Two identical CCS Movie 1 cels

[sensei]

Lately, there's been a spate of cels coming onto the market from The Cardcaptor Sakura Movie (the first one, which fit between Season 1 and Season 2. These have appeared both on YHJ and Mandarake. The following auction interested me greatly:

http://ekizo.mandarake.co.jp/auction/it ... dex=313591

This is the A20 cel from one of the early scenes, before the credits roll, showing Sakura confronting and sealing The Arrow in this unique battle costume. Here's a screen cap of this exact moment.



As you can see, this cel originally had a B-level cel that contained Sakura's hand holding The Windy. While that is missing, it's still a very intense cel of a rare costume and well worth the opening bid of 12,000 yen.

Now what is interesting that I actually already own what appears to be the identical cel (A20), which I picked up on Anicyo (anyone remember Anicyo?) in December 2007. Here's the link to my gallery page:

http://sensei.rubberslug.com/gallery/in ... mID=226831

That also lacks the B-level layer with Sakura's hand and the card. It also came with no douga, which was not unusual for movie cels (my records show that about half my Movie 1 and 2 cels lacked dougas). The Mandarake cel, by contrast, does come with a douga.

I've compared the Mandarake scan with the screen cap and with my scan, with no clear results. The main differences are in the hair highlights that fall behind where the card is in the screen cap. Otherwise, I can't detect any obvious differences in the line tracing or the colors.

Interestingly, I got out the cel itself, and the sequence number is not only the same, but appears to have been written by the same person with the same distinctive way of making the "A." And while the painting finishes up very smoothly at the top and bottom of the cel in the Mandarake scan, the bottom margin of painting on mine is much more jagged, with a number of individual brush strokes extending down toward the bottom of the cel.

Neither one seems obviously a fake. Given CCS's penchant for "rejected takes," could one perhaps be the cel that was filmed and the other a studio production cel that was set aside for some reason? The presence of the douga with the Mandarake cel might help determine that one as the "real" A20 -- but I have at least one "test" cel that came with a douga also.

And it is odd that this one -- the A20 -- comes up for auction now (rather than A19 or A21). Not a key, as Mandy's douga shows. And neither one has kept the B-level top cel with the hand.

Any ideas?

[JWR]

I noticed a difference between your cel and the one for auction. in the right eye just below the smaller light reflection dot I count 3 black lines and in the one on auction I only can make out 1. The screen cap matches yours with the 3 line. Can't say for sure but I could not rule out the one for auction being a fan/fake cel.

[frozentime]

I know most people are relieved if the cel comes with the douga, and see that as in indication that it is likely real, but that has never given me any comfort. If there were two "identical" ones out there, it seems to me that it would be much easier to fake if one were in possession of the douga.

[kamidake]

You could very well have one of the cels from a rejected sequence. Maybe it's got something to do with scanning, but your cel seems to have a yellower tint to it than the Mandarake one. Perhaps they decided the color was off in that sequence and had to redo? They would then reuse the douga or create a new sequence and the cels would be identical, except for slightly different tint on the paint. Just a thought.

[Jadeduo]

Mandarake is usually pretty good about research, they obviously can't research everything but if you ever have a question about and items provenance they have been known to try and get some things authenticated. Granted they might not this item will prolly not go much higher than it's opening bid, but it might.

I am leaning towards authentic on both because what they have been getting on Mandarake has been coming with Original Matching BGs, Layouts, and various types of sketches. This seems outside the norm as it does not have it's matching bg, which it's not really needed because it is just basic black. CCS has been notorious for throwing out entire cel sequences and just starting over from scratch, I think I might have only a handful of correction layers in my entire collection. You, yourself Sensei, have documented all the crazy cels that came out of the Light/Dark Capture episodes, some used, some not... I would not be surprised if the piece of hair that you don't even see is why the cel got rejected. The quality control on CCS was much higher than ANY of the other series I collect with cels, things are of course missed from time to time and those are some of my favorite pieces, but otherwise they were VERY concerned about what made it to screen. ^_^

Another thing too, CCS has also been somewhat all over the place price-wise, as of late, I've been talking about this with KT4 and she thinks the prices have been atypical as well.

So I wait to see how this all plays out myself! ^_^ Too bad Anicyo is no longer around you could see if they have any records, although that being 8 years ago... Maybe not... (feels old)

Best of Luck!
JD

[sensei]

I'm trending toward going with JD on this one: mine is a rejected production cel, while the Mandarake one may well be the one that went under the camera. However, the two are virtually identical, which would be hard to do through forgery, even with the douga in the forger's hand.

I was initially impressed by JWR's observation about the eyes. It is true that the number of lines below the highlight seems to be different at first glance. But comparing the three (L to R, Mandarake, screen cap, my cel), you can see that the extra line is there in the Mandy cel, just badly faded for some reason.



I was more impressed by the results of "flickering" the images of my cel with the screen cap and looking closely at the hair highlights. Look especially at the long one just left of center. (I nicknamed that one "the anteater."



Noticeable difference on the far left side. It's very hard to get these images into exact registration, so the differences in the hair highlights farther to the left may be artifacts. But I centered both images on "the anteater," so the differences here are real ones. That indicates that my cel was not the one that went under the camera to make this cut.

Now look what happens when I "flicker" the Mandarake image with the screen cap, centering both images on "the anteater."



No difference. Case closed.

There are lots and lots of peculiarities about this case. I thought I'd found the reason my cel had been rejected: one part of Sakura's bonnet visible just under her right ear, has been painted the normal color rather than the shadow color. But Mandy's was painted the same way and it's behind the card layer and wouldn't be seen. So that's not the issue.

And the slight shift in flesh color that kamidake noticed is a problem with my scanner and/or my imaging program. Keep in mind, too, that when the cels were photographed, they were light-blasted to create a slight halo around the edges against the flat black background. That's why the eye highlights look bigger in the screen cap than in either cel. And why both cels look more "fleshy."

Overall, the nearly identical details and colors, along with the obviously identical handwriting and pen type of the sequence numbers, suggest that my cel is production rather than fake. But those hair highlights, which are traced freehand on the front of the cel rather than printed from the douga on the back, are never going to be exactly alike, even when done under very high production standards, as both these cels were done.

Thanks to all who checked in on this odd matter.

[JWR]

I'm glad it took blowing the image up to that level to spot the lines on the Mandi image. I could not make them out off just my work comp screen.
I must be nearing the time to get reading glasses

[lunacels]

That is extremely interesting! I pored over them when you first posted and noticed the slight change in the hair highlights, but I didn't know how to describe it without getting out Photoshop and circling the point of interest. Your description of the anteater is right on, though!! Is there a slight difference in the pupil shape (where one is more oval, and the other's right edge slants to the right between the eye highlights? Or is it only my computer?)

Both cels are lovely. It would be neat to get both and explain the differences and animation process in your descriptions. It is so intriguing...but can you imagine being the artist, and scrapping your work at the end of the day?!

I love the superimposed images. That is quite brilliant, and I wish I had thought of that! I'd like to try it with my studio exhibition cels from Sailormoon and compare them to the screencaps, as there are minor (and some not-so-minor) differences there, too. And at any rate, this discussion inspired me to finally ID the episode of my lone Sakura cel (also one where she holds up a card, though not as important or stunning as yours). From first season apparently...I have never watched any except that episode (16), but it was intriguing. I suppose I am going to have to sit down and watch the series now, though I'm very late!

[JustVan]

Wow what an interesting and indepth look at two cels. It really makes you appreciate how nice the CCS artwork is, too!

I wanted to throw out a potential alternate idea, though it's probably not accurate. But I have a cel that is monochrome and which doesn't match the full-color on screen cel (see here and matching cap). In this sequence the shot goes from monochrome to full color in a really fast burst. By the time my cel shows up, it's almost already all in color. So in order for there to be a nearly full-color version on screen I assume that there were two cels made from the douga, one in monochrome and one in full color, and they filmed it at a low opacity to fade the monochrome cel out and the normal color cel in. I haven't found it, but I strongly suspect there is another alternate full-color version of my cel out there somewhere.

Granted yours look identical vs. an obvious color change like mine, but it does make me wonder if perhaps some sort of similar thing was being done due to some filming aspect.

[sensei]

Actually, Madhouse did this from time to time. I have an A1/A2 set of cels that were faded into each other at a dramatic moment:

The "monochrome" A1
The "Technicolor" A2

And there are sequences of nearly identical cels that were alternated rapidly under the camera to produce an interesting "shuddering" effect. There are several "Vine Crucifixion" cels that look exactly the same to the eye, but they have different sequence numbers, so all of them were used to make Sakura and the vines seem to tremble on the screen.

But this A20 movie cel is, I think, a different kettle of fish, as the sequence numbers are identical, as are the lines, except for a few that could not feasibly be duplicated exactly as the lines are drawn by hand on the front of the cel. So it looks as if they are two cels, each made from trace lines copied from the same douga, and painted in the same way. As it looks as if the Mandarake one went under the camera, I'll need to add a bit to my description indicating that this is (for want of a better term) a rejected test cel.

Still it's a very pretty cel, as you kindly say.