How it works

From one photo to one frame

Pegbar does what a collector would do with a lot of patience: hold the cel up to the film and look at every frame until the lines meet. Then it shows you what it found.

  1. Lift the character off the board

    Most of a cel photo is blank card or background. Pegbar finds the painted character first, so the board never gets a vote. On a painted background it keeps only the cel’s thin ink lines, because background paintings don’t have them. Without this step, the search matches the background instead of the character.

  2. Narrow the search

    A feature film has well over 100,000 frames, and a half-hour TV episode around 30,000. Pegbar starts from the film or episode and the character, then searches only the scenes where that character appears.

  3. Lay the cel over every frame

    In those scenes, the cel is fitted to each frame and Pegbar measures how far the ink lines miss. On the right drawing, the cel fits with nothing but a change of size.

  4. Show the evidence

    You get the frame, the time in the film, the drawings either side and the measurements. No confidence percentage. You can see the match for yourself.

Why every frame matters

Why stills miss the drawing

Film stills you find online usually keep about one frame in every twelve or thirteen. A drawing on twos is on screen for two frames, so most drawings never make it into the stills.

Sampled stills

Close, but the next drawing

For the Friar Tuck cel, the nearest still was the drawing just after it. It fit well enough to fool the eye, with 58% of the ink lines overlapping, but only after stretching the cel.

Every frame

The exact drawing

Checked at the full 24 frames a second, the real drawing turned up: 84% of the lines overlapping, an average gap of 2.5 pixels, and no stretching at all.

See the Friar Tuck numbers
The three answers

Every check ends one of three ways

Matched

The exact drawing, its frame and its second in the film. The drawings either side are shown not fitting.

Friar Tuck
Scene found

The shot is certain, but the drawing falls between the frames on hand. Every-frame footage of that shot finishes the job.

Tito
No frame found

Nothing lines up. Pegbar says what it searched, shows the nearest frames, and lists what would settle the question.

Baloo
Honest limits

What a match can and can’t prove

A match is evidence about the artwork: this drawing is in the film. It is not proof about the object in your hands.

A match shows

  • The drawing on the cel appears in the film, at a named frame and second.
  • Which scene it belongs to, and how long it stays on screen.
  • That the drawings either side fit worse.

A match can’t show

  • Whether your sheet went under the camera, or is a second cel of the same drawing.
  • Whether it is a sericel or reproduction made from the same line art.
  • Condition, paint and paperwork. Those need a person and the cel itself.
Before you start

How to photograph your cel

A careful photo is worth more than any amount of searching. These six habits make the biggest difference.

Out of the frameGlass adds glare and the mat hides the edges. If you can safely take it out, do.
Straight downHold the camera directly above the cel, not at an angle, so the lines keep their shape.
Daylight, no flashFlash bounces off acetate. Soft daylight from a window shows the paint as it is.
The whole sheetInclude the edges and any peg holes. They show how the cel was made and used.
The backPaint goes on the back of a cel. A photo of it helps a person judge the cel later.
Any seal, close upA studio seal or stamp can date when the cel was sold.
Questions

Things collectors ask

Will Pegbar tell me if my cel is fake?

No. It tells you whether the drawing on your cel is in the film, and where. That is strong evidence, but authenticity also depends on the paint, the cel itself and its history, which need a person to judge.

Does “no frame found” mean my cel is worthless?

No. The stills may skip your drawing, the scene may have been cut from the film, or the cel may be on a background that confuses the search. The Baloo report shows how a likely genuine cel can still end up with no frame.

Can a sericel match?

It can. A sericel is printed from line art, and that line art may come from the same drawing as a production cel. The match shows the drawing is in the film. The printed paint and the back of the sheet tell a sericel apart.

My cel sits on a background that isn’t from the film. Can it still match?

Yes. On the check page, choose Trace each character and draw a loop around each one. Pegbar cuts the character out and matches it on its own, so a dealer’s backdrop doesn’t get in the way. If two characters on one cel come from different moments of the film, it says so: that cel is a setup, put together after the film from drawings that were each in it.

Which films can Pegbar check?

The check page matches against every frame of three scenes so far: the Sherwood camp in Robin Hood, and two Joker shots from The New Batman Adventures, his gun close-up in “Joker’s Millions” and his New Year’s Eve grin in “Holiday Knights”. The reports on this site also used sampled stills of Robin Hood, Oliver & Company and The Jungle Book, which the check page can’t search yet. The frame library on the matches page lists what is available.

Does my photo get uploaded?

No. The matching runs in your browser on the check page. Your photo is read on your device, compared with the frame library there, and never sent anywhere.

Why is it called Pegbar?

A pegbar is the metal strip with three pegs that holds every drawing and cel in place on the animator’s desk and under the camera. It is what kept your cel lined up with its scene in the studio, and that is what Pegbar checks today.

Ready

Check your own cel

Pick the film and add a photo. Pegbar matches it against its frame library in your browser and shows you the frame it finds.

Match my cel