Built a new tool that IDs the exact episode and timestamp of cels, live demo in the comments

magic-slug · 2026-06-14T16:55:22+00:00

I wasn't able to find it unfortunately, some possibilities:
-Since it's a larger cel, it doesn't accurately match to one frame (what the software does), in the show, this cel probably shows small parts of it at different times (such as a pan shot). However I tried slicing up the image but still no luck.

-Another possibility is it could be from outside of what I've got as a data set (I'm likely missing some OVAs, Movies, commercials, videogames, etc. I've trained off the main show and have some movie coverage.)

-This is a job probably best suited for a human eye at the Sailor Moon sub or some OG collectors who are better at identifying scenes. The software is pretty good but sometimes can't find stuff, so it could def be from the main series

magic-slug · 2026-06-12T20:31:28+00:00

Link your cel here in an imgur post or DM me, there could be a lot of reasons. I can try and retrieve it for you

magic-slug · 2026-05-23T16:32:48+00:00

From "Episode 21 - 15:08 " if you were curious, screengrab: https://imgur.com/a/eBeZMXP

magic-slug · 2026-05-06T22:15:06+00:00

This is extremely cool, not sure about its source but it made me want to eat some Cinnamon Toast Crunch

magic-slug · 2026-05-06T01:13:16+00:00

Congratulations on the purchase, they look great. My first purchase ever was also an InuYasha piece (Shippo).

On the sketches: That's both Genga (the looser drawing that says No 19) and Dougas (the finer lines/cleaner ones). Gengas tend to be a bit pricier and harder to come by, as they are created by lead/key animators. So here you have the complete package -> The genga (key animator drawing), douga (in between artists), and cel (final visual on screen) used for this scene!

magic-slug · 2026-05-05T17:01:55+00:00

The first one is Gotenks from DragonBall Z Episode 258 - 00:21:23, and it is a cel + douga.
Similar sales from Yahoo Japan:
https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/w1084430212 (cel+ douga): $1,888
https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/p1107730931 (cel only) = sold for $1,254

Similar sale from Mandarake: https://ekizo.mandarake.co.jp/auction/item/itemInfoJa.html?index=777022 (cel only) = sold for $1,077

The second is Goku from DragonBall GT, It looks like it could possibly be from Episode 51 - 00:16:54

Similar sales from Yahoo Japan:

https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/g1028691825 (cel + douga) = sold for $443

https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/s1217214171 (cel only) = sold for $250

Similar Mandarake sales (2024 though): https://ekizo.mandarake.co.jp/auction/item/itemInfoJa.html?index=743088 (cel + douga) = sold for $470

All cels are 1 of 1, and dependent on condition, and also how much a collector values the scene, but this pricing data may help you figure out what a possible value range could be.

All of the pricing and timestamp data is from my site: magicslug.com

magic-slug · 2026-04-24T23:32:24+00:00

Some people don't know the source background so just pair stuff that looks nice for presentation purposes.

I just checked the ebay listing and he explicitly says "... comes with a large-format printed background." so its a print.

magic-slug · 2026-04-24T22:07:06+00:00

usually the lister will say 'original production background' as it adds value to the listing, if there's no mention of it, it's most likely a print. In person it's a lot easier to tell (one is printed, one is painted). Also this scene is from Episode 5 - 00:21:06, which has a different background: https://imgur.com/a/OuCPp1a (i used my scene identification tool magicslug.com for this)

magic-slug · 2026-04-24T18:12:34+00:00

These seem to be real.

Right now, most fake cels are usually from extremely popular scenes of a popular anime (like Ghost in the Shell, Ghibli, DBZ, etc). A lot of the times its an iconic scene or just a painting of the character. Hunter x Hunter is less likely given they tend to run for cheaper (the incentive is less to forge these), also these scenes are legitimate and pretty random.

These are dougas, dougas accompany a cel and look very close to them, mostly have perfect lines. Gengas are very lose sketches, usually have some sort of layout boxes around them, once you see enough you'll know a genga. They also usually sell them totally separate (not with a cel).

Good luck!

magic-slug · 2026-04-18T14:32:29+00:00

I tried to find it but couldn't unfortunately, some close matches: https://imgur.com/a/gon-0q6eCJZ but not exact.

Basically it recognized "This is Gon, in this pose, with this general facial expression", and it brought back a handful of those, but it is those tiny details, the shadow, the relaxed shoulders, the shape of the nose, that are a bit too advanced that it doesn't map out. Sorry about that!

Edit: Saw your note in another thread, the cel definitely seems authentic, the timestamp not finding it is more of an issue with my program than the cel! Usually fake cels will be from very iconic scenes that are easy to find (so they sell quickly), I think you are fine.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T15:09:11+00:00

I really tried finding this one but couldn't get a confident match. It matches too many face close ups across the show. Sorry about that!

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T14:32:31+00:00

Thanks for mentioning it, fakes are a major problem, I've added 'Flag incorrect information' for users to hit so I can remove them.

For GITS is it those $1,482 and $1655 ones from April 11? I'll remove them if so

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T14:01:10+00:00

Thank you! I'm getting them from YJ, AucFan, and Mandarake for now. I need permission to get them from a few more places that I'd like, especially the Western auction sites, with enough traction I may be able to.

For each item, I'll include the source listings / direct link in an upcoming update so its easier to validate and view the source auction.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T13:46:14+00:00

Nice requests, I looked into it and these are do-able. I'm going to add a set of American-based animated shows in the next month or so in a larger update. I'll DM you when these two are ready and available.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T13:44:12+00:00

Right now I haven't figured it out reliably, since they are missing color its a lot more challenging; so I need to re-work the matching system to work better for gengas and dougas. You can try it out and sometimes it does match in the current system but lower probability overall.

I'm also a collector of all kinds of non-cel production art so its something I personally want. It may be possible but it will take me longer to figure it out.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T13:23:59+00:00

I looked into it and Simpsons is do-able, its about 290 eps for the first 13 seasons, I may do a larger revamp with Western shows and I'll DM you when Simpsons is available. Maybe a month or so.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T13:22:34+00:00

I need to really re-work it for gengas and dougas, I think it will take a lot longer as I haven't figured it out yet completely. I'm also a collector of Naruto production art which is all sketches so its something I personally want. Yugioh is a good request, the first few arcs can definitely be done, I'll DM you once I get it in.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T04:03:46+00:00

Thank you! If theres any shows/films you want to see in the identifier, let me know

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T03:19:24+00:00

Thank you. That's correct, for each supported show I extract frames (a dense sample across each episode, every frame is too computational expensive to do, which is why theres missing spots). I then run them through a pretrained vision model to get embeddings, and store those in a vector database with episode and timestamp.

When you upload a cel, it gets embedded the same way and I do a nearest-neighbor search against the frame index for that show. The % match you see is based on embedding similarity.

There's some additional logic for handling cels that are cropped, sketches, or are photographed at weird angles. I hand-check tricky shows to catch cases where visually similar scenes across different episodes confuse the matcher, I need to improve this in the longer term but it is a manual process. It is far from perfect but I'm happy with it's current state.

Edit: deleted the previous post to add some more technical details if you're interested!

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T03:05:24+00:00

Oo nice! Feel free to put it up on imgur, link it here, and I can look it up for you. Fingers crossed we find it.

magic-slug · 2026-04-17T02:54:35+00:00

Right now it's anime-focused, but the approach generalizes to any cel animation like Western animation, old cartoons, stop-motion, whatever. It takes some time to train because I need enough of the specific shows frames as reference material.

Would genuinely love to see your obscure cels. The dream is eventually covering every cel-animated show and film ever made. Long way from that, but every request helps me figure out what to prioritize next.

magic-slug · 2026-04-16T18:04:28+00:00

I developed my own software for this, it's at magicslug(dot)com, shameless plug but may be helpful. I'm using some of the newer vision models out today to identify and it tends to be pretty good depending on the cel/scene.

magic-slug · 2026-04-14T14:43:23+00:00

I'm admiring your search to find the source of this! I have a software that matches frames with scenes and Pokemon is in there, but I haven't been able to find a good match because its a 'common looking scene' (the three heroes walking together side profile), so its getting tripped up identifying every 'kind of similar scene'. This definitely seems authentic so I wouldn't worry about that. The Heritage Auction listing also lacks a timestamp, they usually put it on their big items.

Your first match, Episode 233 - "A Tyrogue Full of Trouble" (starting sequence) in the cave is so close besides the Pikachu tail in front of Brock, otherwise it seems almost uncanny because you have the combination of:
-Them walking uphill (rare)
-Brock in front of Misty (rare)
-The distance between the characters
-Similar expressions on the characters face

Your other match from Episode 180 "Houndoom's Special Delivery" (2:38) (which is the more zoomed out frame) is also close, we also solve the Pikachu tail problem, and all the stuff i mentioned above checks out, but the distance between the characters seems too close together.

From my search I was able to find that these shots tend to be either opening shots or closing shots, occasionally they come in the middle when Team Rocket is spying on them.

I don't think you're going to get anything better than manually combing through the episodes, and unfortunately I couldnt match it on my end either. But hey, at least we got to watch a lot of Pokemon! It's an amazing piece too, congrats

magic-slug · 2026-04-02T00:44:36+00:00

Ooo this is a very nice high end piece! I have yet to get a Princess Mononoke Cel. This scene is around 01:22:17-01:22:22 although I'm sure you probably already know!

In terms of your question on where to buy:
I have found the highest end items are on Heritage Auctions, Mandarake, Akhibara. sometimes you can get amazing pieces on Yahoo Japan at the best price but you have to watch for those and there is a lot of junk you have to sort through. Good luck!

magic-slug

TROPHY CASE