Create Your Own Book Trailer Free

Think it's impossible for you to make your own book trailer. Well, think again. If I can do it, anybody can do it! Besides, it's fun and easy once you get the hang of it. First, what is a book trailer? A book trailer is a video advertisement of a book, also referred to as a book video, and a book teaser. It can be acted out, full production trailers, flash videos, animations, simple still photos set to music with text conveying a story. I created mine using still photos set to music.

Book trailers, book videos, book teasers, you name it, is one of the fastest growing, powerful trends in promoting books by way of the Internet. Of course, the cheapest and easiest way to reach your target audience and generate sales via video-sharing sites, websites, blogs, social networking sites and book related sites. Guess what, it cost me nothing to do it! That's right! I paid not one red cent to have it done. I did it myself.

With the help of a few simple software applications, all you are doing is dragging and dropping images related to your book and storyline into the software's story timeline. Then you will add video effects and transitions, and lastly music or sound effects.

Ready, Set, Go!

This is how you get started. First, go to YouTube, or any of the other distribution channels (video-sharing sites) listed below, type in "book trailers" and observe other trailers on these sites before creating your own. This will give you a feel for what you may want in yours. Better yet, check out my book trailer. Or, view it below.

Next

Next, decide on what software you will use. You may use the following software to create your book trailer.

• Windows Movie Maker
• PhotoStory
• Jumpcut
• PhotoShow

I created mine using Windows Movie Maker. I will only refer to Windows Movie Maker in this article. So, do me a favor. Go to your desktop and click on start at the bottom of your computer and then click on Programs. Kabaam! Movie Maker should already be installed on your computer. If not, then you may download it, as well as Photostory for free! Yippee! That's a glorious word, uh? Free. Both of these programs are Microsoft products. God bless Microsoft. The only thing about using Photoshow and Jumpcut is their logo will follow your trailer wherever it goes.

Now that you have the product, go ahead and familiarize yourself with it. Windows Movie Maker comes packaged with very easy instructions for making your book trailer, under movie making tips. Read it thoroughly. Play with it using a few pics from your computer hard drive. Once, you've done that, have some idea in mind for a storyline for your book, write it out, then find some graphics, or images that fits your story. Create a story line that will arouse your audience interest to buy. In addition, please, please make sure the graphics you choose are not copyrighted. I created two of the images in my trailer, "the exploding religion clip" and "the collage of technology clip," using Microsoft Publisher. What a miracle!

Using Images

Below are a few places you can visit for royalty free stock images; however, you may type "royalty free images" into your search engine and a string of them will pop up. Have fun!

• Dreamstime
• Fotolia
• Microsoft Office
• Photobucket

Once you've decided on images to use, go ahead and save them to your hard drive in your pictures folder. Book trailers should last no longer than two minutes, so pay close attention to the minutes as you create your trailer. Mined lasted two minutes and twelve seconds. Now, we can go into the Windows Movie Maker and click on import your pictures. Once your picture is imported, then you can go to that picture, and drag it and drop it into the story timeline boxes at the bottom. From then on, you can decide on what video effects and transitions you want to use.

Adding Music and Sound

After you've done the above, you can now add your music, or sound. The same rule that applies to graphics also applies to music, make sure the music you choose is not copyrighted, or make sure you have permission to use it. I found free sound clips at:

• Soundsnap
• Partners in Rhyme
• Brainy Betty
• Open Music Archive
• Opsound
• ccMixter
• Neo Sounds

You may find some by going to your search engine and typing in "royalty free music", or "free audio clips", or "royalty free sound clips." You can save them to your music folder. Royalty free is the key to keep you safe from copyright infringement.

Promoting to Distribution Channels

Now, the most exciting moment ever has now come for you to put your baby out there for the world to see and my, oh my, aren't there many avenues available to promote your trailer. There are myriad of places for you to distribute your book trailer. You may upload it on your own website, or blog, video sharing sites, social networking sites, and even in your email signature. Video size is limited to 100 MB on most video-sharing sites. My video size turned out 9.72 MB. Below are just a few places to get started. I set a goal to submit my trailer to at least one distribution outlet a day, although I usually end up submitting more than one a day.

• YouTube
• Revver
• Veoh
• MySpaceTV
• Godtube
• MetaCafe
• Yahoo Video
• Google Video
• Book Trailers
• iFilm
• Ourmedia
• De.icio.us
• Digg
• AuthorsDen
• Nelsok

Now take a deep breath and tell yourself, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me and awards me with the ability to create my own book trailer."Congratulations! You just saved yourself anywhere from $200 to thousands of dollars just by creating your own book trailer!