I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one out there who thinks scrolling script, stock images, or god forbid, a PowerPoint presentation that zooms in on those images, is not a trailer. Not even close. If I wanted to be bored for 2 minutes I could watch the political debates. Or grass grow, or paint my toenails. No, a trailer is meant to entertain, excite and intrigue. Frankly when I think trailer, I think dynamic movie trailers with minimal words, a killer backing track, and people that move. Alright, a book is not a movie, and it would make sense that a book trailer is not a movie trailer, but fact of the matter is, if what’s floating around on YouTube is what I’m expected to produce for my story, I’d rather be smothered by a mound of my own books.
So to avoid death by one’s own work, I did this podcast with Adam Cushman from Red 14 films on what makes an awesome book trailer and how you can make a live action one yourself for as little as $3. Red 14 Films was founded in 2011 by a small group of writers and filmmakers looking to engage potential readers through digital film. They produce very short arthouse films that accompany your book, serving as a cinematic back-cover synopsis. These trailers are made for publishing houses big and small, as well as indie and self-published writers. You can find out more about Red 14 Films and making your own book trailer at cinematicbooktrailers.com. Red 14 Films as also running an awesome crowdfunding project at the moment to fund several of their authors trailers. Check that out here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/red14films/four-literary-short-films.
In this podcast you’ll discover
· Why authors need a book trailer
· Why you should treat a book trailer like a music video
· How book trailers can be used to promote rights to film studios
· The difference between a cinematic and regular book trailer and why they’re not out of your price range.
· Top tips for looking professional
· How to make your own trailer for $3.
· Why you shouldn’t use a large amount of stock footage
· The reason why you should use voice overs over production sound
· Where you can hire a cheap (but good quality) camera
· How to pick what parts of your book should appear in your trailer
· Why trailers shouldn’t have credits and why they shouldn’t show your book cover
· The variety of video platforms you can distribute to other than YouTube.
· And the mistakes authors make when making a trailer.
In this podcast we talk about free stock footage websites like video blocks, pond 5 and archive.org. We also talk about the music site incomptech.com and the iPhone app Videfy.
Enjoy!
I love hearing from my listeners! Please feel free to contact me or offer any feedback on topics you would like to see covered at: ebookrevolution (at) yahoo (dot) com.
Emily's non-fiction book E-Book Revolution: The Ultimate Guide to E-book success is now available at Kobo, Amazon and Tomely (Australian e-book store).If you enjoy her tongue in cheek style you may also enjoy her comedy novel set in Facebook, The Grand Adventures of Madeline Cain: Photographer Extraordinaire also available from Kobo, Amazon and Tomely.
The companion website for this podcast is http://ebookrevolution.podbean.com
thx for shre..
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by!
Deletegreat post i was inspired on this post because i really like to become a
ReplyDeleteebook cover designer &
book cover designer
but im still studying how to become a professional on illustrator.
Well good luck to you Jay. When you get up to the point you're happy with your designs you should submit them to the Book Cover Design Awards (http://www.thebookdesigner.com/2011/08/monthly-e-book-cover-design-awards/) to build up a bit of a profile.
Delete