order physical. Ground step: generate at the standard 6 credits and prove the character against her card. Middle step: judge, cull, and repair — edits at 21 credits, swaps at 26, each spent only on frames that passed. Top step: finish — premium stills at 41 for the frames that front a pack, upscalers at 61 for images and from 101 for video, spent once, on work that is already right.
Video has its own stair: prove the still, prove the shortest clip, then commission the catalogue. The quote is printed before every job by duration and resolution, so each step’s price is known before you climb it.
Skipping a step never saves its cost. It moves the cost upward, with interest, to the step where the failure is finally noticed.