The making of “Who is … Paz Kirkegaard?” “The Foolish and the Weak” book trailer, Part I

Dominique Razon as Paz Kirkegaard in "The Foolish and the Weak" book trailer entitled, "Who is ... Paz Kirekgaard?"

Back in August of last year, the editing of “The Foolish and the Weak,” the first book of my Age of Restoration series, was in full swing. I was hoping for a September publication date (oh, silly me!) and, therefore, wanted to get the ball rolling on a book cover and a book trailer.

The book cover was obvious—couldn’t have a book without it! The trailer, however, was not as necessary, but it was one more way to promote the book. Book trailers have become a popular thing, as of late, even if it’s still up in the air whether or not they really sell books. In my mind, it was worth the try, and as it is, no form of advertising was ever a guarantee.

Guru.com became the go-to place for both. The search for a freelance artist for the book cover began on August 5. The one for the book trailer began on August 17. The book cover went through its 10-day bidding process and was eventually awarded and work began on that project.

The trailer bidding, on the other hand, closed early. Only five freelancers bid the job. Four of them were around or way below the asking price, while a fifth was considerably above. In looking at what the four proposed, it was obvious they weren’t bidding based on the details of the project.

What followed then was a long conversation, over a period of months, with the fifth bidder. It became readily apparent that what was proposed for the trailer on my part through Aevea Publishing wasn’t going to fit in the proposed budget. Looking back, I can smile, but at the time, I confess to a significant level of frustration.

It was like the conundrum Bill and Ted found themselves in at the beginning of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. They needed Eddie Van Halen in order to have an excellent video, but to get Eddie Van Halen, they first needed the excellent video. In the case of the book trailer, in order to justify spending money on it, especially more money, we needed to know if the trailer would actually equate to book sales. Unfortunately, the only way to find out was to make the trailer, and not knowing if it would lead to sales or not, there was little desire to go over budget.

The decision was made to go with the fifth freelancer, but the guru.com project was closed until the details of the trailer could be finalized. What ensued over the next two months, from late August to late October, was a conversation that felt more like a tug-of-war at times, between keeping under budget—while having something to grab viewers’ attention—and still staying true to the book.

Scripts were passed back and forth, portions of the book were sent to give the production company a taste of what was sought, and finally, the concept of a script was settled upon. It was decided, due to budget constraints, that the live action book trailer would star one actress (to play the main character, Paz Kirkegaard), it would take place completely indoors, and would be filmed at night.

Instant messaging would take place between Paz and her mother, Paloma, until said IM was hijacked by some mysterious interloper who had access to an unseen camera. The messaging in the chat would hint at changes taking place in Paz. Once the chat was taken over by the unknown entity, there would be some sort of manifestation of at least one of the changes Paz was undergoing.

The project reopened on Guru in late October, but the search for the actress, while well under way, had not been finalized. The script still needed some work, too, but finally, another milestone was reached in mid-December, when essentially all of the needed pieces began to fit into place. The only thing that was off then, was timing. Eventually, Christmas got in the way, and so the shoot was tentatively proposed for the first weekend in January. That ended up being moved to the following weekend.

Shooting the trailer the second weekend actually got moved a day, too, because the actress, , was simultaneously being chosen for a commercial which rearranged her schedule. Finally, there were no more scheduling conflicts and filming commenced at 4 pm, Sunday, January 15.

More in Part II.