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alt title(s): Pixelation 
"One way you can tell if a child will grow up to be a criminal is if they're born with their faces already pixellated."
"CRIME BLURS YOUR FACE!"
—From a Cracked Magazine parody of COPS
"< Lapkawitz> and you can tell she's really japanese becase her genitals produce a forcefield that pixelates the air around them"
—Bash.org
(Not to be confused with Pixilation, which is the Stop Motion animation of live actors.)
Video editors alter a section of the screen by averaging or mildly scrambling the color values of the image across larger areas than the original pixels, producing a blocky effect that obscures detail but retains much of the original hue and contour information.
Used to blur out faces (of criminals, crime victims and undercover police officers; people who didn't sign releases to allow a show to use their images); offensive body parts; rude T-shirt messages; product names and logos which have not paid for placement (MTV does this to videos and on The Real World), and even years on closed-circuit date stamps ( America's Dumbest Criminals does this one a lot).
A black square is still used in some cases, as is a cartoon symbol in comedy programmes (for example, superimposing a crown over the offensive parts of a streaker during a royal visit in Britain).
The whole screen is lightly pixellated (or blurred) in some cases, usually for a reconstruction scene in documentaries about battles.
Large pixels look plain ugly because of the chunkiness, so the pixels may be made smaller— perhaps so small as to just be a "fog" over the offensive material. Fogging like this may be a reversible transformation. A sufficiently skilled person with the appropriate software can, given a blurred image, reconstruct the original without blurring. Very large pixels make the reversal more difficult, and a solid block is of course impossible to reverse.
Anime has a variation of this trope where they put a black bar across the character's eyes. This is a reference to the legally required censoring of Japanese news stories about crimes involving minors — minors must have their faces obscured and be identified only as "Boy A", "Boy B", "Girl A", etc.
Also note that in Japan, any depiction of genitals in any media must be censored in some way. Even in pornographic videos.
In return, many anime have begun to use it for non-censoring purposes, covering an object or such, and letting the viewers' imaginations run wild deciding what it is. This can also be used as a form of Innocent Innuendo, making something look perverted when it's (later revealed to be) really not.
Compare Censor Steam and Censor Box.
Examples:
Anime and Manga
- In some anime, the pixellated object may not actually be offensive, but the object is pixellated in order to get the viewers to use their own imaginations as to what the object in question might actually be. Onegai Teacher and Tenchi Muyo GXP have used this on occasion.
- The Yu-Gi-Oh! manga used pixellation as a Penalty Game: a TV producer who threatened to show a video of Yugi getting beaten up (pixellating his face) was made to see everything in pixellation.
- Done in The Abridged Series too where one of the characters hands over a card that's pixelated, the receiver says he can't even see what it is but is assured it's an ultra rare card that shows naughty bits.
- Spoofed, like everything else ever, in Excel Saga - beautiful but scarily perceptive Misaki is displayed at first with a black bar across her eyes. "I'm not a criminal," she deadpans. The black bar vanishes, to be replaced instantly by a pixel grid. "And I'm not," she continues, "in an adult video, either." The pixels vanish, and her face is revealed for the first time in the series.
- Used humorously in the Full Metal Alchemist manga: rather extreme and bloody Amusing Injuries are pixellated. Almost exclusive to Ed as a result of Winry seeing he's busted up his automail again.
- Subverted in the manga version of the sixth episode of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (and presumably the uncut version of the episode proper). The Monster Of The Week has captured all the women and children and is displaying them on a monitor to Kamina, with pixels covering the necessary areas. When their safety is threatened Kamina exits Gurren on the sole condition that the pixels are removed. When the baddie complies Kamina is infuriated to see that what the pixels covered were, in fact, the towels that the girls had been wearing the entire time. The only one who actually deserved to be pixeled was Gimmy, a little boy.
- Mahou Sensei Negima used this as a joke once, when Chisame walks in on Jack Rakan while he's taking a shower.
- In the Onegai Teacher anime, two of the episodes show the contents of a box belonging to Mizuho being pixelated; they're presumably possessions from her life as an alien and/or mementos from her deceased father, but the audience never gets to know what they really are, since even in the DVD releases the contents are kept pixelated.
- Ninin Ga Shinobuden pixelates one of the ninja after Onsokumaru steals his swim trunks.
- Then there's the time Onsokumaru got attacked by a crocodile. The ninjas discuss the possibility of just pixelating the carnage instead of helping him.
- To learn a new spell, Kukuri in Mahoujin Guru Guru must watch the Kita Kita dance because the hip movements trace out a magic circle she can use. Unfortunately, the only person around who knows this dance is an old man who wears a grass skirt. Fortunately, when Kukuri forces herself to watch the dance is pixellated for us viewers. Unfortunately, this is the only time this happens and the Old Kita Kita Man becomes a recurring character.
- In episode 22 of Keroro Gunsou, they put a black stripe over the Keronians' eyes and distort their voices to conceal their identities. However, they're still easily identified by their bright, primary-colored bodies and the fact that they're hanging out with the same people and in the same places they do all the time.
- The opening theme of Chobits features a stark display of the two main characters against a background of colorful lights and shapes, and continually cuts from one camera view to another using a full-screen pixellation transition effect.
- Hilariously subverted in Gintama where a videogame that pixels out someone vomiting turns the pixelated shapes into Tetris blocks.
- Kirby Of The Stars episode 6 has Dedede and Escargon's faces pixelated on live TV near the end of the episode.
- In an episode of Full Metal Panic? Fummoffu!, the class president tries to explain to Kaname why Sousuke had a reasonable excuse for blowing up the school's shoe lockers when he noticed they'd been tampered with. He asks Kaname to imagine what her reaction would be if she discovered a suspicious package in the mail with a "foul stench" and that's slightly damp. While he's doing this, Kaname has an Imagine Spot of her coming to the door and discovering the package—she drops it on the ground, which causes the package to open slightly. The contents are pixellated, but between the president's description and the reddish color of the pixels the viewer sees enough to be squicked out.
- In Umineko No Naku Koro Ni, Kanon at one point sticks his finger into a wound on his chest to prove that he's not bothered by it. The wound is pixellated.
- Gintama uses this. A LOT.
- When Haruhi summons a "G****m" in Day Of Sagittarius.
- In the manga Koe De Oshigoto, about the lives of Eroge voice actors, there is a hilarous conversation about this, and how much it annoys one of the game's artists.
Card Games
Film
- DVD releases of Grease blur out all Coca-Cola logos in the diner scene. This probably wouldn't have even been noticeable were it not for the fact that there's one part of the scene where two characters are conversing in front of a wall-sized Coke ad...
- Likewise, in a TV edit of Superman II, General Zod is thrown into a giant blurred red-and-white Times Square advertising sign. In a shower of equally blurred sparks.
Live Action TV
- The G4 video game review show X Play uses images of kittens to cover graphic violence and nudity in game footage.
- Similarly, Japanese variety/sketch-comedy show Gaki No Tsukai Ya Arahende often covers up nakedness in hidden-camera sketches with an image of the cast member's face.
- In an episode of Seven Days, pixellation was used to cover up the relevant bits during a college streaking event for exactly the opposite of its official purpose. Unfortunately, the pixellation wasn't thorough enough to hide the fact that none of the actors was actually nude.
- Mythbusters will (over)do this with the names of hazardous chemicals used in experiments that they don't want the viewers to know and, summarily, use to recreate the experiment. Also, when part of the process that uses such chemicals is needed to be stated in a scene, a variety of humorous sounds (from a cat's meow to a firetruck siren) will play to block over the chemical's name, and - if the Mythbuster's face is being shown as they explain what they're doing, their mouths will be masked over by a graphic of whatever sound is being used to cover the chemical name, just in case any of the viewers can read lips.
- This was lampshaded by Adam: "This ingredient is made of blur. Ha! And this has blur in it too. Blur is very dangerous. You don't wanna mix blur with blur."
- This is called "greeking" in the trade. It's used to cover up copyrights and trademarks and most shows do it. For example, on Good Eats, A1 Steak Sauce becomes "B2", and most other products become "Bob's" brand, even items you recognize.
- The Walking with Prehistoric Beasts series documents the rise of mammals post-dinosaur all the way up to humans. In one scene it shows protohumans engaged in the revolutionary new method of having sex face-to-face rather than back to front, and apparently they're close enough to humans for this new method to be blurred out.
- A lot of the gore was pixellated on Takashi Miike's six-episode TV series MPD Psycho.
- In the Discovery Channel program Man vs Wild, host/survival expert Bear Grylls must occasionally be completely nude when drying his clothing to avert hypothermia. For obvious reasons, he is seen blur-clad in these shots.
- The quiz show Never Mind The Buzzcocks has a round called What have we pixelated where they play sections of music videos with a pixelated item which the panel must guess. A hard round which has included items such as a person and a hand in a box.
- In one episode of Backpackers, which takes place in D***Land, EVERYTHING but the main characters is pixelled out. However, due to the motion of the images and the objects being filmed, it's easy enough to recognise Mickey and Goofy.
- British automobile Magazine Show Top Gear often uses pixellation of a person's mouth in conjunction with audio bleeping when presenters or guests let loose with profanities on the show. Very common during the "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" segment, as the celebrity drivers get a bit excited doing the lap around the Top Gear test track.
- And their survival instructor in the Arctic episode, an ex-special forces guy, is described as "a man with a pixelated face".
- And the Ferrari-branded tobacco pipes, in syndication after someone with too much free time complained at the three smoking said pipes in the original broadcast, shortly after smoking in workplaces was made illegal.
- The Daily Show uses pixelation to obscure things that would otherwise upset the censors, such as Jon giving the finger. A Running Gag during the Bush presidency, based on the way that the Vice President's residence was blurred out on Google Maps, was that "Dick Cheney can pixelate things just by touching them".
- When the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame aired its induction ceremony of 1998 on VH-1, Paul Mc Cartney was joined onstage by his daughter Stella, and her shirt was pixelated. It was hiding an F-bomb on the shirt but, since Stella was a fashion designer, there may have been people wondering if it was hiding something else.
- In one episode of Garth Marenghis Dark Place, a giant eyeball raping a hospital patient (seriously) had its phallus pixellated. This is followed by an interview clip of Dean Learner saying he feels it's sad that they had to pixellate it.
- Both pixellation and blurring were part of the game on Headline Chasers.
- Older episodes of Pizza pixelated the advertisements on the eponymous pizza place's cars to hide the store's telephone number. Oh, and they censored the frequent nudity.
- There was a MADtv sketch (don't know what season it was on) where a man (Will Sasso) goes to his doctor (Aries Spears) with a bad case of pixellation which appears whenever he takes off his pants. The doctor tells the man that pixellation is normal and commonly found on genitals, women's breasts, and middle fingers when shown on network television.
Professional Wrestling
- WWE pixellates its previous logos from when it was the World Wrestling Federation when showing archival footage; this is because of a lawsuit from the World Wildlife Fund over the use of the initials.
- The WWF also used pixellation as part of one of their storylines, when Ric Flair showed up with a title belt, claiming to be the "Real World Heavyweight Champion". The belt in question was actually the NWA World Championship, which Flair had held at the time he jumped to the WWF, and which the NWA had refused to return his security deposit on, so he decided to keep the belt instead. After Flair was forced by court order to return the belt, the story continued onwards, with Flair using a heavily-pixellated WWF Tag Team Championship belt in place of the NWA belt (a lampshade was hung on this by WWF president Jack Tunney, who claimed he had ordered the pixellation since the WWF did not recognize Flair's belt as an actual championship, and thus will no longer show it on TV).
Close Professional Wrestling
Video Games
- The Sims, both the original and The Sims 2. The game creators felt the need to pixellate the whole bodies (in the original) or just "obscene parts" (in the sequel) of The Sims. All of this despite the fact that Sims use the toilet through their clothing, and, as anyone who's been able to turn off the censorship pixels knows, a naked Sim is about as naughty as a naked Barbie or Ken doll—they don't even have nipples, much less genitals.
- Saints Row 2 uses huge pixellation to cover up anything that isn't covered by a particular choice of clothing, or when naked for the streaking minigame.
- Crotch-pixellation still occurs when the player character is wearing pants or a skirt, but no underwear. Or So I Heard.
Web Animation
Web Original
- Parodied in a recent Rooster Teeth short, in which everything from tattoos to brand labels are censored in real life, much to the confusion and annoyance of some of the characters.
Webcomics
- Oddly, used apparently straight in several strips from VG Cats, for rude body parts. Doesn't affect crude immature scrawling done by the characters, but any show of breasts or penises (or anything that'd resemble them closely) gets pixelated.
- Occasionally, Bob And George would censor profanity with pixellation, but a black bar was used just as often. Naturally, this was parodied in this strip, in which an entire dialogue box is censored. Note that it usually didn't shy away from that.
- Whenever a character is naked in Order Of The Stick (usually Elan), pixellation is used for covering the person's gentials. Even though s/he does not have any, on the basis of being a stick figure.
Western Animation
- On The Simpsons episode where Ned Flander's wife dies, he's shown in the shower and his naughty bits are pixellated. Even so, it seems that Ned has nothing to be ashamed of...
- Again on a parody of Cops, Principal Skinner demands his face be blurred which it instantly does...despite being clear and present up until that point
- Used again, when a horrified cameraman says "There aren't enough pixels in the world!" after seeing Homer's butt.
- Parodied in the first episode of Drawn Together, where Princess Clara couldn't tell that Foxxy Love was making a rude gesture because it was pixellated.
- Parodied in Futurama. The characters are watching a show equivalent to COPS. The two cops come to arrest a giant centipede alien, his face obscured by "fog". As the cops cuff him, one says "And unblur your face, too!", causing the alien to groan and do just that. In another instance, Bender trips over the power cord of a "Black Bar Generator" which was used to cover the naughty bits of several nude male Blernsball players.
- Also parodied with the couple whose outfits resemble the black censor bars.
- And with the episode where Amy shows off her high definition offensive tattoo, which is "too high res for 21st century TVs," and is completely blurred out. Even on high def TVs.
- Played with on Invader Zim. Dib goes on a paranormal talk show with some footage of an unmasked Zim and GIR. When GIR eventually shows up as a surprise witness, his face is pixellated...even though he makes no other attempt to hide his robotic identity. He moves a lot as he speaks, even occasionally leaving the cover of pixellation.
- He also claims to be a woman named "Stacy" during this appearance.
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