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What you missed on NaNoWriMo 2013: The Series this week!
…I stop working on the project, try to restart, fail at finishing just about everything including watching the movie Let’s Scare Jessica to Death, make a book trailer, visit the frustrating Shop Rite Bottle Return, have a drunken meeting with my editor, get a preview of the cover of my upcoming novella, remember I’ve forgotten a friend’s birthday and more!
Day 15 – Stuck at Halftime: 11/16/2013
Day 16: Everything but Writing 11/17/2013
Day 17: Shout Outs at the Bottle Return 11/18/2013
Day 18: Maybe a Re-Read? 11/20/2013
What you missed on NaNoWriMo 2013: The Series this week!
Week Two is normally the NaNo slump…worthless orange cones on the highway cause a jam-up, my husband is kicking my word-count ass, I cancel a weekend trip to Rhode Island because I’m overwhelmed, I finish (finally, seriously?) the Canopic Jars trailer, I find illiterate notes…and if you’ve ever wanted to get a peek at what writers REALLY do when they get together and party, now’s your chance: an inside look at AnthoCon 2013! Enjoy!
Day 8 – A Bunch of Orange Cones: 11/11/2013
Day 9 – A Serious Party: 11/12/2013
Day 10 – Good Morning, Karis: 11/12/2013
Day 11 – The Morning After: 11/12/2013
Day 12 – Up at 2 a.m.: 11/13/13
Just ahead: WICKED SEASONS. Watch the Trailer!
Wicked Seasons, the NEHW Press anthology containing my story “To Chance Tomorrow,” is due out in November. I’m not only excited about having my work in such a great volume with so many cool stories, I’m excited to present the trailer! After you watch Read the rest of this entry
Behind the Scenes: Making the Bad Apple Trailer
If you’ve not seen the trailer for Bad Apple, my dark emerging YA thriller coming from Vagabondage Press Books this September 25, here it is.
Believe it or not, people have been asking me how I did it, so here’s a behind-the-scenes look at how it was made.
My initial concept was to use video of a teddy bear being crushed under the items of adulthood: originally, I had a cookbook as one item, a dish as another, and was going to make a fake “brochure” for the glitzy resort at which Scree arrives and toss that down, too. Then, believe it or not, I was going to douse it all with water or fire (crazy, right)? Somehow, the original concept morphed: it changed to a shower of kids’ toys and a barrage of apples.
One thing that never changed was that I wanted a music box as the soundtrack. Something normal, though, nothing in a minor key that would be too obviously creepy. It needed to be creepy in a very subtle way. If it was normal, it’d be creepier than if I deliberately tried to use something made to sound creepy. It also needed to be something ultra-familiar, that everyone would recognize. I figured I could purchase Brahms’ “Lullaby” legally royalty-free, and I was right (I know from my years in theatre that the key is to look for sound effect albums).
Next, I created all the title cards and the text (although that was tightened again and again as the process moved forward).
Then I went into the garage and got the teddy bear I had in mind: my Nana had made it (she loved to crochet and made us everything from stuffed toys to pocketbooks to clothes). I used the teddy bear to shoot some test footage to see if I could get the falling bear effect to work the way I had envisioned, and also to figure out how many seconds would work best: I was really insistent on keeping it to as close to one minute as possible (after all, film and television trailers are kept at 30 seconds to one minute for a reason. Anything longer than that, you might lose your viewer). I built the trailer around the false footage, so that all I had to do once the final was shot was insert, clip to the right timing and add titling. Here’s that test footage.
The falling bear effect was going to work exactly as I’d imagined. However, I couldn’t film and be the one throwing the items. I needed help, so I asked my friend Michele, who was going to furnish some of her daughter’s old toys. What was hilarious is that a couple of these toys I had when I was a kid—and are described in Bad Apple.
The night of the shoot I went to buy apples. I swear I’d never seen Shop Rite have so many varieties—and they looked so pretty I was instantly disappointed I didn’t have my camera in my bag. I bought three of each. What was hilarious was that I didn’t keep the varieties separated, and as they were all different prices, the kid at the check-out was overwhelmed having to do them all one at a time.
I went to the car – and I did have my camera, after all. So I went back into the store and shot these photos.

How colorful! Bad Apple’s Scree wouldn’t be able to stop looking at this great display. From left to right…

Golden Delicious are great for baking. I used to call these “potato apples” when I was a kid. We always had them at my grandmother’s.

McIntosh I can’t stand; they’re too mushy for me. But they’re good if you want to make your flour-based goods (like breads and cakes) moist.
Then I realized I’d missed a couple of varieties. I was also suddenly inspired to make a documentary of the development, writing of and execution of Bad Apple, so I started filming myself. Yeah, I know, dumb. I did it anyway. Here’s what I shot in the store.
Michele arrived with the bag of toys, and first we had to get all the stickers off the apples.

The apples after we took the stickers off. They’re so colorful I really didn’t like that I had to do the trailer in a washed-out black and white. I hate missing a good color-pop! For some reason, though, it doesn’t look like I bought that many. Trust me, they weighed a ton.

The toys. As a child, I had the blue and red ball, the jack-in-the-box, the stacking rings, and the Humpty Dumpty. (Personally I find the ashtray behind the toys kind of funny. Oops.)

Michele’s “throwing station.” In the end, the items bounced too much. She ended up standing next to me and dropping them from waist-height.
What was also fun was that, since she didn’t have one in her daughter’s toys, she’d bought a child’s ball (I’d specifically asked her for one—I was going to attempt to recreate a special effect I had done for Woman in Black back in 1998). I couldn’t remember how to do it. She figured it out.
We were ready. Here are some false attempts (we shot it four times, although it might have been more).
Here’s the final footage—shoot number 5—that was later edited and manipulated to create the final product.
Some notes on the final: I chose a washed-out black and white footage for two reasons: I wanted something “ghostly,” that suggested something deep in the past, but also something light enough that the text could be read easily. Fitting the text into blocks that were readable against the background footage was the most difficult part of the process.
Hope you’ve enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look at the making of the trailer for Bad Apple!
Book Trailers: Boon or Bust?
I’ve been writing short stories since the age of five. At that age and into my early teens, I’d often dream of a commercial—a trailer, basically, but I didn’t know that word back then—for my tales; I could envision my characters as though they were real, talking to each other, saying their dialogue against cool music, and big letters with the title of my story and my name. I used to think, “why don’t people make these for books?”
Well, just like I had always thought “why don’t they just put a single song on a cassette?” in the late 1970s and then in the late 1980s it happened, book trailers burst on the scene a few years ago. I was thrilled that they finally existed, although some writers in some discussion groups in which I participate don’t necessarily feel the same way. There has been some debate about the value of book trailers—are they really necessary? Should I spend time on making one for my book? Should I spend money in hiring a company to make a trailer for me? Do they really sell books?
Frankly, I believe whether or not there’s a traceable point-of-purchase from your trailer to your book is irrelevant. A trailer provides content which supports your book. It takes less time to watch than a review takes to read, is easily accessible via mobile devices, and, more importantly, it’s visual, so it’s easy to remember. And while not many book trailers go crazy-viral, every book trailer has that potential.
I’m a visual person; when I read, I see what I’m reading as a “film” in my head (if that doesn’t happen, I put the book down and read no further). Therefore, a trailer is much more likely to entice me to make a purchase than a review—especially if that trailer’s unique or entertaining. Today’s audiences are so used to being bombarded with visual media 24/7—Youtube, Vimeo, Hulu, Netflix, DVRs, 24/7 Cable, watch everything instantly on your Kindle Fire, your laptop, your Ipad; in addition, the generations behind Generation X, the current and future book buyers, are primarily visual learners (Gardner, 1993)—so it just makes sense your book should have a footing there. After all, when you release a book trailer, what you’re really saying is, ‘hey, my book’s as entertaining as a movie or show! Come check it out!’
The value in a book trailer isn’t always tangible. But I know that sometimes a trailer has made a book look so exciting I had to have it—whether it was at that moment or down the road.
And isn’t that what you want?
Below, some book trailers I liked which grabbed me for one reason or another. I was going to provide a huge list of resources, but fiction writer Darcy Pattison has done such a comprehensive job of covering all aspects I’m going to let her do the work: http://www.darcypattison.com/marketing/book-trailers/
The Hour Before Dark, Douglas Clegg
Breaking Silence, Linda Castillo
Crabapples, Rob Watts
Dark Matter Heart, Nathan Wrann
Gardner, H. (1993). Mulitple Intelligences: The Theory in Practice. New York: Basic Books.
SPRING HAS SPRUNG: Pix of New England Horror Writers at the Stratford Spring Showcase of Crafts
The New England Horror Writers sprung into spring at the Stratford Spring Showcase of Crafts in Stratford,Connecticut early last month. The event was held on Easter weekend, so the crowds were light, but we still had a great time. Here are a few photos, and make sure you scroll down and see the cool video Jason Harris made to display at our upcoming appearances. Enjoy!
You can see more photos of the event over at the New England Horror Writers Blog here: http://nehwnews.wordpress.com/tag/stratford-spring-showcase-of-crafts/
Jason Harris made this slideshow for our upcoming appearances. It made its debut at this event.
SKELETONS IN THE SWIMMIN’ HOLE – TALES FROM HAUNTED DISNEY WORLD BOOK TRAILER RELEASED
I’m a sucker for a great trailer. Here is the trailer for Skeletons in the Swimmin’ Hole: Tales from Haunted Disney World, created/produced by Ghost Writer Extraordinaire — you can watch it via the YouTube link, or you can just watch it right from my site here. Enjoy! Comments welcome.
YouTube Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQgvru5flsM