Luma AI Ray3.2 Guide: Keyframes, HDR, Draft Mode and Credits

Ray3.2 is Luma AI's own video model, released in June 2026, and it handles text-to-video, image-to-video and video-to-video inside the Luma workspace. A 5-second 1080p clip costs 400 credits in SDR, a 360p Draft of the same shot costs 20, and HDR doubles the SDR credits while HDR plus EXR triples them ^[1]. New clips run 5 or 10 seconds from text or an image, up to 20 seconds when you modify footage, at native 1080p with up to 16 keyframes. The output is silent. Our verdict: draft cheaply, lock the shot with keyframes, and pay for HDR only when a colorist will actually grade the file.

From Ray3 to Ray3.2: which version you are clicking

Luma's Ray line moved quickly. Ray3 arrived in September 2025 with HDR and Draft Mode, Ray3.14 followed in January 2026 with native 1080p, and Ray3.2 landed in June 2026. Luma says Ray3.14 was 4x faster and 3x cheaper than Ray3 at 720p. Its training summary states that both later versions derive from Ray3, which began from a third party's open-weight model and was then trained further by Luma. Ray2 is deprecated. If an older tutorial shows Ray2 menus or presets, its steps will not match the app you open today.

Ray3.14 is still listed beside Ray3.2 at the same text- and image-to-video credit prices, and it keeps two jobs Ray3.2 does not do. Extend runs on Ray3.14, at 400 credits per 5 seconds at 1080p in SDR. Ray3.14 Modify is also the route when a clip must change length or loop, because Ray3.2 video-to-video always returns the length of its source. The older model has narrower limits. On Ray3.14, HDR covers only 5-second clips at 720p or 1080p, and 10-second clips are text-to-video only.

Step 1: choose the input and the clip length

Luma's own advice is to pick a start strategy by what you already hold: words, a still, footage or a set of keyframes. Ray3.2 covers all four. From text or an image it renders 5- or 10-second clips; from footage it returns a modified version that matches the source length, up to 20 seconds, with no duration setting at all; prompting from words alone has its own walkthrough in our text-to-video guide. Every mode can render at native 1080p, and the model supports six aspect ratios: 16:9, 9:16, 4:3, 3:4, 21:9 and 1:1. Resolution and length set the bill. Compare both rows below before choosing 10 seconds.

Video-to-video is billed per second of source instead: 36, 48, 72 or 144 credits per second at 360p, 540p, 720p and 1080p, so a 10-second source costs twice a 5-second one at the same resolution. Reframe, which changes the aspect ratio of a finished clip, costs 10 to 120 credits per second across the same four tiers. Luma's pricing table also adds a note to Ray3.2: 'No keyframes: plus 30 credits'. We quote it exactly as Luma prints it, so check it beside the row you plan to use. The modify controls have their own walkthrough in our video-to-video guide.

Step 2: draft at 360p, then spend on the keeper

Draft Mode is the 360p tier, which Luma describes as rapid, low-credit exploration. A 5-second Draft costs 20 credits; the same shot at 1080p costs 400. Luma's suggested workflow is to draft low, render the chosen take at 1080p with HDR, then export EXR frames. Its credit-saving advice adds a shortcut: when a draft works, upscale it instead of regenerating it from scratch. For video-to-video, the Speed inference mode returns results sooner but saves time, not credits. Quality stays the default for finals. Treat Speed as a schedule tool, never as a discount.

The plan math shows why drafting matters. Plus costs $30 a month billed monthly, or $25 a month billed yearly ($300 a year), for 10,000 credits per account. By our arithmetic, those credits cover about 500 five-second Drafts, 100 clips at 720p or 25 clips at 1080p, if every credit goes to that one job with no failed or rejected takes. Pro's 40,000 credits cover 100 of the 1080p clips, and Ultra's 150,000 cover 375. The credit value of one 5-second 1080p SDR clip on Plus billed monthly is about $1.20, a figure Luma never charges as such.

Failed generations get their credits back, but takes you reject still cost credits, and unused credits expire at the end of each billing cycle (pricing). That is the real case for Drafts. A rejected 5-second 1080p SDR take costs the full 400 credits, while a rejected 5-second Draft costs 20, so settle the prompt, the framing and the motion at 360p first. A loose prompt is expensive. Only the take that already works deserves the higher resolution.

Step 3: lock the shot with up to 16 keyframes

Keyframes are how you stop Ray3.2 from improvising. The model allows up to 16 inside a single clip ^[2], and Luma's posts describe pinning them at specific timestamps, which it calls multi-keyframe sequencing. A start frame alone turns a still into motion, and our image-to-video guide covers that route step by step. Later frames fix a pose, a framing or a product's position at the moments that matter. Luma's image guide recommends source images of at least 1080p, with 4K as the ideal.

For existing footage, keyframes work as edited stills. Luma's video-to-video guide says you can pull a frame, change it in Photoshop or Nuke, or inside Luma with Uni-1, Nano Banana or GPT Image, then feed it back at the same frame index. A modify job needs a prompt, keyframes or both; with neither, it errors. Prompts should describe the end state, not issue commands or use negation. Performance tracking carries expressions for up to eight faces at once, which helps with a cast. Motion Transfer and camera-motion transfer copy movement from reference footage onto new material.

Step 4: switch on HDR and EXR only for a grading pipeline

HDR is off by default. Turning it on generates native 16-bit HDR, and EXR export, which requires HDR, attaches a ZIP of EXR frames in ACES2065-1 (AP0) for Nuke, DaVinci Resolve, Flame or Baselight ^[3]. Luma's color guide, written for Ray3.14, describes HDR output as camera data with headroom for compositing and grading rather than finished pixels. That headroom has a price. If nobody on the project grades footage, the EXR folder is a file you paid for and never open.

The cost is a straight multiplier on the SDR credits: HDR is 2x and HDR plus EXR is 3x. A 5-second 1080p clip therefore takes 800 credits in HDR and 1,200 with EXR. By our arithmetic, a monthly allowance of 10,000 credits covers 12 such HDR clips or 8 with EXR, against 25 in SDR, again with no failed or rejected takes. The credit value of one HDR plus EXR clip on Plus billed monthly is about $3.60. The same 2x and 3x multipliers appear on Luma's API page. Decide on HDR before the final render, not after it.

Step 5: add sound, scale to 4K, and extend

Ray3.2 clips are silent. Sound comes separately: ElevenLabs speech, music and sound effects inside the workspace, lip sync by pairing the video with an audio track, or a different model with native audio, such as Seedance 2.5 from ByteDance, Kling 4.0 from Kling AI or Veo 3.1, Google's video model. Those models bill per second in the same Luma credits. Kling, Seedance, Veo and other outside models in Luma can change in availability, length limits and price, and Luma's limits may differ from other apps using the same model (review). Scenes, Luma's storyboard tool, offers a Ray3.2 render path, and that path has no audio either.

Native output stops at 1080p. For 4K, upscale. Luma's own upscaler costs 10, 15 or 25 credits per second to 1080p, 2K or 4K, and the Topaz engine costs 10 or 17 credits per second to 1080p or 4K. One upscale job handles up to 120 seconds of video and leaves the original untouched ^[4]. For an HDR or VFX master, the same guide points to an HDR or EXR workflow rather than the standard upscaler. To lengthen a shot, switch to Ray3.14 Extend, priced per 5 seconds.

Developers reach the same model through the API. Luma says Ray3.2 is the first Ray model offered as an API with its full control surface, and the API page repeats the app's credit table, the 16 keyframes, 1080p output and the HDR multipliers. The API uses credits, not a subscription, and no dollar price per API credit appears on the pages we read. The older Dream Machine API docs still list only Ray2-generation models, so confirm you are reading the current docs before writing code. Luma's own known-issues list mentions HDR requests falling back to Ray 3.

The bottom line

Ray3.2 suits people who finish footage elsewhere, as our guide for filmmakers shows. Its reasons to exist are up to 16 keyframes, native 1080p, 16-bit HDR and ACES EXR frames; its limits are silence and 5- or 10-second ceilings for new clips. Work it in order: draft at 20 credits per 5-second shot, commit 400 credits per 5-second 1080p SDR clip only to the take you keep, and add the 2x HDR or 3x EXR multiplier only when a colorist is waiting. For dialogue or ambience in the same pass, pick one of the models with sound in the same workspace. For long or looping shots, Ray3.14 is still the tool.