The Strange Story of How I Got Here

I am Jennymarie Jemison, a creative director and graphic designer in Austin, Texas.  My design career began in Dallas, Texas, working on video game box art and marketing at Gathering of Developers, an independent game publisher. Starting as an intern, I advanced to full-time art director by the time I graduated from Southern Methodist University with a degree in Creative Advertising. I even had my own interns, both named Ben.  I’ve produced the box art and marketing efforts of something like 35 video game titles, but the game that made the biggest impact on my life was Max Payne.

The original title was a big hit.  I still see people proudly rocking the mouse pad I made over 15 years ago.  The game’s developer, Remedy, wanted me to work on the sequel as well, but it was being published by Rockstar Games in New York City. To take the work meant I’d have to move there.  I’d never even been to New York but I accepted their job offer. I arrived just in time for my first day at the job, September 10th, 2001.  Rockstar put me up in a massive hotel in Chinatown, just sixteen blocks from the World Trade Center.  I watched the fateful events of that day unfold from my window, and my hotel was evacuated without my knowledge.  I spent three days there alone with no working phone line or contact with anyone at all, making myself eggs and sandwiches in the hotel kitchen when I got hungry.  It was a surreal introduction to the city I called home for the next five years.

 

 

Working at Rockstar made me a better designer.  With only five of us on the design team, we were all responsible for different game titles.  Grand Theft Auto, the best-selling game franchise of all time, was a huge effort that required all hands on deck.  My introduction, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, was an incredible amount of work.   I remember making palm trees for days upon days.  It was such sexy game art, with 1980’s Miami as the backdrop depicted through the incredible illustrations of Stephen Bliss. The company’s art director and my boss, Jung Kwak, remains one of my Ladyboss idols.  She taught me what compassionate leadership looked like.  Rockstar Games is notoriously not the easiest place to work, but she kept us insulated from some of the harsher conditions and continually inspired despite them.  I count myself incredibly lucky to have been there when I was so that I got to work under her tutelage.  When she left the company, I did as well.  I left a much stronger designer than I’d been when I arrived. I also credit working in video games as the reason my work is so varied.  Each game franchise required its own distinct look and feel.  No one style could ever take hold.

I wanted my work to have a different focus after leaving.   After years of working only on videogames, I wanted to create art materials for something that wasn’t violent.  I wanted to spend less time on a computer, and I wanted to see more of New York City.  I’d also never created a website and I felt that web design would be more and more important.  So, I made a website for a fake business.  The furthest thing from violence and darkness I could remember.  Cats.

 

My fake business became real when the website was circulated on design blogs and my phone started ringing.  The person asked how much I charged per visit, and I said a number I thought was ridiculous.  Their follow-up question was, “Can you come twice a day?”  That summer was very profitable, if not slightly more stressful than anticipated.  I should have hired more Jennys, but I couldn’t trust anyone to check on the cats but me.  I had a lot to learn about running a business.  If I had expanded, I’d probably be a millionaire cat madam by now, making guest appearances on morning talk shows.  Instead, I retired after spending the loneliest Christmas of my life in NYC with only cats to comfort me.  Fatal flaw in the cat nanny plan, you have to be available when people go out of town.  Which means you can’t go out of town.   What I did learn in the endeavor, was that making your business look legitimate, was almost as important as being legitimate.  And that if you craft a unique experience for your customers, in my case, an elaborate questionnaire,  (Sample questions: “Can you circle on this diagram anywhere your cat does not like to be touched?  What celebrity does your cat most resemble in spirit?  Does your apartment have any ghosts? “) your customers will value that interaction and care. And that experience is your brand.

I also took that time to do more things I’d always wanted to do.  I studied acting, a dream long deferred, at Atlantic Acting School.  I started auditioning and got an agent.  I booked my first national network commercials.  I started freelancing as a graphic designer for MTV Networks, eventually settling at Spike TV. I was afraid of finding another toxic workplace there, having just escaped one.  I was scared of the “Network for Men.”  I soon learned there was no need to fear.  They were the loveliest, most thoughtful men (and women) I’d ever worked with.  They allowed me to do work I’d never done before, like art-directing award shows and creating the style guide for the entire network, because they were confident in both me and in their team.  They allowed me to go on auditions, and when my ambitions of living a simple, slower life while exploring independent film led me to Austin, they gave me a cake.  At Spike, I found that demonstration of trust, freedom, and support I now bring to the teams I create.

Lured by breakfast tacos, indie film production, and sunnier days, I packed up my Williamsburg apartment and headed to Austin.  I knew I had work waiting for me, as my old friend from Godgames had a client who needed a website.  He was a web developer but needed a designer to help him.  That first client was Tito’s Handmade Vodka.  It was 2006.  For the next six years, our work for Tito’s grew as they did, from sixteen to all fifty states.  From outdoor advertising to their national print campaign, we did it all.  Our little office was always busy, not just with Tito’s, but with countless small businesses.  We called ourselves Fs77, and described ourselves as “tiny but powerful.”  My three-legged spaniel, Stella, found on the streets of Austin, became our mascot.  We even hired some young talents to help us.  It was a golden time.

But all good things must come to an end.  In 2012, Tito’s gave us the ultimatum we knew would come one day.  Work for them in-house or say so long.  My partner had started a kombucha company and it was just starting to take off.   I was about to begin production on the first film of my own. I did not want to lose the freedom to continue working in film and commercials.  We tried to hold onto the office without Tito’s, but we only lasted a few months.  More valuable insights were learned, although some tears were shed as we said our goodbyes. File that under “Things I could have learned by watching the first season of Mad Men.” I knew if I had the chance to start over, I would find a different way of operating that could endure even in lean times.  My flexible team model was born.

I filed the formation papers for Five & Four on my birthday in 2013.
Why that name?  What does it mean?  When I was three years old, I could only count to five, so five meant infinity.  Four was then penultimate infinity.  Add them together and it meant the most I could comprehend with my little brain.  I would tell my parents I loved them “five and four.”  I used it for all the things I most loved, never to express the inverse, only for love.  And I’m trying to keep it that way.  Using all the hard lessons I’ve learned in this journey, I am trying my hardest to keep my work joyful, and my teams and clients happy.  The best work is created that way.  I hope that if you’ve read as far as this, something within my story here resonated with you.  Let’s see what the next chapter holds, for both of us.