Support for Indie Authors discussion

I created this series book trailer today and would love some feedback if you don't mind!
https://youtu.be/Ove75FAgyJY

I can do that for you :)

Joselyn wrote: "I can do that for you :)"

Thank you :D

I think at the end you should ad the name of the saga but iverall was pretty interesting and catching

Oh no! Why would you burn all those books? Why?

I noticed the word "deceit" is misspelled. Otherwise, it's a cute idea. But, man, those dragons are hard on books.

Hi Elizabeth,

Just watched the trailer! I would recommend fixing some of the typos just to make it clean from a technical standpoint. It was also hard to read the text on the covers due to pixelation, and I actually thought they were burning cards from maybe a tarot deck before I saw Dwayne's comment above. Then I looked them up and saw that they were indeed book covers. So maybe a sharper image will make it clearer for the viewer.

And I agree with Joselyn that the final message of the video should be a still shot of the book cover, or some call to action like "Go to [Amazon page] now to help Al save his family!"

Is there a way to get rid of the Animoto Trial frame around the video, or does that only go away with some associated fee?

I like the burning effects, and I get the sense that the story behind it would be attractive. If you can sharpen the imagery of the burning books and make a more direct link between the video and the next step for the viewer, I think you'll have a nice tool to use while marketing.

The trial frame apparently only goes away with an associated fee...which I don't have.

I thought of naming the saga at the end and my story teller's heart clutched up at the change of flow. I'll try again! As it stands I have the link below in YouTube.

As for typos, The only one I saw is deceit (which I spelled correctly over and over again! This is the only word that got auto-corrected on me and it was WRONG! grrr!) What else did you think needed correcting?

The imagery of the burning books is not really available to be fixed. I took the cover photos myself and that is just poor camera (and camera operator quality!) I do have an illustrator that I'm working with now and we have come up with a better thematic representation of the stories for cover art. So hopefully soon we'll have better covers to work with!

Thank you guys so much for the help!

UPDATED VERSION!!! I think it FINALLY allowed me to correct deceit (at least I didn't put a p in it on any of these...I always want it to have a 'p')

https://youtu.be/6Gf8RXZzDo8

I like the new ending! A call to action that clearly defines the viewer's next step. And hooray for the fixed typo!

I would recommend shifting the emphasis so that it reads "The dragons NEED your help!" The other typo aside from deceit was the capitalization of "Need" before the all-caps "YOUR", since it didn't seem to add anything to the flow of the sentence or the meaning of the words.

Now, does the text that accompanies each cover represent something that happens within each of those books? Because I was struggling to find a common thread between the three books based on those descriptions; only the image of the compass (which itself isn't a book cover) gave me information on the overall plot.

Now, this may be an annoying question to hear, since you just put all this effort into this trailer, but why did you choose not to make a trailer focused solely on the first book? You don't want readers jumping to the middle or end of the story arc, so why even give any of those details? Thirty seconds of Book 1 might be more effective at getting readers than thirty seconds shared across what is so far a trilogy.

The capitalization of the N in Need was not a typo but a subtle emphasis. I did not want to shout, but I couldn't italicize the word. Apparently that didn't work like I wanted it to *grumble grumble grumble*

Yes, the text accompanies the overall story arc. The first text, Al telling his story, is purely book 1. Then in Book 2 he is searching and may, or may not, have found help. Book 3 includes more searching...and the big bad is in more prominence.

I didn't have the illustrations I wanted to do any of them in a separated format...something I hope to change soon! However, I didn't want there to just be the poor quality book cover image and then all words. When I either get the covers changed, or get some new images, I will definitely get some trailers for one made! Thank you!

I like it! My only concern is that for those of us who are old and slow and want to read as well as look at the covers, it goes a bit fast. Maybe just tack on an extra couple of seconds with each text if possible?

Christina wrote: "I like it! My only concern is that for those of us who are old and slow and want to read as well as look at the covers, it goes a bit fast. Maybe just tack on an extra couple of seconds with each t..."

Unfortunately, I cannot change the speed. I believe that if I were paying for the use of their site, I would have more control over that. I could also make it longer, which I would love. Sadly, I just can't do that at the moment.

Thank you!

Eh, no worries. I just watched it twice. ;)

I like your initiative!

I like it, it was better this time and it would have been great if it could be slowe as cristina said.

but I think is ready like that so people know where to find the saga and all

Joselyn wrote: "I like it, it was better this time and it would have been great if it could be slowe as cristina said.

but I think is ready like that so people know where to find the saga and all"

Thank you for checking it out for me Joselyn! I really wish I could slow it down. Hopefully that isn't too much of a detraction.