Here is a 2845 word blog post on the best book trailer makers:
Book trailers have become an increasingly popular way for authors to promote their latest publication. These short videos aim to capture viewers‘ attention and interest them in reading the book through a dynamic multimedia experience.
In this comprehensive guide, we‘ll explore everything you need to know about book trailers and the top services available for creating them without breaking the bank.
What Are Book Trailers and Why Are They Effective?
A book trailer is essentially a video advertisement for a book. It highlights exciting excerpts, key characters and plot points, an enticing premise, and ultimately aims to make viewers eager to read the full story.
Book trailers are modeled after film trailers and utilize similar conventions – fast cuts between dramatic scenes, voiceovers teasing an intriguing narrative, atmospheric music building anticipation, and text overlaying imagery hinting at themes.
The first book trailer surfaced in the 1950s when Ernest Hemingway recorded an audio-only trailer to promote one of his titles. But the concept did not gain broader awareness and popularity until the early 2000s when digital video technology became more advanced and accessible.
Flash forward to today and book trailers have proven to be powerful marketing assets:
- One survey found 76% of people said watching a book trailer made them more interested in reading the book.
- Book trailers increase discoverability – when uploaded to YouTube, embedded on blogs, and shared through social media, they help titles reach new demographics of potential readers.
- Visually showcasing a book helps it stand out at a time when thousands of new books hit the shelves and e-bookstores every day.
While some argue book trailers reveal too many spoilers, the consensus is they are an invaluable part of a modern book promotion strategy when done right.
Next let‘s examine the top services that make it simple for indie authors to create stunning book trailers themselves without expensive video production.
Types of Book Trailers
Before highlighting the best book trailer software, it helps to know there are a few standard types of book trailers:
Live Action Trailers: Feature video footage of actors reenacting scenes from the book to build drama and intrigue. This most closely resembles Hollywood movie trailers but has a higher production cost.
Animated Trailers: Bring illustrations and text from the book to life in short animated sequences paired with voiceovers and music. Relatively affordable to produce.
Digital Photo Montages: Display a sequence of photoshopped images thematically tied to the book and overlay text captions and audio. Cheaper and simpler to make using most tools featured below.
Author-Focused Trailers: Built around an interview with or testimonial from the author instead of extensive footage/animation directly adapting narrative excerpts.
Keep these options in mind as you browse book trailer production services and decide which approach best fits your budget and creative vision.
The 20 Best Book Trailer Makers
Based on ease of use, special features, media libraries, analytics, and more, these are the top 20 pieces of software for crafting an eye-catching book trailer:
1. FlexClip
FlexClip makes it simple for authors to turn their books into cinematic trailers, even if they have no prior video editing experience.
With FlexClip, you can:
- Choose from professionally designed book trailer templates
- Upload your own media or browse their massive stock library of video clips, images, and graphics
- Easily add animations, text overlays, music, and visual effects
- Preview your trailer in real-time as you edit
- Download in any format or share directly to YouTube, Facebook and more
Creators praise the intuitive drag-and-drop timeline for arranging media and the wealth of customization options available.
2. Animoto
Animoto lets anyone make hollywood-style book trailers in minutes thanks to its extensive template library and integrated music, stock footage, fonts and editing tools.
The learning curve is nearly non-existent – pick images and video clips related to your book, drag and arrange them on the timeline, input some text to highlight key selling points, and Animoto instantly applies zooming/panning effects, transitions, and an atmospheric soundtrack.
They also provide detailed analytics on trailer views and interest.
3. Biteable
Choose from biteable‘s ever-expanding templates, input your content, and watch this software generate a slick, animated book trailer for you complete with motion graphics and scene transitions.
If you get stuck, biteable offers an Ask the Experts program connecting you with a creative professional to provide feedback and help fine tune your trailer.
Plus biteable integrates directly with Youtube, Facebook and Instagram for one click sharing to the perfect platforms for driving book sales.
4. Adobe Spark
Already use other Adobe Creative Cloud programs? Then Adobe Spark is a no brainer for crafting book trailers thanks to its seamless integration.
Spark puts a simple spin on video editing, automatically applying motion to still images, stylish text animations, themes, and background music. Or take full control and edit each element manually.
When finished, leverage cross-linking between your other Adobe programs to use trailer assets in blogs, social posts, emails and beyond.
5. Wondershare Filmora
Filmora makes it easy to cut together an engaging book trailer with transitions between scenes, text captions overlaid on footage, intro/outro templates, effects, and more advanced tools.
And Filmora goes beyond easy drag and drop editing – they provide detailed tutorials on cinematic techniques and shot composition so first-timers can produce a polished trailer.
They also have a library of royalty-free music and sound effects to incorporate.
6. InVideo
InVideo is the leading AI-powered video creation platform. The book trailer maker provides pre-made templates you can customize by uploading photos/videos related to the book’s story and characters.
Their AI will instantly process assets to create an eye-catching sequence complete with customizable motions, transitions, text, filters and auto-generated audio.
If you need assistance, their creative services team can step in to professionally edit and enhance your book trailer.
7. Photoscape X
Photoscape X offers many standard trailer-making features like integrated clip trimming, text overlays, filters, and transition effects powered by AI.
But they take it up a notch by offering an formidable suite of photo, image, and GIF editing tools so creators can easily photoshop cover art, headshots, location photos and other assets to use in the trailer.
No need to outsource graphic design and image manipulation – handle it all yourself in Photoscape X.
8. Shakr
Shakr brands themselves as the top animated book trailer production platform designed specifically for authors.
They make gorgeous animated trailers easy, handling all graphic design and sequencing automatically based on your direction. As an author, you simply pick and customize animated characters, backdrops, props, motions, speech bubbles and fonts that capture the tone you envision for your book promotion.
Use their pre-defined templates for common genres or start from scratch.
9. Powtoon
Prefer cartoony or retro 8-bit pixel art animation for your book trailer versus more realistic CGI?
Look no further than Powtoon. This software focuses on making quirky animated videos aided by their library of fun characters, logos, shapes, color palettes and font styles.
Beyond custom graphics, you can incorporate YouTube videos, voiceovers, backing tracks, and more.
10. Canva
Canva has quickly become the favorite graphic design platform for authors crafting their own book covers, ads, social posts, flyers and more thanks to ease of use and attractive templates.
Naturally, Canva also offers a straightforward book trailer maker within its broader suite of design tools.
Quickly whip up slick videos by importing your own visual assets or searching Canva‘s 500k+ image library to find book-relevant photos, scenes, themes, and motifs. Apply animations and text with one click.
11. Photoshow
Transform your book into a live-action cinematic trailer with Photoshow‘s customizable templates and integrated stock video library searchable by theme.
Easily arrange clips on the editing timeline along with complementary B-roll footage, apply preferred filters and text overlays, and let Photoshow handle the transitions and overall pacing for you.
No advanced technical expertise is required to storyboard an intense and gripping book trailer.
12. VideoCreek
VideoCreek differentiates itself from other options through advanced metrics and data insights offered on your book trailer‘s viewership and impact.
Their dashboard delivers actionable analytics like playback finishing rate, rewatch rate, peak drop off points in pace/engagement and more so creators can optimize.
You also get access to curated e-learnings on proven book trailer best practices from industry experts.
So if you want to take a scientific approach to maximizing your video promotions, VideoCreek has you covered on both creation tools and data/education.
13. Book Brush
As the name indicates, Book Brush specializes exclusively in book trailer production. And their templates and creative assets center specifically around the written word.
Add speech bubbles, typewriter effects, turning pages, floating book graphics, and other clever animations tailored to literature promotion. Over 500k images in their library tie back to reading themes.
Use their pre-configured genre templates or fully customize to your desired mood, pacing and style.
14. bookemon
bookemon stands out for their extra focus on trailer distribution – they help authors not only create an awesome animated video but also maximize visibility.
Options include one-click publishing to bookemon‘s book blog network (with 5 million+ monthly visits) and their special Book Trailer Site that gets your video in front of 75k active book readers.
Plus creation tools facilitate crafting pro-quality trailers no matter your experience level.
15. Promo
Access 110 million premium Shutterstock assets to build your book trailer visuals from scratch. Stock photos, clips, graphics – anything you need to tell a compelling story.
Promo provides multiple trailer format options from square to vertical to cinematic widescreen. Pick from film poster templates, customizable intro/outros and integrated music.
Not feeling creative? Choose images and let Promo‘s AI auto-generate an edited trailer timed perfectly to audio peaks and valleys.
16. Renderforest
Renderforest is an automated video creation platform where you input specifics like genre, emotional tone, imagery preferences and target audience age range for your book.
Their AI will instantly generate a professional quality trailer tailored to your direction along with alternate options to choose from. Features unique dynamic visual effects.
Requires no complex editing on your end – simply provide concepts and guidance and Renderforest handles the production details.
17. Invibio
Another solid AI-based video editing option, Invibio swiftly pieces together book trailers using custom logic around timing, transitions, text integration, image focus/movement, audio peak alignment and more.
Creators praise how quickly they can build multiple trailer options by uploading related media assets and letting Invibio work its magic. Useful templates provide initial direction.
Also includes integrated custom character animation and logo reveal effects not found in some competitors.
18. Microsoft Powerpoint
Already have a Powerpoint presentation featuring images encapsulating your book? Or want to build a simple, no frills slide-based trailer?
Leverage familiar Powerpoint tools to add pizzazz like custom transitions between slides, text animations, shape overlays, and more.
Drop in audio tracks, narration or background soundscapes to liven it up. Export the finished product in standard video formats playable across devices.
It may not allow advanced editing like other tools here but works great for basic book trailer needs.
19. VideoPad
VideoPad editors love this software for its balanced combination of professional level tools and straightforward multi-track timeline perfect for beginners.
Build your storyline visually dragging and arranging images, clips, textboxes, overlays, logos, etc, enhanced with integrated effects like fades, wipes, zoom, and chroma key green screen.
Take precise control with capabilities to split, trim and join video segments. Apply preconfigured LUTs and color correction. Mix in complementary audio, sound effects and voice overs.
20. LightMV
LightMV offers impressive functionality density with multi-layer video editing, effects like freeze frame and speed control, color and filter management, transition tools, text animators, and insanely fast 4k and 8k footage rendering.
Easily construct an impactful book trailer rapidly leveraging their timeline document flow featuring integrated trimming, appending, ripple editing and nesting of assets.
Robust capabilities made simple is LightMV‘s superpower. You control the cinematic flair.
Tips for Creating An Effective Book Trailer
To recap, an effective book trailer:
- Runs 30-90 seconds
- Focuses on key narrative moments, beloved characters, and emotional themes
- Has compelling imagery synchronized with audio cues and textual captions
- Uses vibrant, descriptive language to highlight unique details about story and style
- Leaves viewers excited to immediately dive into the full book
Here are some additional tips for planning and executing an awesome trailer:
- Study examples from books similar to your own for inspiration on structure, angles to highlight
- Write out a creative brief detailing intended pacing, highlight scenes, requested graphics
- Determine a distribution strategy for social media, paid ads, book blogs
- Run variations testing different teasers, imagery, calls to action to optimize performance
- Keep honing – even a finalized trailer can be adjusted as you get viewer feedback
Invest time upfront conceptualizing creative direction, mapping a promotional plan, and choosing the right book trailer software for your skills. Follow best practices and you‘ll reap rewards with expanded readership of your published works!
