Catmull-Rom spline
An interpolating spline that passes straight through every one of its control points — a favourite for smooth camera paths and animation curves.
Unlike a Bézier curve, which only touches its end points, a Catmull-Rom spline runs through every control point. The tangent at each point is derived automatically from its neighbours, so an animator can drop points and get a smooth curve without fiddling with handles. That makes it a natural fit for in-betweens and camera paths.
Edwin Catmull — later a Pixar co-founder — and Raphael Rom described it in 1974. The price of the convenience is that the curve can overshoot at sharp direction changes, and it needs one extra point at each end to define the tangents.