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| Jessie Baldwin |
If you have not seen a copy of this Fall’s Conference Book, ask someone who attended the conference to show you theirs. The consensus among attendees was that the book is amazing: full color inside and out; high gloss cover; original art; parchment look pages; ads interlaced with other content throughout; & a perfectly brilliant overall
storybook design. Indeed, this Fall Conference book is a Divine Design!
You may wonder how this all came about. When our LGET Dennis Wooldridge needed someone to pull together the Conference Book, he turned to Jessie Baldwin, a member of Central Florida Facilitators, a graduate of Full Sail in Orlando, and a freelance graphic designer (jessiebaldwin@digitaljessie.com).
Jessie explained, “He wanted to give someone new and willing, who needed to blossom, the chance. He said he felt like I needed to do this.”
Jessie was flattered, and more than willing to step into the world of graphic art and publication. “How do you want it to look?” she remembers asking.
She was amazed and excited to learn that she would have freedom to develop and suggest design. “How about a Storybook?” she proposed right away. “That’s how the booklet itself should look. You should open it up and be caught up in the world of a fairy tale.
As it turns out, her background in 3D computer animation (think of features such as “Finding Nemo” and video games), lends itself to graphic design. She has done some freelance graphic design work, like business cards and promotional materials, as well as some work for a local studio, and is always delighted when new business
opportunities come her way.
In the process, Jessie said, “I learned I like doing graphic design even more than the 3D design.”
“I was the Art Club president in high school,” she said. “When I went to Full Sail, they made 3D Animation look so fantastic, I was in kind of star-shock. However, I really want to do graphic design. My degree will help support that.”
When asked about the Conference Book, Jessie said, “I selected the fonts for the cover, The cover is actually a collection of about seven images reworked and spliced together.
She was quick to share credit. “Susan Morgan helped pick out the fonts.”
Jessie drew several of the characters that are scattered throughout the book, including the scrolling tree on the first page, a pixie, a wizard, and a cute red dragon. One of the elements she is most proud of is the ad on the back page of the book. Given the storybook design, a typical ad would have seemed out of place. However, when George Kostopoulos brought an ad in story format, she was able to place in on the back so that it appeared to be an old parchment taped onto the back of the book, blending in seamlessly with the storybook design.
“I used Adobe Photoshop for the entire book, but I will be learning Adobe InDesign. I did the layouts on my kind of broken-in-half Apple laptop computer,” she laughed. She credits Lisa Franklin for the great job with securing the ads, saying that “Lisa would tell me what size the ads were supposed to be, email the file, and leave it up to me to play with the layout. The ad placements were all random, interlaced with the Conference
content instead of all at the back of the book.”
Since this was a fairy tale themed conference, one of Jessie’s jobs was to look out for copyrighted imagery. Disney (and other) images cannot be used without permission. People understood, and changes were made where necessary.
“Dennis and I worked all day toward the end, with Dennis doing verbiage and me doing placement, in order to get the files ready to submit on time to the printer. I drove out about 2am to make the final file drop to Dennis.”
At the conference, the LGET announced that Jessie will be the Designer of our Spring Conference Book.
“I was voluntold!” she laughed. “Honestly, I can’t wait to do the next one. I plan to start early on it. I’ve already got some ideas.”
When told she has set a high standard, Jessie’s response was “I want to improve.”
How would she sum up her experience?
Like this: “I had a lot of fun. There were times where it was really stressful, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way. It was one of the top five things I’m truly proud of in my whole life.”
She then added, “I want to thank everyone in Toastmasters for their support, and thank them for giving me the opportunity to do this Conference Book.”
District 84 returns the sentiment. Thank you, Jessie, for your Divine Design!
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