What Goes Inside an EPK

A complete EPK isn't mysterious once you see the parts laid out — it's a predictable set of elements that press, festivals, and buyers expect to find. Some are text you write, some are images you gather, and a couple are things you already have (your trailer, your credits). The goal of this chapter is to give you the full inventory in one place so nothing gets forgotten, because the most common EPK failure isn't poor quality — it's incompleteness, the missing still or absent director's statement that forces someone to email you back. Not every film needs every optional extra, but there's a core set that a professional kit always includes. Think of this as your packing list; the following chapters teach you how to make each item well.

The complete EPK checklist

A professional film EPK contains:

• Logline. One or two sentences capturing the hook. The first thing anyone reads and often the thing they quote.
• Synopsis (short and long). A short paragraph and a fuller one-page version, so outlets can use whichever fits — without spoiling the ending.
• Director's statement. A personal note on why you made the film and what it means — the heart that makes press want to tell your story.
• Cast & crew bios. Short professional bios for key people, plus a clean, correctly-ordered credits block (the "billing block").
• Film details / fact sheet. Title, runtime, genre, format, language, country, completion year, and any content notes — the quick-reference specs.
• High-resolution stills. A selection of strong, press-quality images from the film — the pictures that actually get published.
• Poster / key art. Your official poster and, ideally, a couple of formats (portrait and a horizontal/banner version).
• Trailer & clips. A link to your trailer (and optional clips) — hosted somewhere reliable, not just attached.
• Press release. A news-style announcement journalists can run — swapped or updated per occasion.
• Reviews, quotes & laurels. Any press pull-quotes, festival selections, and awards — social proof that builds as your film travels.
• Contact information. Clear press/sales contact — name, email, and who to reach for what. Astonishingly often left off.

Core vs. optional — and keep it current

Faced with that list, don't panic and don't skip. Two principles make it manageable. First, know the core versus the optional: the non-negotiables that a kit must have from day one are the logline, synopsis, director's statement, bios/credits, film details, stills, poster, trailer link, and contact info — build those and you have a complete, professional EPK. The extras that grow over time — press quotes, festival laurels, awards — you add as your film earns them, and an early kit simply has fewer of them, which is fine; nobody expects laurels before your premiere. So don't wait until you have accolades to build the kit; build the core now and layer in the social proof as it arrives. Second, and this trips up more filmmakers than anything else: your EPK is a living document, and its single most common flaw is being out of date. A kit with last year's contact email, a missing new award, or the old poster makes you look inattentive at the worst moment. Treat the EPK as something you maintain: when you win a festival, add the laurel; when a great review lands, add the quote; when your contact changes, update it everywhere; when you cut a new poster, swap it in. The filmmakers whose kits impress are the ones whose kits are complete and current — which is really a matter of building the full inventory once and then keeping it fresh. One practical tip echoing an earlier point: gather the hardest-to-get items (stills, BTS photos) during production, because they're painful to recreate later — the subject of the next chapter. But for now, you have the map: eleven elements, a clear core, and a habit of keeping it updated. That's a complete EPK, and everything ahead is about making each piece genuinely good. Next, we tackle the assets you should be capturing before the film is even done.