Your Book Trailer's Opening Scene - Which Way To Go

OFFICIAL TITANIC POSTER

Outline Your Book Trailer with this Hollywood Trick:

Once upon a time, I was an aspiring screenwriter. (still am, but who cares) In fact, screenwriting was how I got started writing novels, so I've learned a trick or two from the pros on how to pitch your screenplay to Hollywood.

Novelists can use this same technique to fine-tune their book trailers.

Traditionally, screenwriters pitch a logline of their script, which is a brief sentence or two, or a short paragraph outline for the movie.

Titanic Logline:
A seventeen-year-old aristocrat, expecting to be married to a rich claimant by her mother, falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic.

This logline is all about the love story and along with  loglines, screenwriters also mock-up sample posters. The reasoning is, if you can't envision the poster, the movie won't work.

Think about this idea. A logline and a poster do one very important thing for your story: they help you define the core story question. In other words, Titanic is really about a love story between an aristocrat and a poor, starving artist. On a broader scale, it's also about social classes and its disparities when it comes to true love. But that only covers the genre: A love story.

You can write hundreds of love stories, but what sets them apart? It's always, boy meets girl, girl hates boy, and in the end, they fall in love and live happily ever after. Right, but what makes these stories unique? That's where your story question, the driving force behind your story, comes into play. In Titanic, the main conflict is all about The Heart of the Ocean jewel, a rare, blue diamond, and its whereabouts. Who owns it? Was it stolen, or is it lost on the bottom of the ocean floor?

But, the plot thickens, and that leads to a love affair, a feud for the lost diamond, and then a sinking ship, among several other subplots thrown in for good measure. Wow, what a powder keg this story sits on!  So how do you sort it all out and what opening do you choose for your trailer?

Let's see, James Cameron chose to frame this story within the context of this core story question. What happened to the Heart of the Ocean diamond? It's a fictitious tale, book-ended to frame the true history of the Titanic's demise. Why? Because without this "literary" device, the real story of Titanic is nothing more than a documentary. And that's not as exciting as a 3 hour movie with a complex structure and a myriad of intriguing subplots.

The poster, however, mentions nothing about the diamond. The poster focuses entirely on their love affair. Notice the imagery. A young couple in love, and a ship seemingly splitting them apart. Then the tag line: Nothing on earth could come between them. Really?  Not quite, because that's exactly what happens. That tagline does a tremendous job launching the main theme of the story: True love conquers all. That's really what this Titanic movie is all about. Everything else is context, subtext, and icing on the proverbial cake. And what a multi-layered cake it is.

So how does all this relate to your book trailer? Simple, you need a hook to launch your book trailer, a logline, of sorts, that says: here's the essence of this book. This is what this book is really all about.  And you need to show it with vibrant images, sound, and voiceovers if necessary. You need to pose a story question that sets the tone for the book and the trailer, from frame one. Think theme and think genre.

The official Titanic movie trailer runs long at 4:09 minutes. That's about twice the length of most trailers, however, this is a long movie with a rather complex plotline, but those digital shots of the Titanic are breathtaking and interesting to watch, so it all holds up.

Look at this way, the marketing folks chose to saturate their marketing with different points of view. Very smart because, why would you want to repeat the same message in the poster and in the movie trailer? That's redundant and a waste of marketing dollars. Instead, they chose to angle the poster as a love story, (after all, you must keep its message simple) and showcase the trailer with a historical POV, focusing on the rare diamond, the feud over its disappearance, and the race against time to save themselves aboard a sinking ship. Hence, a four minute trailer.

Whew! This is exhausting just writing about it. It's no wonder the budget for Titanic was about 200 million. Ridiculous, but most likely, necessary.

The bottom line here is that when you outline your book trailer, think about the story theme and the story genre. Because that's where most of the images and music comes from. Musical scores are all about genre. Images are also about genre, but they can be specific to scenes too, so you have to decide early which way to go. What's your focus? Is it theme, or is it a specific scene in the book? A scene that covers the main theme, or the opening scene, or hook. Your choice.

Once you pinpoint your short synopsis (logline) and envision a (movie) book poster for your book, you're on your way to finding the best way (which scene or images to use) to open your book trailer. Starting a trailer is a lot like staring at a blank canvas, or an empty screen with a blinking cursor. Where do you begin? What launches the story? What are the circumstances that set it off?

What will engage the viewer and hold their interest for the next 90 seconds or several minutes? And how will those images, those questions, inspire viewers to keep searching for more answers?
  

Realize this:

 Your book trailer is an open-ended question, a curiosity that leads viewers 
on a quest for final answers, and consequently, closure.

Without this mindset, all your efforts, all your hard work will lead to nothing more than a slideshow of something that vaguely resembles your story. Apply these principles and techniques to your writing, to all your marketing, and to your book trailers, and see the amazing difference it can make in how readers perceive your book, its story, and ultimately, your book sales.

QUENTIN TARANTINO'S HATEFUL EIGHT TRAILER - What We Can Learn

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You've no doubt heard of Tarantino's next project, The Hateful Eight. There's been a lot of talk about the leaking of the script last year and Tarantino's tirade over that. Not sure whom among the actors leaked the script, but it's rumored to be either ... Read all about it here: http://screenrant.com/quentin-tarantino-shelves-hateful-eight-after-script-leak/

As a huge Tarantino fan, I'd love to see this movie but as it stands, right now, he might just publish the screenplay and not make the movie as planned this coming winter. At any rate, my focus here is the trailer itself. Another leak, QT is most likely pissed about, but hey, it's out. If anything, I think all the publicity is a good thing for buzzing this film, but let's get into deconstructing this trailer.

Quentin Tarantino - He's pissed!

It is said that Tarantino films are the most studied movies in film schools and universities, and for good reason. Tarantino breaks many rules and gets away with it in high style. If nothing else, Tarantino films are a great study in film making, and his movie trailers are certainly a great study in making book teasers.

As I've said before, there's not much difference between a movie trailer and a book trailer. They both aim to get viewers or readers interested and engaged in the movie or book, sometimes both. It's just that simple. The mechanics are the same, the marketing is virtually the same, and the main difference is that most book trailers use photo stills to tell the story, the sales pitch, that is, unless you go for one of those expensive cinematic book trailers, that look and sound like movie trailers. Not bad, but they also make you want to see the movie of the book, (if there is one) and not read the book itself. Not exactly the desired effect.

Let's never forget, it's a sales pitch, nonetheless. How we finesse that pitch, how we present it, is the secret to any successful trailer. And what you leave out of it, as you'll see in this Hateful Eight Trailer, is more important than what you put in.

Check out this pirated trailer to see if you can figure out what the story is about. This appears to be an early version of the teaser for the film. Notice how this trailer is all about the genre and offers little details about the story. A great teaser!

 

Another Movie Trailer for The H8ful Eight

This teaser includes the actors and gives a deeper look into the story, but again, it mostly relies on genre, Westerns, in this case, to impart a feeling, or set the tone. So, if you're a western fan, you're all-in either way. No details necessary. You watch because of the genre and the story is incidental. In this case, you also watch because of the writer/director. It's Quentin Tarantino, enough said. You know you're in for a wild ride.

Okay, but your book is not the next QT offering. Boo-hoo, cry me a river, I know the feeling. You're not alone. Forget about it, put away your hankie, pull up your big-boy pants (or big girl panties) and get over it already. The good news is, you don't have to be Tarantino for readers to enjoy your next book. Right. That's what they all say.

But that doesn't mean your book trailers can't be Tarantinoesque. Mind you, you don't really want to go for the full cinematic look for reasons already mentioned. You can do a nice job with some footage and animated stills and still convey a great feeling for the story, leaving readers with a craving for your book, and not a movie that probably doesn't, or will ever exist.

Below is a good example of what I mean by using a combination of footage and animated stills. And when I say animated stills, it means still photos that you can add motion to, as in panning, easing in or out, blurring or focusing, and so on. These are standard effects you can apply with WMM, Vegas Movie Studio, iMovie, or the video production editor of your choice.

This is my most recent book trailer for the Shadows in the Fog book by Greg Messel. He writes Detective Noir crime novels. One of the techniques I use in this trailer is to open with short footage. Slowly revealing the story world. Focusing on the genre. That's important because you don't want to rush into a story no one has ever heard of. You want to take your time an acclimate the viewer to their new surroundings, if you will. Set the stage (establish the genre) and let it all sink in slowly and work your way into the story. This also builds tension as you ratchet up the pace and quicken the shots as you go along.

 Now, you must realize that you have about 90 seconds to work with. So you can only take so much time to introduce the story world. About 5 seconds is enough time to anchor the viewers and acclimate them to this new world. Think of it this way, it's more about pace than length. Ease into it and reveal the story problem, the all-important conflict that opens the story, slowly, without lingering. If there's anything worse than rushing through an introduction, it's holding a shot for too long.

At any rate, that's where your hook comes in. How are you going to engage your audience? What device are you going to use? Remember, that whatever you say or do, it must be intrinsic to the storyline. Your opening hook must be an integral part of your plot, a small part that you reveal upfront, but not entirely. This is where a sense of mystery takes hold and doesn't let go.

Here's where you get to ask the million dollar question and leave it hanging, unanswered until the end of the story. (How cruel can you be?) Without this device, you may as well pack it in. If you don't build curiosity from page one, your story is doomed to fail. It's just that simple.

And I'm referring to debut authors in particular. Authors who can sell books on the strength of their name alone can open their story however they want. New authors don't have that luxury. They have to engage their readers right away and hold their interest until the very end. The writing standards are quite different.

That being said, I don't believe in weak openings, regardless of an author's clout in the industry. Or weak ending for that matter. (See my rant about Stephen King's, Joyland.) Like most readers, I want a good hook that keeps me in suspense, right from the start and holds my interest right to the bitter end. Have you ever picked up a book and started reading and been distracted for whatever reason, and then you've been compelled to pick up the book again and continue searching for something in the story?

Maybe you've tried to quit a movie but were compelled to come back time and again to revisit the story for unknown reasons. That's a good hook at work. It's the story question posed at the beginning of the opening scene or chapter. Now you need closure, and the only way to get it, is to finish seeing the movie or finish reading the book.

Story hooks in movies and in book trailers work the same way. Once you engage your audience, it's difficult for them to let go. They feel compelled to finish watching or reading. And that's what you want, isn't it? Of course you do. That's what we all want as writers. We want to pique our audience's curiosity. We want to tease them and leave them in suspense. That's the name of the game.

That's how we get readers to click for more answers and ultimately have no choice except to buy your book. These techniques are not new, but they are essential if you want to succeed as a writer. That's why I always say, that if your opening is weak, your marketing will be dubious at best.

And speaking of that, in my next Post, I'll show you a trick many screenwriters use to pitch their scripts to Hollywood. What does that have to do with book trailers? Everything! Hey, it's all marketing. It all ties together in many different ways, but the goal is always the same.

How do we sell the story?

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