You asked for "a short film for social" and the quote came back for one file. Or worse, the quote came back for one file, you accepted it, and in the edit it turned out you needed seven. One film is never one file. This is the arithmetic that sits underneath every motion quote, and it is almost never done at the briefing stage, which is why motion budgets break in the edit rather than in the estimate.
It takes two minutes, and you can do it without knowing anything about video. To keep it concrete, this guide follows one campaign: a launch film running on Instagram Reels, the Meta feed and YouTube pre-roll, in Danish and English.
List every placement
Where will the film play? Instagram Reels, Stories, TikTok, the Meta feed, LinkedIn, YouTube pre-roll, YouTube organic, a website hero, an in-app surface, a digital screen in a venue, cinema, broadcast. Write them all down, including the ones that feel like afterthoughts. The afterthoughts are the ones that turn out to have different rules.
“A short film for social media and YouTube.”
“Placements: Instagram Reels, Meta feed, YouTube pre-roll. Nothing else for now; Stories and LinkedIn may follow in the spring.”
Group them by aspect ratio
Reels, Stories and TikTok are 9:16. The Meta feed is 4:5. LinkedIn, YouTube, a website hero and broadcast are 16:9. Cinema is wider again. Each group is one master cut, because a 9:16 film and a 16:9 film are composed differently: what sits in the middle of a phone screen sits at the edge of a television. Three groups is three cuts, before anything else is counted.
Our campaign: Reels is 9:16, the feed is 4:5, pre-roll is 16:9. Three ratios, three cuts.
“One video, exported for each channel.”
“Three cuts: a 9:16 for Reels, a 4:5 for the feed, a 16:9 for pre-roll. Each is composed for its frame, not cropped from another.”
Count the languages
Each language version means a separate text layer, separate subtitles and, if there is a voice, a separate voice track. Two languages doubles the work on every cut that has words in it. It also means the edit has to be built with the text layers kept separate from the start, which is cheap if the editor knows on day one and expensive if they find out in week three.
Our campaign: Danish and English. Two languages.
“We may also want an English version later.”
“Two languages from the start, Danish and English. Build the text layers separately. Voice-over in Danish only; English gets subtitles.”
Multiply, then add the master
Aspect-ratio groups times languages, plus one master. Three ratios in two languages is six files, plus the master, seven deliverables. That number is what the producer prices, and it is the number most briefs never state, because you said "a video" and meant all seven. Writing it down in the brief is the difference between a quote that holds and one that does not.
Here is the campaign, counted.
| Placement | Ratio | Danish | English | |---|---|---|---| | Instagram Reels | 9:16 | 1 | 1 | | Meta feed | 4:5 | 1 | 1 | | YouTube pre-roll | 16:9 | 1 | 1 | | Master | 9:16 | 1 | |
Seven files. Say seven.
“Deliverables: the film.”
“Deliverables: seven files. Three ratios in two languages, plus the 9:16 master.”
Name the hero cut
When there is more than one ratio, one of them is made first and the others are adapted from it. Which one is a real decision: a 9:16 hero re-framed to 16:9 is a different film from a 16:9 hero cropped to 9:16, and the difference is usually a shoot decision about how the frame is composed. Name the hero in the brief and the shoot is planned for it.
“All versions are equally important.”
“Reels is the hero. Compose for 9:16 and adapt the feed and pre-roll cuts from it. Most of the audience is on a phone.”
When you do not know
If you do not yet know where it will run, say that, and say which placements are likely: "Reels for certain, probably the feed, YouTube undecided." A producer can price the certain ones and hold the rest as options with a price attached. What breaks budgets is not the open placement. It is the placement that appears in week three as "oh, and we also need it for".
What follows for free
Once the placements are listed, the rest is lookup. Each placement carries its own duration ceiling, codec, sound default and safe areas. The feed and LinkedIn play silent by default, so captions are required. Broadcast wants ProRes at 25 frames and a loudness of minus 23 LUFS. Cinema wants a DCP at 24 frames and its own grade. None of this needs you to know it, and none of it should be asked of you. When you brief with HereBriefly, you tap the placements and the specifications, the count and the hero-cut question are written into the document as you go.
Nicolai Højfeldt founded HereBriefly and writes these guides. Everything in them comes from briefs that went wrong on one side of the table or the other, and from the ones that went right.
