Creating a Promo/Back to School Video

This is SUPER easy with iMovie!!

If you have a Mac (or iPad) you can use iMovie for free to create a SUPER easy Promo video (or Back to School Video) to get kids PUMPED to “return” to school!

First open iMovie on your device. It is going to prompt you to select the + sign in the upper left corner. Then select Trailer.

After you choose Trailer, it will give you MANY options/themes to choose from. I used the iNDiE trailer. You can preview each trailer by hovering over the trailer & pressing the play button. Below each trailer it will show how long the trailer is and how many “Cast Members” (this is basically the characters). I choose one with 2 cast members because I wanted to introduce my Real picture and my Bitmoji picture as well.

After choosing your trailer theme, on the bottom of your screen their will be a

After changing all the different cast names to mine the Video credits looked like this:

It TOTALLY makes it feel like a REAL movie trailer (and makes it seem like you spent WAY more time then you actually will creating this!)

Anyways… after you create the Outline, the last tab says: Shot List… now here was my mistake. If you were making a REAL trailer this would be where you would want to start… BUT we really aren’t, we are just making a fun short story/promo… so SKIP Shot List… Trust me, it will all be filled in on the next tab…

OK, so we SKIPPED Shot List and moved to Storyboard this will show you the On Screen Words that will be on the video and the pictures (in the order of appearance) so you can create a FUN and engaging “story” to prepare your students for the beginning of the school year! So the Trailer will begin: A Teacher (then shows Real Life picture of me), and her bitmoji (shows the chosen bitmoji picture), and the story continues….

On the screen it will say: Getting Ready for School (go to Back to School bitmoji picture), Wake up – and Get Ready (then 3 bitmoji pictures in a row). The numbers on each picture are how long that picture will be on screen… So I made sure to put a picture with a lot happening on the longer time, just so there is more time to enjoy the more complex image.

On the screen it will say: Find a Quiet Spot & your Supplies (the 6 bitmoji picture montage), Make sure to eat Lunch (1 bitmoji picture)

On the screen it will say: We will Learn and Have Lots of Fun! (11 bitmoji picture montage). Under each picture it will try to describe what will be happening in that shot – so you can rearrange pictures, etc after watching the video through if you want some pictures on the screen for longer or shorter amount of time, etc.

The part that took the LONGEST (and this whole project took me about 10 minutes) was finding which bitmojis I wanted to use, and what the “storyline” was going to be. Basically I wanted my future students to be excited about going to “school”, even though we are E-Learning for the beginning portion of this school year.

If you’d like to see the finished product you can check it out on youtube here of I’ve posted it below!

The video trailer is really easy to create. I know some teachers send out Postcards to their new students to help them prepare them/excite them/introduce themselves before school begins. This might be an EASY way to personalize a video for that specific student and send the link to them. Keeping the trailer the same except add the child’s name (maybe) instead of The Teacher… and her bitmoji… you can write: The Teacher is excited to meet… (insert child’s name)… then go into preparing for the beginning of the school year.

Another idea (if you have older students & they have access to iMovie) you could have them create research project and use Trailer as an option to tell about their topic or review a book giving a quick synopsis of what happens in their book, etc. It really is THAT easy to make one, I have all the confidence that a student could create one!

If you have any questions or tips on making our Bitmoji Promotional Videos even better, please leave a comment below! Thank you!!