Book Trailers

[Moni12]

Do you make them? What do you think of them? I've been thinking of making one to post on my blog, but am not sure yet if this is something I really want to do.

[Guardian]

Yes, I used to make trailers and I'm also to plan to create one trailer for my novel too. As a graphic artist (That's my second profession) who also used to make trailers (Mostly CGIs), I must say; unfortunately most of the book trailers are in the lack of quality and they're rather alienating the readers instead of bringing in new ones. If you're planning to do a book trailer with Windows Media Maker, I would strongly advise to forget it, because with WMM, it will present an amateur atmosphere and I bet that's not what you're intending to achieve.

If you're intending to make a book trailer, make it with true animation and post production softwares or forget the trailer completely.

[Moni12]

Thanks for the tip. Is there any kind of software you would recommend?

[Guardian]

Adobe After Effects, Sony Vegas Pro. These are the good ones. With these ones you can make a professional trailer, even from still pictures if you have good material for it (i.e. quality pictures, photos, paints or draws, decoration elements, good fonts, your own music, etc, etc...).

[Sommer Leigh]

I love Adobe After Effects, but it takes some time to get used to. It is a very powerful program.

Be very, very, very careful that everything you use you either made yourself, purchased the licensing to use, or are given WRITTEN permission to use. Magnatunes.com is a great place to look for music because the licensing is relatively inexpensive and there is plenty of musical sounds to choose from.

The trailers that always hook me are ones that somehow speak to the book. They don't look like a movie trailer version of a book, they look like they are somehow part of the book, and if all you're going to have are some lines from the book flashing on screen while music plays and then at the end show the cover and release date, I wouldn't bother. Those are the videos no one cares about.

But when the trailer directly speaks to the book, they can be very cool. Some great examples to look at (in my opinion) are:

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYiw5vkQFPw

Vixen by Jillian Larkin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqWhLaIg ... r_embedded

Fall for Anything by Courtney Summers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UNDoouM ... r_embedded

The Sky is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yqim02tV ... re=related

Tell me a Secret by Holly Cupala
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBcgNOeh ... r_embedded

The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVrPYBHy ... r_embedded

Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX82ggGCF7c

Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l59sMzeA ... re=related