An intriguing taster can get you funding and distribution at any stage in the game. Here are some guidelines that will help your trailer win commissioning editors, funders, and audiences:
- Choose a scope for your trailer. Do you want to show the whole range of your film or do you want to focus on only one or two key scenes? Maybe have two trailers with different scopes (and lengths).
- Create a sense of mystery or intrigue. You want to involve your viewer.
- Keep it tight. This might seem like common sense but the editing of the trailer informs the audience of what you value. If your editing appears unintentionally loose or sloppy in the trailer, they probably won't want to risk wasting even more of their time sitting through your whole documentary.
- Be conscientious of your sound design. Avoid using music and sound effects that are have been recently overused. Unless the use is particularly clever, your trailer will otherwise seem thrown-together.
- If you have a foreign language doc and your subtitles aren't ready, at least have some text to help viewers understand what's going on.
- Pay attention to your written synopsis and how it complements the trailer. You want to avoid redundancy but still give the audience a sense of how the trailer relates to your project.
- Include your contact information and/or production information. If you have some sort of regularly updated web content, be sure to include the address.
- Double check that your trailer works wherever you upload it. If it stops in the middle, well, a lot of your hard work will be for naught.
If you have any suggestions for this list, please let me know.
Pitching Trailer Checklist: The Taster
