SHOW AND TELL: Making Of A Video Book Trailer
I’ve had a lot of fun cobbling together trailers for my most recent thrillers. And today, I want to share how I put the trailer together, and also added “click-able” links to the video. In other words, pull the curtain aside just a bit for readers, and also for other book writers.
A book trailer is no different than one created for a movie: short, full of impact-icity, and designed to entice or even compel viewers to BUY the book. There’s debate on how much benefit (if any) book trailers have on sales, but heck–more eyeballs and ears just learning about SHOW AND TELL could potentially help.
It’s a given that the book must be good. And it’s a given that it should be available as widely as possible. Those two aspects must happen for the book to garner positive reviews–which also serve to convince readers your book is worth the purchase.
The real unicorn-rainbow-dust is obtaining DISCOVER-ABILITY. I suspect a well-done and compelling book trailer can help.
RULES FOR BOOK TRAILERS
There’s no real “rules” about trailers. Just put yourself in the viewer’s seat and take notes. 1. What makes YOU “click” on the video on YouTube or wherever, 2. What makes you STOP watching before it’s done? 3. What makes you watch to the end? 4. After viewing, what makes you A. like/share/recommend B. take the next step (click/buy/subscribe/whatever).
Based on that, I now strive for 1. Click-able cover image 2. Succinct (under 90 seconds…60 is better!) 3. Tension (what happens next? use the CLIMAX scenes of plot, not the whole story) 4. Value added…in my case, free sample chapter
I don’t pretend to be a whiz or professional at movie-making the way many of my actor and producer colleagues are, but for a DIY super-low-budget project, I’m pretty pleased. Using the criteria in the previous paragraph, I’d love your feedback. Does it make you want to click/watch? Did you watch to the end? Would you “click” the link at the end for the free read? (We’ll get to how it was made, including the click-able link, so please keep reading!).
Did you see the clip with Magical-Dawg? Hey, he had to be in there somewhere, since he’s the inspiration for Shadow, my hero-dog character. You can read more about that in this fun blog post.
One of the so-called “rules” is to keep the video short. Apparently, today we’re all ADD-voyeurs with such short attention spans that—–> OOOOH SQUIRREL!
Although now it’s a single video complete with sound, it didn’t start out that way. If you want, watch again and see if you can count how many separate videos, pictures, and sound cues were used to create this final product. Post your guesses in the comments, and I’ll reveal the answer later. *s*
My first attempt at a trailer was nearly 2-1/2 minutes long, yikes! but it’s had over 500 views so I guess folks liked it well enough. For LOST AND FOUND trailer, I shot nearly all the video myself, (some of it OF myself!) and recorded the voice over but purchased the gunshot sound effects. So other than the cost of the software, which I already had, the first video was nearly free. *s* I’ve included that video further down the page, for those interested.
The trailers for the two latest books HIDE AND SEEK and SHOW AND TELL cost more because I purchased more stock video and audio. There are free-share sites for this but be careful of licensing and copyright issues. Authors don’t want books pirated, so we must respect the rights of the photographer/videographer/model/actor. I purchased several clips from DepositPhotos.com (yes, they have video, too). I think that I paid $30 for “web rights” version for each clip I purchased from them. So each of these videos cost me about $100.
My book trailer for HIDE AND SEEK (also included toward the end of the post) not only used sound effects but also mood-enhancing music, and I tried to time the musical emphasis with appearance of the subtitles. For thrillers, I think that works well. Other genres probably it wouldn’t matter quite so much.
In fact, most book trailers I’ve seen consist of still pictures representing characters or setting with captions that sketch the high points of the plot. There are folks able to make these types of trailers compelling, but I’m not that talented. I prefer video to still pictures, and I prefer voice overs to captions. Probably using a combination works best because reading vs listening is more (or less) compelling and memorable depending on the individual. Today with the advent of SmartPhones and easy-to-record video, you can often shoot the video and images you need yourself–and do the whole thing for free.
But once you have all the different 10-second clips of images, settings, characters and actions, how do you put them together? Video software, of course.
VIDEOPAD EDITING SOFTWARE
There are many kinds of software packages that are easy to use, often free, and provide the effects you’ll want. A simple slide show with captions works well, and can be uploaded to YouTube or Vimeo or other host services (even directly to FaceBook) to leverage share-power.
I discovered VideoPad editing software several years ago, and first downloaded the trial version and fell in love. Using the VideoPad freeware, I produced dozens of my short Ask Amy cat and dog behavior videos and several hundred others all available on my YouTube channel here. When you take a look at some of these, you’ll notice the same intro for each (with puppies or kitties added, depending on the subject), so often you can create your own “stock” footage to use time and again.
Here’s how it works. You open the software, click the “add” button to upload images or video clips or audio files, and then drag/drop into various “tracks.” You can layer these as you wish, move them around, create fade in/fade out or other (zoom!) transitions between these components. The audio track runs below the image files so you can time them, and see where (57 second mark) something happens to create your caption to appear/disappear where you wish. I love this software! You can then “export” the file into any of several formats. The MP4 format works for YouTube very well, but you could expert as a .MOV or any of several other options, including low or high definition, save the file to DVD or whatever you’d like. Brilliant!
Stay tuned for future how-to webinars with screen shots and more for DIY trailers, and other writer-icity topics. Yeah, I don’t have enough to do with the books…I gotta add webinars, too. 
