Lens Flare Censor

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The use of Lens Flares (or perhaps some other stream of light) to hide something from sight. May give the impression that a character's naughty bits are phosphorescent.

See also Censor Steam.

Examples of Lens Flare Censor include:

Anime and Manga

• They Are My Noble Masters: Miyu's bare chest is covered by the bright glow of a light positioned behind her.
• Saki: in the Hot Springs episode, Mahjong Club president Hisa delivers her lines with her back to the morning sun as it tops the trees. Between the lens flare at an oh-so-convenient angle and the sun over her shoulder, her only discernible features are on her face.
• Girls Bravo: When Kirie steps into an elevator of Fukuyama's design, which doubles as a 'scanning' machine, it was presented in the original network debut as a very, very bright light that obscured anything that might be suggestive.
• As seen on the page picture, Strike Witches loves doing this when they don't use Censor Steam. Even on night scenes, beams of light will appear out of nowhere. Thankfully DVD releases remove them.
• The "sunlight beams at night" happen on Asobi Ni Iku Yo! too, which is not shy of using this on general.
• Hidan no Aria uses this to censor... girls in their underwear. Is this show aired at grade schoolers or what?
• Manyu Hikencho uses huge white bars to censor bare breasts in its initial broadcast. However, since it's an action-comedy about huge breasts, this makes many episodes virtually unwatchable until the light- or non-censored versions are released.
• Happens during extremely violent attacks in Blood C. Unlike the above examples, nudity is left untouched, oddly enough.
  • Oddly enough, Saya hacking up monsters into bloody chunks, is left uncensored. But when it's a human, they break out the censor.

Comic Books

• The Young Justice comic featuring The Mighty Endowed. Her "huge tracts of land" are censored out via this method.

Film

• Most Japanese films shown in UK cinemas during the 1970s and 1980s had lens flare censorship, notably the film released as 'Yellow Emmanuelle'. It also had English subtitles at the bottom for the English viewers, and Japanese subtitles at the left side for Japanese readers of (presumably) English dialogue.
• A blatantly out-of-place footlight covers... something that would otherwise hang into view... at the end of The Full Monty.

Live-Action TV

• NCIS uses lens flares to cover the genitals of cadavers, instead of the usual sheet that other forensic shows tend to use.
  • The corpses tend to be anatomically incorrect anyhow, as sometimes they don't superbright the women's chests, and you can see that they (along with about 80% of the male cadavers) have no nipples.
  • In some sixth-season episodes, they've changed methods and gone for a small towel.
  • It's particularly notable that the size of the lens flare changes depending on the state of the cadaver, even within a single episode. A male cadaver's chest will be lit normally, while a female cadaver's chest will initially be hidden by lens flare, only to be lit normally once it's been open for autopsy.
• CSI has employed conveniently placed standing magnifying glasses that create a lens flare/distorted light effect on bodies.
• Deal or No Deal often uses this to hide the contents of cases in previews of upcoming episodes.
• Saturday Night Live used this in their Thrilla Killa Klownz video "Magical Mysteries," when Ryan Phillippe (as an unnamed Thrilla Killa Klown) grabs his crotch as he raps, "And all you scientists can suck our *bleep*."

Music

• Holly Valance's "Kiss Kiss" video. An entire career founded on lens flare hiding potential nudity.
• Used extensively in the music video for Methods of Mayhem's "Get Naked".

Web Comics

• Used in this Sunday@10 pinup ("somewhere between SFW and NSFW", according to the author).