City & Tourism
Two children's sightseeing moves serve as the thread, linking local crafts, ancient-town landmarks and the modern city into a long blue-and-gold Chinese-style scroll.
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01 / Background
This roughly 35-second short on Longgang's intangible heritage had to let viewers recognize several local crafts in very little time, while conveying how the city blends old and new. We started by gathering real reference images of the crafts and landmarks, then gave each item its own characters, objects and place in the frame.
The film uses a new Chinese gongbi illustration style: a deep blue starry sky, golden mountain lines and building outlines form a unified background, as two children stroll from left to right. Cultural scenes appear one after another as the picture pans sideways, and the ending stretches from a group in traditional dress all the way to the modern city.
02 / Creative Highlights
The children keep walking right as the background and the crafts along the road pass by in turn. The direction never changes, so viewers always know where to look next, and the many heritage items add up to one continuous journey.
Finger painting and calligraphy, tea cakes in steamers, leather-carving tools and hat weaving all come with specific people and objects. Each craft is labeled with its name on a red seal, so even in a crowded frame, viewers can match the picture to the name at a glance.
Lychee orchards, Hakka buildings, the ancient town and the modern city all share the deep blue ground and golden outlines. Each place looks different, but the art style stays consistent, so tradition and the future can meet on the same scroll.
We assembled the background first, then placed the characters' actions and heritage elements in the foreground separately. As the picture moves, people, objects and buildings sit in clear layers, keeping the decorative feel of gongbi illustration while staying watchable in constant motion.
03 / Scene Breakdown
A teal-and-gold dragon swims through the starry sky and dives into the clouds; as the clouds part, a lychee orchard heavy with red fruit appears, setting the deep blue, gold lines and red of the whole scroll.
With teal-green scales and gold outlines, the dragon twists its way down between auspicious clouds and stars.
The camera pans to a lychee orchard below distant mountains, its nearby branches full of ripe lychees.
A boy and a girl walk in from the left holding up a little golden dragon. Two women by the road are sorting lychees, a man behind them is painting with his fingers, and further on, two qilin leap out.
The two children carry a little golden dragon to the right, as two women crouch beside them sorting lychees, with a red seal reading “Longgang Lychees.”
At a table, a man with ink-covered hands smears his painting straight onto the paper; the seal beside him reads “Finger Painting and Calligraphy.”
The background becomes the wall of an old Hakka house as two white-and-gold qilin leap out toward the children; the seal reads “Yongsheng Tang Qilin Dance.”
The children reach the archway of the ancient town, with a dragon dance troupe whirling behind them and someone passing by with a lantern; next come Hakka tea cakes in a steamer and an old craftsman bent over his leather carving.
Dragon dancers perform in front of the ancient town's archway under a seal reading “Longgang Dragon Dance,” as a woman with a lantern walks past.
A woman in blue floral cotton lays white tea cakes one by one into a bamboo steamer; the seal reads “Henggang Hakka Tea Cakes.”
A bespectacled old craftsman sits at a wooden table, carving the leather bit by bit with a knife.
The background becomes the glowing Universiade Center as several Hakka women weave cool hats; then a line of people in cool hats carrying bamboo poles walks past, a pagoda and the Twin Towers appear in turn, and young people in modern clothes step into the picture too.
Three women in black-rimmed cool hats bend over their weaving, with the faceted outline of the Universiade Center behind them; the seal reads “Gankeng Hakka Cool Hats.”
Hakka women with carrying poles pass in front of the pagoda, the background gives way to Longgang's Twin Towers and the city at night, and young people in qipao and casual wear wave as they walk.
04 / Storyboards & Final Frames
The whole film is one scroll unrolling to the right: background sections joined together, with characters and crafts placed on top. Below, in the film's order, are the final backgrounds and character art used in each section.
Shot 1.1
New Chinese gongbi style: a dragon outlined in gold among the night stars and auspicious clouds.
Shot 1.2
Distant mountains in colorful fluid ink wash, mountain shapes traced in gold lines and a lychee orchard full of fruit in the foreground: the first section of the scroll.
Shot 2.1
A boy and a girl of about six. The boy holds up a little golden dragon, the girl wears her hair in two buns, and they walk to the right the whole way.
Shot 2.2
Two women crouch to sort a basket of lychees, with the “Longgang Lychees” seal.
Shot 2.3
A man sits at a table, painting on paper with ink-covered fingers.
Shot 2.4
Two white-and-gold qilin dance facing each other, with the “Yongsheng Tang Qilin Dance” seal.
Shot 2.5
Rows of Hakka walled houses in front of golden distant mountains, with the inscription “Si Yu Zu Ju” (“Here the clan gathers”) above the door.
Shot 3.1
Drawn after the archway of Gankeng Ancient Town, with “Gankeng” written on the gate tower.
Shot 3.2
Two groups of dancers perform facing each other, with the “Longgang Dragon Dance” seal.
Shot 3.3
A man in a long robe carries a lantern marked with the character “Zhang,” representing the Zhang family's traditional lantern-making craft.
Shot 3.4
A woman in blue floral cotton lays tea cakes into a bamboo steamer.
Shot 3.5
An old craftsman does leather carving with a knife at a wooden table.
Shot 4.1
The same blue-and-gold technique renders the faceted roof of the Universiade Center.
Shot 4.2
Three women bent over weaving cool hats; another image shows a line of people in cool hats carrying bamboo poles.
Shot 4.3
The last section of the scroll: the Twin Towers and the city's high-rises under a colorful Milky Way.
05 / Results
A roughly 35-second intangible heritage short that fits many local traditions into one stylistically unified Chinese scroll. The children keep strolling, so however packed the content, viewers can follow along.
A wide background plus separately made assets gives this local culture short both a unified style and concrete action, and offers one way to showcase many crafts at once.
Case Study
Qilin dance, dragon dance, cool hats, tea cakes, leather carving, finger painting and calligraphy, lanterns... Longgang has plenty of intangible heritage, but filming each one separately would take several minutes and still not cover them all.
We painted them all into one Chinese-style scroll and had two children carry a little golden dragon from left to right, with the crafts appearing one by one along the road.
This is our work for the Publicity Department of the CPC Longgang District Committee, Shenzhen: the sixth film in the Longgang series, 35 seconds long, beginning with a golden dragon in the starry sky and ending beneath the Twin Towers.
01
The project came with a clear reference film from the start: an “intangible heritage scroll” that keeps unrolling sideways, with the content swapped for Longgang's own. The hard part was step one: Longgang is a district, not a big city with heritage items everywhere you look, and information online was scattered.
We first ran in-depth research with AI to sort through Longgang District's intangible heritage list, and finally picked the seven most visual items: the Bantian Yongsheng Tang Qilin Dance, Longgang Dragon Dance, Gankeng Hakka Cool Hats, Finger Painting and Calligraphy, Henggang Hakka Tea Cakes, Longgang Leather Carving and Zhang Family Traditional Lanterns, plus Longgang's lychees. For background landmarks we chose Hakka walled houses, Gankeng Ancient Town, the Universiade Center and the Twin Towers. We found real photos for every item and followed them closely: the look of the qilin, the brims of the cool hats, the shape of the tea cakes. This step took the most time, but locals recognize what we drew.
02
In the reference film, a single painting keeps moving sideways. If we generated the video section by section, the colors and perspective wouldn't match and the seams would jump.
So instead of storyboarding, we drew up an asset list: five background sections (lychee orchard, Hakka walled houses, Gankeng Ancient Town, Universiade Center, city at night), all painted in the same “deep blue starry sky + gold-outlined mountains + colorful fluid ink wash” style, then pre-assembled into one long image over 13,000 pixels wide. Each section's canvas was extended first, then we painted in extra foreground elements to cover the edges, so no seams show as the picture moves.
03
The children, the women sorting lychees, the qilin dancers, the women weaving hats... each character was drawn separately on a solid background and paired with a red seal naming its heritage item. These assets were first turned into short animated clips of their own: the children walking right, the craftsman carving leather, the women weaving hats.
In the edit, we laid down the background and ground first, joined three clips of the children walking, and used keyframes to slide the background slowly to the left, so the crafts on both sides of the road come toward the viewer one by one. The children face the same direction from start to finish, so viewers' eyes keep moving right with them. For music, we chose a cheerful track with a bit of a festive New Year feel.
The background moves and the people are busy at work as two crafts appear one after the other, with seals giving their names.
04
Seven heritage items, plus lychees and four landmarks, fit into a 35-second short. Viewers don't need to read an introduction: one walk with the two children shows them that Longgang has the qilin dance, cool hats and leather carving, and that behind these old crafts stand today's Universiade Center and Twin Towers.
At the final stage, the title changed from “A Thousand Years of Intangible Heritage: Longgang Edition” to “Exploring Longgang: An Intangible Heritage Scroll,” and the cover pairs a calligraphy title with a frame from the film and a small Longgang seal, better matching the film's relaxed “look as you stroll” tone. For teams promoting local culture, this “one long image + layered assets” approach is also a good way to turn a heritage list into an attractive short film.
FAQ
Paint them as a horizontal scroll and let the leads walk through it. In this 35-second film, two children walk from left to right as the qilin dance, dragon dance, cool hats, tea cakes, leather carving, finger painting and calligraphy, and lanterns appear by the road in turn, each labeled on a red seal so viewers can match them at a glance.
Find real photos for every item first. Before work began, we sorted through Longgang's heritage list, then collected photos of the actual objects and performances for each chosen item. The qilin's design, the cool hats' brims, the tea cakes and steamers were all drawn from references, and the Gankeng Ancient Town archway and Universiade Center in the background were also outlined from the real sites.
Paint one wide background first, then place the assets in layers. We joined five background sections into one long image over 13,000 pixels wide, painting in foreground elements to cover the seams. Characters and crafts were made into separate animated clips, and in the edit, keyframes slide the background sideways. Foreground characters and the buildings behind them stay in distinct layers, so the whole film unfolds like a scroll.
Approach
First, confirm the names of local heritage items and find real images, then settle the background landmarks and character actions. The brief became an asset list that spells out which people, objects and places each craft needs.
A wide background serves as one continuous scene: the landmarks are composited in advance, the canvas is extended, and foreground elements are painted in to cover the seams, so the edges join naturally as the picture pans.
Compositing starts with the background and ground, then adds the children's walking, with keyframes moving the background and the heritage assets along the road. The music is cheerful and festive, and the cover uses a calligraphy title and a Longgang seal, making the overall style recognizable at a glance.
More Work
Ideal for brand launches · public-sector communications · cultural-tourism campaigns · IP transformation · event openers · earnings visualization · social campaigns · AI workflow development
