Women and Underrepresented Creatives Need Support
Sound familiar?
Hi, My name is Jessie Kate Bui, I’m the founder of Hedge Studio, and my mission is to help diverse storytellers transform from struggling creative to confident director so they can celebrate their presence and share their unique perspectives with the world.
You are here because you champion diverse storytellers. Already, you are taking courageous steps to improve the status quo by empowering storytellers to overcome their struggles, find confidence, and gain clarity. These efforts lead to more sustainable, inclusive, and diverse stories.
I am here to help. For 7 years, I have been dedicated to healing limiting beliefs that get in the way of more connection, love, and understanding. In this effort, I believe that diverse storytelling is the key.
Using my background mentoring visual storytellers, teaching at Art Center, and creating educational resources such as Talking Threads: Costume Design for Entertainment Art, I've curated and transformed my best solutions into a new course that helps diverse creatives heal their self image, share their nuanced stories, and find empowerment in their life and work. This content has transformed the careers of my mentees in meaningful, lasting ways. Moreover, I have partnered with nonprofits to make this process available to lower income individuals. Now, I look forward to expanding my reach, supporting organizations like yours in amplifying the voice of diverse creatives. Together, we can bring even more ideas, innovation and progress to your industry and to the world.
STORY MEDIUM
let's make the struggling creative a myth
WHAT I'M OFFERING
Course packages for schools looking to provide mental health solutions to struggling students and team members.
Offer it as a special program, feature it through your extension or continuing education as a paid course, or include access as part of your support services to qualifying students in need.
WHY NOW?
Support the growing demand for diverse stories by equipping the storytellers to succeed
WHAT NEXT?
Connect 1:1 in a discovery call to discuss how the course can fit into your existing strategies
STORY MEDIUM
Story Medium is a self-paced storytelling course for creatives who are struggling due to anxiety, depression, stigmatization, non-inclusive approaches, or lack of representation. We explore film and life through a psychological lens to hone storytelling skills, elevate designs with empowering techniques, improve their self image, and transform their creative practice.
By the end of the course participants will create:
A Business plan: Setting them apart from the competition with a personal brand story, positioning strategy, and clearly defined services.
A Pitch Deck of an original story: Helping them showcase their new skills and unique voice in an original story.
A Customized Mindset Kit: Helping them draw on their storytelling skills and fictional characters to tackle daily challenges and reach flow state.
Through these projects, participants cultivate a more sustainable creative practice that frees them to show up with more confidence and play.
ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR
As a designer, I discovered that story had the power to eliminate my imposter syndrome. And when I felt lost in life, I found my professional art and story tools could empower my therapy sessions and reveal a deep sense of purpose.
My own struggle transformed into a superpower - deconstructing creative processes and finding ways to make them more accessible and pleasurable.
EXPERIENCE
- PROJECT DIRECTOR & CO-AUTHOR OF TALKING THREADS
- CO-TEACHER AT ART CENTER
- VISUAL STORYTELLING MENTOR
- BRAND STORY COACH FOR ENTREPRENEURS
Weaving together psychology, modern visual storytelling approaches, and identity narratives, I formalized the transformative methodology that helped both me AND my clients.
Talking Threads: costume design for entertainment
“Students of costume design, concept art and animation will welcome Talking Threads as an instant classic, and an indispensable addition to their bookshelves.”
CAMILLE BENDA, HEAD OF COSTUME DESIGN, CALARTS
“Talking Threads is a costume designer’s treasure chest, an overflowing trove of precious information, golden rules, and pearls of wisdom.’”
IAIN MCCAIG, ARTIST/WRITER/FILMMAKER
“This book takes you expertly by the hand along this fascinating investigation that is designing for fiction and storytelling. From Chagall to Black Panther, from historical tales to science fiction, the limit is your imagination. ”
GUILLAUME ARETOS, CHAIR, ENTERTAINMENT DESIGN, ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN.
THE METHODOLOGY
PARALLAX METHOD
Named after the original fictional story, Parallax, that I used in my own healing journey, the Parallax Method is a 3 step process that is the driving methodology behind all my work. Helping creatives, and audiences regain trust in their inner voice, gain new perspective, and transform their life through the power of storytelling.
STEP 1: FIND YOUR STORY
Using a simplified story structure inspired by Hero's Journey (Dan Harmon’s Story Circle) in combination with the Enneagram (a set of psychological motivational archetypes) to identify authentic story arcs. based on your life.
STEP 2: FICTIONALIZE YOUR STORY
Using professional research approaches in combination with the principles covered in the Talking Threads book to guide your world-building so you can gain fresh perspective.
STEP 3: REWRITE YOUR NARRATIVES
Using concepts from EMDR therapy and Ikigai. in combination with your new story and designs to help you slow down, tune into your inner voice and take more purpose driven action towards your goals.
COURSE FEATURES
Story medium uses this signature Parallax Method, complemented with an abundance of practical application exercises helping storytellers to reestablish trust in their inner voice and stabilize their creative practice so they can reignite their creative soul.
With accessibility as a priority, the course is self paced, lifetime access, and full of step by step breakdowns, demos, workbooks, recorded lessons, and templates. Each lesson builds on the last to help participants flow through their learning experience with less frustration. A discussion forum provides a space to troubleshoot challenges along other participants and live workshops give them the opportunity to customize approaches and assignments to fit the learning style, accessibility needs, and project goals.
Finally feedback forms allow the course to continually improve, helping it to become a resource they can use again and again.
52 Recorded Lessons
12 Recorded Demos
12 Live Workshops
Workbooks
Discord Chat
Feedback Forms
Contact for Pricing and Package Discounts
CASE STUDY
The practical exercises in Story Medium are designed from the real world insights of working with diverse creatives. As an example, I would like to share Amanda’s experience.
MEET AMANDA
A neurodivergent artist on the autism spectrum attending a prestigious design school, Amanda received financial aid based on income and portfolio, with a dream of working as a costume designer in film, animation, or games.
In class she received prompts like, design a "cool sci-fi warrior". For some, this is fun, a what if–they see opportunity. For Amanda, this is stressful; she is so caught in the abstract, so unclear about the expectations, that she struggles to move forward. What does “cool” mean? What do they expect from me? How can I define a successful solution when it’s so abstract?
Amanda needed additional time to find the logic in the assignment through deeper research, leading her to struggle to finish within the timelines given. She felt frustrated the whole time, and when she received negative feedback, it often seemed just as abstract to her.
Despite all the effort she put into choosing accurate options, the feedback asked her to improve the “appeal”, another abstract/subjective word. This confused her further, making her feel that her approach and efforts aren’t understood or accepted….but the “acceptable” approach is beyond her comprehension.
Amanda was quickly burning out while coping with an insidious lie:
"my needs are a problem and I don't belong here"
When I started mentoring Amanda she was exhausted, feeling unsupported and deeply concerned about her future prospects.
She was looking to find a way to achieve her goals with one-on-one help, and we got to work.
MEETING AMANDA WHERE SHE WAS AT
We began by using a simple story structure to create an original fictional story based on her life. By using a story she understood from the inside out, it deepened her understanding of the purpose and impact of each design task, while giving her the opportunity to share how she conquered a limiting belief in the past.
We used this to start identifying what was causing her to feel so lost and frustrated in her classes.
I helped her see new ways to more quickly translate abstract prompts and emotion-based character descriptions into logical prompts that she could understand.
I guided her through a step by step process that simplified costume design tasks down to the smallest decisions and actions. This built her comprehension of the goal of each step so she could contextualize feedback more clearly.
As we went, we made adjustments, swapping the order of steps, modifying the tools or techniques, all to compliment her way of thinking through each problem.
UNCOVERING UNTAPPED POTENTIAL
Because her fictional story shared her point of view as a member of the lgbtqia+ community, the insights also helped us understand what had led to her finding peace and empowerment in her differences in the past.
Enlightening me with a better understanding of her unique research and problem-solving strengths. The discussions this process prompted helped us break down some of her more recent challenges (and my own!) in ways she could understand.
EQUIPPING HER TO SUCCEED
Using this knowledge, we were able to experiment with customized exercises to achieve “appeal” through logic with less reliance on intuition. I gave her space to question or challenge the exercises I created for her to help us discover patterns in her underlying confusion and refine our solutions together.
As we neared the end of the mentorship, we discussed scenarios Amanda would run into during future classes and reverse engineered solutions so she would feel equipped to fill in the gaps created by overly abstract assignments, and meet her deadlines.
By the end of the course she had a story that both demonstrated her new process and techniques, and a more hopeful attitude returning to classes. In the course immediately following ours, she was able to tackle abstract prompts with more confidence and hit her assignment deadline using the custom processes we created together.
Our final focus was to help her better position her services and create templates and guides that allowed her to set clear expectations for future collaborators. Easing her transition into the workforce as a more equipped and confident creator.
Why isn't this transformation more common?
When I met her, Amanda’s neurodivergent needs were ignored for too long and she was burning out due to the limiting beliefs about her capability to use her tools, work in the industry or share her story.
Making it even harder to use or trust the resources she HAD been given.
We need more holistic solutions if we want to break this cycle.
REVIEWS
Amanda is one of many visual storytellers all over the world that I have helped decomplexify and deconstruct the creative process.
Through mentorship, I have identified highly effective ways for narrative designers to gain better comprehension of storytelling and design, identify missing pieces in their process, or more easily adapt process steps to fit their practical and emotional needs. All in an effort to empower more diverse creative voices.
"Jessie Kate has created a celebratory, open and accepting environment that allows you to tell authentic and impactful stories without judgment or shame. She is compassionate and fully invested in helping you tell your story from your point of view. She is a guide on this journey, helping you navigate the waters within your story so it can evolve into a beautifully authentic tale of your experiences."
AMANDA MORTON, Research and Costume Specialist
"As someone who enjoys research, Jessie really taught me the value of being intentional and specific with it to help bring a bigger picture together. I can take what I’ve learned and not only use it for costume design but also for characters or environments or props, and from that can feel like I’m creating a world grounded in something solid."
NATALIA FALCIGLIA, Character Painter
"Besides giving us an incredibly rare content with academic quality, Jessie’s mentorship took me on a personal and creative journey beyond my every expectations. I loved our meetings every week, learning about time periods and how to research them, the importance of thumbnailing and how to not edit your ideas too soon in the process, getting extremely constructive feedback that respected my process of developing my own story. I learned many creative strategies for brainstorming, exploring ideas, and a hardly ever present self-compassionate approach during the creative process."
PAULA GUIMARAES, Art Director
...While building practical experience using story and design to equip creatives with personal branding tools to enhance their entrepreneurship and pitch presentations....
"As an entrepreneur, it’s critical for people to know, like, and trust the person behind the brand and the best way to do that is by sharing your story in many different ways, and Jessie Kate Bui is an expert at this. She not only gave me a structure to follow moving forward for storytelling, she curated bits and pieces of my journey and created a beautiful personal guide I can refer to. Her knowledge and incorporation of the Enneagram types is amazing and she masterfully takes you through her 8 beat story circle to deepen your message for your audience. You will walk away learning so much more about yourself (a bonus I didn’t expect) and the tools needed to share your story on any platform, making you stand out as an entrepreneur."
TERESA HILDEBRAND, Clarity + Life Coach
"I was totally stuck when it came to telling my story and how it led to the creation of my business, until I, serendipitously, met Jessie Kate. She is someone with whom it’s very easy to connect and go deep quickly (not a common trait). Her approach to storytelling is equal parts depth and practicality. She has figured out an original (and I dare say genius) process to get to the gem hidden in every twist and turn in life, and to articulate them together in a story that is impactful while staying in full integrity with the truth.
I used to think that you needed to have a particularly wild and adventurous life to “have a story” that people would want to hear, but Jessie Kate showed me that it’s not about how spectacular your experiences may be, but instead about telling it with the right combination of truth and emotion.
You may think that this is an investment in your business but it may end up being an even more far-reaching investment in your relationship with the past versions of yourself that help you get here."
RAQUEL ROJO, Fashion Stylist
"I had been struggling with telling my whole story online for a few years, and always inching closer but never quite hitting the mark. Jessie held space for me to tell her my whole story and not worry about the "outcome," trusting that she would steward me through the process. Thanks to her background in media storytelling, she was able to help me fashion a narrative that spoke directly to my ideal customer's pain points, but then quickly moved them toward my unique way of looking at the problem and solving it (based on my lived experience), which I hadn't been able to nail before. I'm so happy to have found Jessie!"
NILIMA ACHWAL, Pitch and fundraise coaching for pre-seed/seed founders
POWER OF STORY MEDIUMS
Thriving storytellers channel their insights, using the features of their modern story mediums, to take us on transformative journeys. Their voices inspire us to heal, reconnect, and find new joy in a more diverse human experience. By supporting creatives with courses like Story Medium, you empower them to add their stories to a powerful line up of other change-making projects.
SERIES
Infinity Train, Undone, and Maniac use the medium of series to help us slowly unbury our past pain and face it to find inner peace.
GAMES
Games like It Takes Two help us heal from disconnection in a relationship through a magical mix of real world co-op collaboration as we work together towards a common goal.
COMICS
Long form Comics like X-men highlight the dangers of stigmatization and segregation around unfamiliar differences, exploring a vast variety of characters and “powers” that allow us to find characters we can resonate with, helping us see our differences in an empowering light.
FILM
Everything Everywhere all at once uses the medium of film to tackle the heavy struggles of minority families, generational conflict, and depression in a clever moment in time that uses surrealism and comedy to open our hearts to a simple message of hope.
LET'S MAKE THE STRUGGLING CREATIVE A MYTH
As a champion of diverse storytelling, you are already making important strides in helping elevate diverse voices through trade education, financial aid, grants, hiring initiatives or in studio training programs to improve diverse opportunities.
Story Medium adds another facet to those efforts, filling a void while empowering creatives to utilize these existing opportunities more effectively.
Offering Story Medium scholarships through Rise up Animation, a non-profit supporting BIPOC creatives, was our first step to impact more creatives through collaboration. I am thrilled to empower even more voices by partnering with you!
Set up a discovery call with Jessie Kate Bui to discuss how the course can address your specific needs.
WE'VE NEVER BEEN MORE READY
- Growing focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion opening opportunities for more diverse stories
- Pandemic leading to larger focus on the need for work/life balance and mental health tools
- Breaking down of mental health stigma with Gen Z leading the charge with positive messaging around it.
- Authenticity trend in marketing creating a complimentary setting to tell more diverse stories
HEDGE STUDIO
Empowered storytellers unleashing their wild ideas
Our mission is to help diverse storytellers transform from struggling creative to confident director so they can celebrate their presence and share their unique perspectives with the world.
Heal the Storyteller, Heal the World
PHASE 1 : EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES: to stabilize and heal struggling creatives
PHASE 2 : ENTERTAINMENT PROJECTS: to create opportunity for diverse storytellers
PHASE 3 : PHYSICAL PRODUCTS: to maintain a healing mindset and flow state
PHASE 4 : GRANTS & FREE SERVICES: to empower aspiring directors
Your purchase of courses not only helps your own creatives, it helps move forward the mission of Hedge Studio. In every product and service, we use psychology-driven techniques to create educational tools that empower truth, immersive stories that inspire connection, and interactive products that enrich your life with healing narratives.
Creating a variety of future jobs specifically designed for underrepresented creatives.
HEAL THE STORYTELLER, HEAL THE WORLD
Through stories, we find hope.
As we heal our storytellers, we unleash a force of positive change.
Cultures throughout history have used fictional metaphors and symbols to help guide us to overcome challenges in life. From Shamans to Storytellers to Psychologists, it has been a reliable method to speak to our collective consciousness and heal humanity. Spiderman inspires us to use our power with responsibility, Cinderella inspires us to express love even in hardship, Dorothy reminds us to appreciate what we already have.
On the flip side, stories can create barriers between us, disconnecting us from each other or causing misunderstandings out of fear, shame, or anger. We tell ourselves stories like, "Your differences make you a threat to me …I have to be successful to be loved …all conflict is a sign of rejection.”
The misperceptions, lies, and limiting beliefs that result from fear-driven stories can lead to stigmatization, unstable homes, broken relationships, and loss of personal expression. And the more complex our world becomes, the more rapidly it changes…the easier it is to get lost in these limiting beliefs.
Fortunately, empowered storytellers put a dent in these limiting beliefs by providing more nuanced perspectives and powerful metaphors that break down societies' fear-driven stories. In particular, America’s most direct form of storytelling, entertainment media, is elevating the more diverse representation and the insightful creatives who can tell these important nuanced stories. Together, we can build on this momentum, supporting more and more voices in showing up, speaking up, and changing our world for the better.
In closing, I invite you to join me on my mission to help storytellers tackle their own limiting beliefs so we can continue to unleash more powerful, hopeful, and connecting stories. Through this support, we can provide both immediate relief and far-reaching impact.
SUPPORT YOUR ARTISTS WITH THE STORY MEDIUM COURSE