Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

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KarenK
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by KarenK » January 4th, 2010, 10:47 pm

The publishing industry is struggling like the rest of the country. They need to pay attention to what has happened with the other forms of entertainment over the past 15 years. Book trailers are not new and from a marketing perspective they can do wonders for a book, the agent, and the publishing house and of course the author. They have to be done and marketed properly and book trailers can reach a whole new audience for their product.

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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by RebeccaKnight » January 8th, 2010, 3:02 pm

This is fascinating :). I'd always wondered what people thought about book trailers and how effective they are. I've been turned off by a few as well, but wondered if there were some amazing ones that were highly successful.

Has anyone else seen and been intrigued by videos of the author reading an exerpt and interacting with the potential readers? Was that more enticing than a words-and-images-flashing trailer?
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Ryan » January 9th, 2010, 2:45 pm

Some are cool and some are horrible. There's a lot with a bunch of bad pictures, cheesy music, and soap opera one-liners but then again that's me and I don't watch soap operas. Millions of soap opera lovers probably love the trailers. Subjective thing...this writing thing is.

I've seen advertisements by some media groups charging $5000 for a trailer. I think it's a natural way to market a book and its author considering the amount of people who You-Tube all day and the way things go viral nowadays. I agree with a lot of what has been said. It's hard with fiction as part of the fun is making up your own images. Memoir is another thing though. At least that's what I'm hoping.

My book is a memoir and I'm banking on it being a multi-media story as I edit video and have tons of footage to work with. I plan on having dozens of short videos available to my readers and am really excited about multi-media e-book platforms(VOOKS). Lots of video editing in my future but I also plan on producing 30 second video spots to traffic people to my future book's website.

I'd love some feedback on my book's video trailer. Each of the memoir excerpts have a short video to go with them as well.

http://thechinproject.wordpress.com/memoir/

Please leave praises as comments on my blog and critiques here. :) :)

Cheers

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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Regan Leigh » January 15th, 2010, 4:40 am

This is an interesting discussion. (I just joined the forum and haven't seen this thread before.)

I made a semi-book trailer this week for my current WIP. http://www.reganleigh.com/?p=863 I did it for a few reasons. I love to play in iMovie. That's one reason. ;) I also wanted to beef up my website. I'm still working on adding stuff, but I knew I needed an area to discuss my current projects. I'm about to get ready for my last round of betas and I thought it would be nice to have some place to direct them for more details on my WIP.

Would I ever pay someone out of pocket to make a book trailer?

Um, no.

I may not have amazing editing skills, but I can do a decent job. If I wanted something more professional, I'm lucky to have friends ready to help out. But even if I didn't, I'd still never pay. I don't know that the videos are that helpful.

Like one of Nathan's recent posts said, I think we should concentrate our energies on marketing that fits our individual strengths. If yours is not in this area, don't do it. Find another way you can move forward without breaking your wallet or sending you into iMovie coma. (I know. I just came out of it.) ;)

*Off to explore this new forum land until sleep takes over.*
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Blythe » January 15th, 2010, 11:57 am

I think it depends on the audience. YA and trailers are a perfect fit. Pete Hautman encourages his readers to adapt his books. Here is an amazing result--it is basically a short film:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvzUZxOxp00

Pete has this figured out, I think. His readers are passionate about his books and love to engage with them. Making the trailers is a way they interact with the books and other readers.

Maggie Stiefvater is another author who makes trailers I admire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX82ggGCF7c

Of course, Maggie is a visual artist, composes her own music....

I do none of those things, but I'm putting one together for my website. As for the cost, minimal. My eight-year-old is doing the tech work, a friend will be composing the music, etc. I don't know if it will be that effective, but making it is a fun project and a great way to involve some kids who are interested in my book.

I'm also buying in to a collective trailer as a member of the Tenners book debut group. It will be like this one, but feature Autumn release books. Collective buying power gets a pretty polished product for $20.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8Vl6kMe ... r_embedded

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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by lovelylj » January 16th, 2010, 11:27 pm

I think it depends on the audience too, I've made several book trailers. The first one is not so good because I've taken a whole bunch of copyright information and I expect for it to be pulled at any day at any moment, lol. I was in college, they had final cut pro and I was just learning the program My first trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoHDdvTlGOI

Here is my latest trailers, the content I use comes from sites like authorsden
http://activeden.net/ at the time it was called flashden with a small music section, the song I picked was $10, but the song is darn near 5 minutes. So I've gotten at least three, I think it's three out of this one song. Or you can go here http://www.freesound.org/ the sound files are free.

As far as the images go, I go to istockphoto.com and buy credits there it's $20 for 12 credits, depending on the photographer the credits aren't too high, I forgot how much I spent for the images for these trailers (they have videos too!). I figure why not make the trailer because I publish short stories on smashwords and amazon kindle and the covers for the books I get from istockphoto.

I think the trailers are effective (don't let the comments get you down) I'm begining to disable comments for my videos because the adults will come by view the video and then maybe or maybe not buy or book. The children will post all sorts of comments that have nothing to do with your trailer.

So, all in all I think that the video trailers are helpful, they way I look at it is - it can't hurt, it can only help.

There's the three tools I use - istockphoto - activeden - and windows movie maker

Making a video is like making a web site (to me) because the mistakes are usually the same
Too long- web sites can have too much information on one page and a video trailer can be too long - I am guilty of this ;( lol
The colors don't match - I've seen web sites with orange backgrounds and yellow text after my dizzy spell ended I was able to run from the site
Not enough info - some web sites and trailers don't tell you much or have broken links in trailers if you don't tell the viewer where to get your book they can't

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iG_av357IE - Planet of Doom (short story)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0JIR_9qQeg - Return 2 Earth (novel)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59ZnPx6hKr4 - The 13th Floor (so far only 2 sales but only 10 people have seen the vid) (short story)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYdHu2MXqmg - Battle at the Revkar Portal (short story)

I've got to get more hits/sales for these videos before I can do a video for my other short story
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/8570
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by cody » April 2nd, 2010, 4:06 am

With book trailers - it is definitely a case of the good, the bad, and the ugly. But every day we see better trailers uploaded to the web. It won't be long before every author worth their salt will want a captivating, movie-style trailer, but is it worth spending the dollars? A cheap trailer can be made using still images and stilted lines, but is anyone likely to dive into your book after being told that Suzy met Neil (wait for it) the vampire dentist (wait) who murdered her (hold it folks, the next screen is on its way) sister ... Don't do one like that! So yes, I think it is worth putting some money into a trailer. The biggest expense is hiring the film equipment and the actors, but there are loads of creative people out there if you have a good look. I enjoyed every minute I spent making my trailer - spent far more than I planned (budget was about a five hundred dollars). Book sales have doubled since it went out. Even some publishers are doing trailers now - and when THEY start leaping on the bandwagon it has got to be going somewhere! Here's mine - a romantic romp set in the 1940s and the present day.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3Kl5N6xLq0
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Sommer Leigh » April 11th, 2010, 12:57 am

I don't like the really cheesy book trailers. I think they actually do no credit to the books. But the good ones? Oh man. The good book trailers sell me, get me excited for the book, and start me daydreaming until its release date.
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Jen P » May 9th, 2010, 7:44 am

The best I've seen is by madison of m2 productions for Cindy Pon's novel and her prices were very, very reasonable, when I enquired in 2009. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihJ1xy009bk)
I did one posted over at paperbooks.co.uk too, for a friend's The Snowing and Greening of Thomas Passmore. (http://forward.legendpress.co.uk/mainsi ... urman.html). We shot our own moving images, added some still shots, and tried to keep it moving at a good pace.

I don't know if they make any difference, but perhaps you could contact Cindy via her website and ask about her experience?

Good luck.

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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Sommer Leigh » May 15th, 2010, 12:24 am

I am torn on book trailers, but I generally like the IDEA of them, but the execution for most has not been great. And I think those are really big turn offs.

I am in the minority I think who do not have a problem with book trailers themselves. I don't think they are trying to be exactly like movies or tv shows, and I don't think you NEED them to draw people in. I think they are just an extension of a piece of work for the digital age where we really love our youtube and similar sites. Also, I'm kind of a media nerd, so new ideas to tie in things I love (like books) is alright by me.

I absolutely love well done artistic book trailers.

I really hate book trailers that do nothing but show the cover, release date, publisher, author all as a vague powerpoint-y slide show with epic-y sounding music in the background.

I really hate book trailers that feel too much like movies, even more so if the acting is bad. Yikes.

I really really really love book trailers that tie into the book CREATIVELY. Because who here doesn't love awesome websites and blogs that tie in creatively to the book theme of the authors current release? Two people I can think of off the top of my head with fantastic website/blog tie ins to their books are Scott Westerfeld's current Leviathan series (steampunk and alternative history = Love) and Cassandra Clare's Infernal Devices series (Clockwork angels, oh my!) And while I haven't seen a trailer for Cassandra Clare's new work, I am hopeful that they work in the scope of the artwork on her website, but Scott Westerfeld's trailer tie in was absolutely wonderful. I made such a racket of squealing in delight when I saw the trailer, and if I hadn't already dedicated myself to preordering it, I would have when I'd seen it. Of course his trailer does not feature poor acting, it features art from the artist who designed the art inside his book. So it WORKED.

Likewise, Maggie Stiefvater did her own trailers for Shiver and Linger. She designed the music and the art and managed the stop motion all on her own. And I really love that aspect alone, but because she designed the trailer to tie so beautifully into her books they do not feel like movies, they feel like artistic extensions of her awesome books.

These make great book trailers. But the pitiful acting, the actors that don't really look quite like the characters, the low budget/movie magic feel detract entirely from the experience of the books.

The only book trailers I've loved with actual actors are Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth and especially the trailer for her sequel The Dead-Tossed Waves. These were executed really well. They feel like movies, but the voice over reads directly from the beginning of the books. No lousy acting and no boring summaries. I think that's why they work.

Check these trailers out, well worth the time:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYiw5vkQFPw Scott Westerfeld's Levaithan (This trailer gives me goosebumps even though I've already read the book!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX82ggGCF7c Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l59sMzeA_vQ Maggie Stiefvater's Linger
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ou1s3t6q2Q4 Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVrPYBHycx4 Carrie Ryan's The Dead-Tossed Waves
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Heather B » June 1st, 2010, 1:05 am

The first book trailer I ever saw was for my current favourite series. It was however, horrible. Really, really horrible. I love the books and the author but this trailer was supposed to be airing before 'Eclipse' when that hits cinemas and I'm afraid all it will do is turn people off ever wanting to read these books. It almost turned me off wanting to read them.
Which is a shame, because they're wonderful.
I've avoided book trailers ever since. I'm sure they could be good if they actually try but I think I'd prefer to walk into a bookshop and make up my mind that way.
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by BransfordGroupie » August 11th, 2011, 8:38 am

Here's another trailor (simple but effective) that grabbed my attention: Another Faust. I read the book, and it is a great read.
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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Ishta » August 15th, 2011, 4:46 am

Okay. I haven't read thi sthread in detail, but I have skimmed it. I saw a number of links to book trailers that I'd like to check out. But I haven't yet, so know that if you posted a link ot your trailer, what I'm about to say isn't about your trailer!

By and large - and I say this coming from a film and theatre background, so forgive me if I sound snobby - book trailers are really crappy. The acting is stilted, the lighting and camera angles are poor, and even the scripts are cheesy (which, considering that we're writers, is disappointing - can't we at least get the WRITING part right?). I haven't seen many book trailers, but most of the ones I've seen have been so unprofessional and so B-movie-ish that I cringed my way through the whole thing. I generally find them to be really off-putting.

HOWEVER, some of them are really good, and I think a good book trailer is golden. One example is the trailer for MRS PEREGRINE'S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN, which is slick and well-done and deliciously, tantalizingly creepy. It looks like a movie trailer by a major film studio, and I think this is the standard to which we should try to hold ourselves. I linked to it in my blog post last Friday: http://ishtamercurio.blogspot.com/2011/ ... ilers.html

I think a well-done book trailer is a great thing; but unfortunately, I don't think most of them are quite there yet. I hope we get there, though, because they can be great promotional tools.

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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by carynrose » August 15th, 2011, 11:03 am

This is a timely thread, because I just finished my book trailer this weekend. I did it myself, in iMovie, with stills from my personal collection. For music, I'm lucky that I have friends who are professional musicians, and I asked if anyone had a throwaway/demo/unfinished song they could let me use.

I liked that it let me explain what the book was about in one minute and seventeen seconds. I tried to make it personal and emotional.

We'll see if it works. If it does, great. If it doesn't... it cost me my time, and I had a chance to go through my archive and learn how to use a new software program.


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Re: Book trailers: who makes them, $$$, and are they worth it

Post by Quill » August 15th, 2011, 9:07 pm

carynrose wrote:This is a timely thread, because I just finished my book trailer this weekend. I did it myself, in iMovie, with stills from my personal collection. For music, I'm lucky that I have friends who are professional musicians, and I asked if anyone had a throwaway/demo/unfinished song they could let me use.

I liked that it let me explain what the book was about in one minute and seventeen seconds. I tried to make it personal and emotional.

We'll see if it works. If it does, great. If it doesn't... it cost me my time, and I had a chance to go through my archive and learn how to use a new software program.
I think it is GREAT that you made a book trailer. I couldn't really get a feel for what the book is about, though. Maybe it's all the rhetorical questions. Wasn't sure if it was about a band, or about groupies, about groupies of big bands, or garage bands, whether it was a drama, a YA book, a music fan book, a love story, a road-trip kind of thing. I liked it but didn't think it gave me quite enough info, as a potential buyer.

I would like to create one or two book trailers for my WIP, when I'm finished, and feature them on my website, which hasn't been created yet, either. Seems to me a good trailer would help raise a buzz out there.

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