I made two trailers for my forthcoming book 1616: The World in Motion. The short one is a little over a minute long and has no voice-over narration. It’s main advantage is that it’s, well, short. The other one, a hefty ten minutes long, is more informational.
The short video trailer:
Carol says the short trailer overemphasizes Asia, which is a fair criticism, but I’ve about hit my limit for now on video work! I thought the long video trailer was just probably too long for most people, but early listeners Anne and Ellen had the following reactions: Ellen says “I like the long trailer better! I think it has a better sense of the book and is more engaging. But I think the audio track needs some work — the music’s a little loud and your voice a little quiet in comparison. I like the script and images you chose though.” And Anne says of the long version “I enjoy the narration and all the fabulous graphics … the music is well selected too. I wonder though-if the sound track could have less volume so the voice over is clearer to listen to. I preferred it in areas where the music was lower. It does run a little long but is very interesting.”
So on the basis of that feedback I’ve turned down the volume on the music (I hope by the right amount), uploaded the long trailer to YouTube, and embedded it here: