CGI & Illustration
Tea Leaves China
/// Overview
The opening episode of Stuff the British Stole season 3, told on blue-and-white porcelain: a history of theft painted onto the objects it was traded in.
/// The Challenge
The episode follows how Britain took tea from China, through espionage, opium and war. The brief asked for the maps, routes and timelines to unfold in the ink on the teapots, not on a blank canvas. The hard part was keeping a hand-drawn illustration readable on curved, glossy 3D porcelain.
/// The System
I turned the brief into three rules: one cobalt on white glaze, every scene shaped by its pot, cup or plate, and the ink moves while the porcelain stays. Each vessel was picked for its scene: a teapot when a map needed room, a plate for the trade loop, a cup for a panorama. The maps follow the same hierarchy as the drawings, with one place in deep blue and the rest in wash.
/// The Process
I sketched every scene, led the 3D and animated it. Alejandro Londoño painted the illustrations from my sketches. They were animated flat in After Effects and wrapped onto the Redshift renders with UV passes, so timing changes didn't need a re-render.