I run a pipeline that draws 2D fighting-game characters with image and video models, then checks every drawing before it ships. A check that fails means paying to redraw. For a while the checks went to a cloud vision model, which takes about 10–15 seconds per call. So I wrote a NumPy-only "pixel judge" that answers in under a second. Then I found the catch. On side-view takes, the expensive model still gets called almost every time, because the pixel judge can't tell a true profile from a three-quarter view.

This post is the research I did before fixing it. Nothing below is built yet, and I have no new benchmark numbers. It's a plan with sources, and I'd like you to poke holes in it.

The setup

Each fighter starts as a full-body front painting. From that front, the pipeline draws a side view, then 11 motions (idle, walk, run, attacks, block, hit, fall, and so on).…