The archive · Design & Visual · Product decision · 2023
Bito hand-draws the 60th Golden Horse Awards so 'life' becomes its visual idea
For the 60th Golden Horse Awards, Bito used hand-drawn crayon, charcoal and pastel frames to make 'life' the ceremony's visual idea.
Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival · Bito
What it had to solve
Taipei's 60th Golden Horse Awards, the Chinese-language film world's biggest film night, asked Bito to craft the ceremony's visuals. The governing idea was 'life', and the studio decided the animation itself had to embody it rather than decorate it.
How it works
Taipei's 60th Golden Horse Awards asked Bito to create the visuals for the Chinese-language film world's biggest film night. The edition's guiding idea was 'life', and Bito's answer was to go backwards in technique: instead of slick digital motion, the studio returned to the purest form of animation and drew everything frame by frame.
Fifteen artists made the opening sequence and the 24 nomination title films, producing more than 1,000 meticulously hand-drawn frames. They worked in crayons, charcoal, pastels, acrylics and oil pastels, mixing media to capture the texture of daily life — and they deliberately left the strokes imperfect.
Imperfection was the argument: hand-drawn art cannot be exactly repeated, which is exactly how the festival wanted to picture life. The result gave the ceremony a handmade visual identity, and the work was later archived by D&AD's Graphic Design awards.
Why it lands
- The medium does the thinking: hand-drawn frames embody transience and irreplaceability, so the style itself states the theme.
- Going against the CGI grain made a 60th-anniversary night feel human and singular rather than polished and generic.
- Commissioning 15 artists across five media turned the titles into a collective act, matching a festival that gathers a whole industry.
- Keeping imperfect strokes visible gives the audience an emotional hook that no digital effect can fake.
What it did
The hand-drawn opening and the 24 nomination films carried the 60th ceremony's visuals, giving Asia's most closely watched Chinese-language film night a handmade identity; the project entered the D&AD awards archive under Graphic Design.
What you can take
When the idea is as abstract as 'life', choose a medium that performs it: imperfect handmade marks say 'transient and irreplaceable' in a way polished CGI never can.
Since then
The 60th Golden Horse ceremony in November 2023 opened with Bito's hand-drawn sequence, and the 24 nomination films became the edition's visual signature. The project entered the D&AD awards archive under Graphic Design, and the credits list from the work — 15 artists plus a full live-action and sound team — circulated as Bito's calling card for craft-led identity design.
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