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Are you thinking about making your first book trailer yourself? Today author/illustrator Mary Ann Fraser tells us how she went about making the video for the Ogg and Bob easy readers, which she also illustrated. The books were written by her son Ian.





How did you learn to make trailers?

I first learned about making book trailers from David Boeshaar at a Ventura/Santa Barbara retreat on social networking. He was great at making the process easy to understand, but a lot of it is just digging in and playing with the software to learn all you can do.

What goals did you set for yourself? What questions should an author ask herself about her book before making the trailer?

Basically the goal was to attract attention to my book (s) without giving too much away, and the final product needed to be two minutes or less. I also knew I wanted to make something a little different than what was already being done, but was somewhat limited by my video equipment, especially when it came to sound.

I think it's important to plan around what you know how to do and what you can afford. There are copyright free music downloads out there, some for free, some not. It's wise to figure out your budget from the beginning. I recommend writing a script before you start.

Were there any surprises or challenges along the way?

The most challenging part for me was figuring out how to get the video from the camera to my computer. I finally had to load it onto my husband's computer and then he sent it to mine. You can do voice-overs with an inexpensive headset and mike, but the sound will be compromised. The better the equipment, the better the final product.

What kind of software did you use?

I use Windows Movie maker which came with my computer. It is very user friendly.

Can you recommend places on the web for linking trailers?

Amazon's Author Central now allows you to attach a video to your author profile page. You might also look at http://www.bookbuzzr.com, http://www.squidoo.com, http://www.trailerspy.com, or http://www:vodpod.com.

Thanks for sharing, Mary Ann.


TC&TF dedicates this week to book trailers, to celebrate the debut of my own for Tyrannosaus Math (see sidebar), created by the young and talented Jesse Johnson.
Tomorrow: An interview with author April Halprin Wayland.