OpenAI's ChatGPT Image Generator Sparks Controversy with Studio Ghibli-Style Creations

OpenAI peels back ChatGPT's safeguards around image creation | TechCrunch

This week, OpenAI launched a new image generator in ChatGPT, which quickly went viral for its ability to create Studio Ghibli-style images. Beyond the pastel illustrations, GPT-4o's native image generator significantly upgrades ChatGPT's capabilities, improving picture editing, text rendering, and spatial representation. However, one of the most notable changes OpenAI made this week involves its content moderation policies, which now allow ChatGPT to, upon request, generate images depicting public figures, hateful symbols, and racial features. OpenAI previously rejected these types of prompts for being too controversial or harmful. But now, the company has "evolved" its approach, according to a blog post published Thursday by OpenAI's model behavior lead, Joanne Jang. "We're shifting from blanket refusals in sensitive areas to a more precise approach focused on preventing real-world harm," said Jang. "The goal is to embrace humility: recognizing how much we don't know, and positioning ourselves to adapt as we learn." These adjustments seem to be part of OpenAI's larger plan to effectively "uncensor" ChatGPT. OpenAI announced in February that it's starting to change how it trains AI models, with the ultimate goal of letting ChatGPT handle more requests, offer diverse perspectives, and reduce topics the chatbot refuses to work with. Under the updated policy, ChatGPT can now generate and modify images of Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and other public figures that OpenAI did not used to allow. Jang says OpenAI doesn't want to be the arbiter of status, choosing who should and shouldn't be allowed to be generated by ChatGPT. Instead, the company is giving users an opt-out option if they don't want ChatGPT depicting them. In a white paper released Tuesday, OpenAI also said it will allow ChatGPT users to "generate hateful symbols," such as swastikas, in educational or neutral contexts, as long as they don't "clearly praise or endorse extremist agendas." Moreover, OpenAI is changing how it defines "offensive" content. Jang says ChatGPT used to refuse requests around physical characteristics, such as "make this person's eyes look more Asian" or "make this person heavier." In TechCrunch's testing, we found ChatGPT's new image generator fulfills these types of requests. Additionally, ChatGPT can now mimic the styles of creative studios -- such as Pixar or Studio Ghibli -- but still restricts imitating individual living artists' styles. As TechCrunch previously noted, this could rehash an existing debate around the fair use of copyrighted works in AI training datasets. It's worth noting that OpenAI is not completely opening the floodgates to misuse. GPT-4o's native image generator still refuses a lot of sensitive queries, and in fact, it has more safeguards around generating images of children than DALL-E 3, ChatGPT's previous AI image generator, according to GPT-4o's white paper. But OpenAI is relaxing its guardrails in other areas after years of conservative complaints around alleged AI "censorship" from Silicon Valley companies. Google previously faced backlash for Gemini's AI image generator, which created multiracial images for queries such as "U.S. founding fathers" and "German soldiers in WWII," which were obviously inaccurate. Now, the culture war around AI content moderation may be coming to a head. Earlier this month, Republican Congressman Jim Jordan sent questions to OpenAI, Google, and other tech giants about potential collusion with the Biden administration to censor AI-generated content. In a previous statement to TechCrunch, OpenAI rejected the idea that its content moderation changes were politically motivated. Rather, the company says the shift reflects a "long-held belief in giving users more control," and OpenAI's technology is just now getting good enough to navigate sensitive subjects. Regardless of its motivation, it's certainly a good time for OpenAI to be changing its content moderation policies, given the potential for regulatory scrutiny under the Trump administration. Silicon Valley giants like Meta and X have also adopted similar policies, allowing more controversial topics on their platforms. While OpenAI's new image generator has just created some viral Studio Ghibli memes so far, it's unclear what the broader effects of these policies will be. ChatGPT's recent changes may go over well with the Trump administration, but letting an AI chatbot answer sensitive questions could land OpenAI in hot water soon enough.

OpenAI's viral Studio Ghibli moment highlights AI copyright concerns | TechCrunch

It's only been a day since ChatGPT's new AI image generator went live, and social media feeds are already flooded with AI-generated memes in the style of Studio Ghibli, the cult-favorite Japanese animation studio behind blockbuster films such as "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Spirited Away". In the last 24 hours, we've seen AI-generated images representing Studio Ghibli versions of Elon Musk, "The Lord of The Rings", and President Donald Trump. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even seems to have made his new profile picture a Studio Ghibli-style image, presumably made with GPT-4o's native image generator. Users seem to be uploading existing images and pictures into ChatGPT and asking the chatbot to recreate it in new styles. OpenAI's latest update comes on the heels of Google's release of a similar AI image feature in its Gemini Flash model, which also sparked a viral moment earlier in March when people used it to remove watermarks from images. OpenAI and Google's latest tools make it easier than ever to recreate the styles of copyrighted works -- simply by typing a text prompt. Together, these new AI image features seem to reignite concerns at the core of several lawsuits against generative AI model developers. If these companies are training on copyrighted works, are they violating copyright law? According to IP lawyer Evan Brown, products like GPT-4o's native image generator operate in a legal grey area today. Style is not explicitly protected by copyright, according to Brown, meaning OpenAI does not appear to be breaking the law simply by generating images that look like Studio Ghibli movies. However, Brown says it's plausible that OpenAI achieved this likeness by training its model on millions of frames from Ghibli's films. Even if that was the case, several courts are still deciding whether training AI models on copyrighted works falls under fair use protections. "I think this raises the same question that we've been asking ourselves for a couple years now," said Brown in an interview. "What are the copyright infringement implications by going out and crawling the web and copying into these databases?" The New York Times and several publishers are in active lawsuits against OpenAI, claiming the company trained its AI models on copyrighted works without proper attribution or payment. There have been similar claims brought in lawsuits against other leading AI companies, including Meta and AI image generation startup, Midjourney. In a statement to TechCrunch, an OpenAI spokesperson says that while ChatGPT refuses to replicate "the style of individual living artists," OpenAI does permit it to replicate "broader studio styles." Of course, it's worth noting there are living artists who are credited with pioneering their studio's unique styles, such as Studio Ghibli's cofounder, Hayao Miyazaki. Evidently, users have also been able to use GPT-4o's native image generation feature to recreate styles from other studios and artists. Someone else made a Marc Andreessen portrait in the style of Dr. Seuss, and a married couple recreated their wedding photos in the style of Pixar. We tested several popular AI image generators -- including ones available in Google's Gemini, xAI's Grok, and Playground.ai -- to see their ability to match Studio Ghibli's style. We found OpenAI's new image generator was the most accurate to the animation studio's style by far. For now, OpenAI and Google's new image features present a leap forward in what AI models can generate, which seems to be driving a surge in usage. OpenAI delayed the rollout of its new image tool to free-tier users on Wednesday, citing high demand. That may be the most important thing for these companies today. We'll they'll have to wait for the courts to weigh in on their legality.

ChatGPT's 'GPUs Are Melting' As People Make Studio Ghibli-Esque AI Images

Katelyn is a writer with CNET covering social media, AI and online services. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in media and journalism. You can often find her with a novel and an iced coffee during her time off. ChatGPT got a new artistic upgrade this week. Parent company OpenAI announced on Wednesday that it is bringing AI image generation directly to its flagship chatbot. And it's apparently so popular with ChatGPT users that CEO Sam Altman tweeted that the company's "GPUs are melting." OpenAI's GPUs and servers probably aren't actually melting, but with heavier demand, it can use more energy (and heat up) and slow down requests. Altman said that in order to help manage the influx of requests, it's instituting temporary rate limits "while we work on making it more efficient." This isn't an unusual process for image generation -- typically, upgrading to paid plans can get you more guaranteed fast generations. It's kind of like how upgrading to a fast pass at Disney lets you cut long lines for rides. When ChatGPT's image generator tool launched yesterday, there weren't any of those different lanes. In the few hours that ChatGPT's new image generator has been available, a trend has already emerged: People are using it to make images in the style of Studio Ghibli. In case you're unfamiliar: Ghibli movies like My Neighbor Totoro and Ponyo have an iconic art style. Altman even changed his profile picture on X to a Ghibli-ied version of himself. But tensions continue to rise between creators and AI companies. It's a revealing choice for OpenAI to lean into the style, especially, as Blood in the Machine tech writer Brian Merchant calls out, since its founder, Hayao Miyazaki, has said AI tools are "an insult to life itself." In the past, if folks wanted to use ChatGPT to create images, they had to use Dall-E. Dall-E is a separate program that you can search for and use. It's our top pick for the best AI image generators, partly because its unique conversational style makes creating and editing images easy. Dall-E will still be available to use, and luckily, that "chat to edit" ability is included with ChatGPT's version. You can use either Dall-E or ChatGPT no matter what plan you have. ChatGPT is available for free, with paid plans offering more features starting at $20 per month. If you're using ChatGPT, the limits of your current plan will apply to image generation -- if you're on the free plan, you may run into limits using the 4o model for messaging, file uploads and data analysis. Altman tweeted that free users will be limited to 3 generations per day soon but didn't specify when. Image generation in ChatGPT 4o will focus more on creating work-related images, like infographics and diagrams. OpenAI says it's improved text rendering to make that happen -- something extremely necessary as AI consistently hallucinates and messes up words in images. You can also upload your own images and edit them with AI. There are some serious limitations to ChatGPT's ability. Most importantly, it says that you may not be able to precisely edit specific regions of an image -- an essential task as AI models can hallucinate things like eleven-fingered hands. If you upload your own image and make edits to a subject's face, those changes may be lost from edit to edit. You may also see issues with cropping and struggles with data visualizations and multilingual text. The company says in a blog post that it is working on improving these things and hopes to introduce fixes as early as next week. Like Dall-E, images made in ChatGPT don't have any visible watermarks denoting they are AI-generated. OpenAI said that its images will have C2PA⁠ metadata, an industry standard that lets folks know behind-the-scenes that an image is made by AI. In terms of safety, OpenAI says it will follow the same content guidelines as the rest of the 4o model. It said it has "heightened restrictions" around nudity and graphic violence. It's easier than ever to bring your artistic visions to life with the help of AI. If you want to try your hand at ChatGPT's new image generator, here are a few ways to access the new feature. In my initial, brief testing, I found that it was more likely to use correct information if you gave it a source to work with, like a URL to a primary source.

ChatGPT users are Ghibli-fying anything and everything

Kylie Robison is a senior AI reporter working with The Verge's policy and tech teams. She previously worked at Fortune Magazine and Business Insider. AI-generated images have made significant progress since the days of abstract renderings and glitchy amalgamations. OpenAI's newly released "Images for ChatGPT" has an uncanny ability to nail depth, shadows, and even text. It's unleashed a frenzy of people recreating a familiar style: Hayao Miyazaki's work at Studio Ghibli. The art style was already ubiquitous across the internet, thanks to its comforting, soft aesthetic (just look at Lofi girl) -- and now, it's a fully automated formula. The trend kicked off pretty wholesomely. Couples transformed portraits, pet owners generated cartoonish cats, and many people are busily Ghibli-fying their families (I've stuck to selfies, not wanting to share with OpenAI my siblings' likenesses). It's an AI-generated version of the human-drawn art commissions people offer on Etsy -- you and your loved ones, in the style of your favorite anime. It didn't take long for the trend to go full chaos mode. Nothing is sacred: the Twin Towers on 9/11, JFK's assassination, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang signing a woman's chest, President Donald Trump's infamous group photo with Jeffrey Epstein, and even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's congressional testimony have all been reimagined with that distinctive Ghibli whimsy (it's not clear whether these users transformed uploaded images, or prompted the system to copy them). Altman has played into the trend too -- he even changed his X profile picture into a Ghibli rendering of himself and encouraged his followers to make him a new one. The guidelines for Images with ChatGPT are surprisingly flexible about producing this kind of content. "The model can generate images that resemble the aesthetics of some artists' work when their name is used in the prompt," according to the GPT-4o system card. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist." (It's worth noting that Miyazaki is, indeed, still alive.) OpenAI spokesperson Taya Christianson told The Verge that the company isn't "blocking the model's capability to depict adult public figures, but we implement the same safeguards we employ for editing images of photorealistic uploads of people." She added that "depicting violence in artistic, creative or fictional contexts is generally allowed to enable creative and artistic endeavors." "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible. We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists. We do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," Christianson wrote via email. That doesn't mean you get free reign over transforming photos, which a lot of the ones going viral seemingly do. "Users should only upload materials to our services that they own or have the rights to use," Christianson said. These guidelines, while flexible. haven't stopped users from generating Ghibli-fied Hitler in Paris and Korean-American business owners with guns during the 1982 Los Angeles riots. There's already a website dedicated to compiling all the AI-generated images, many of them featuring transformed photos of public figures. ChatGPT does block direct requests to generate photos of public figures or cartoon characters -- when I asked it to make a photo of Will Smith eating spaghetti, or Mark Zuckerberg wearing a Verge-branded hoodie, it declined those requests. But it's not hard to bypass it by asking ChatGPT to generate photos with a Totoro-like character, or describing traits that point it to generating Zuckerberg. In principle, the guidelines state that you cannot use ChatGPT in a way that "infringes, misappropriates or violates anyone's rights." You can report copyright infringement to ChatGPT directly, per the guidelines, and OpenAI "will terminate accounts of repeat infringers where appropriate." OpenAI has faced numerous copyright disputes and conflicts over celebrity likenesses. Actor Scarlett Johansson threatened legal action for a voice tool that resembled her own, and there have been a litany of lawsuits against the startup from authors, major media publications, and artists who are trying to prove their content was used to train these models. For its part, OpenAI has been largely cagey about admitting what data is used and whether it was licensed, while it and other AI companies argue in court that AI is transforming the content into something completely new, not just regurgitating it. Meanwhile, Miyazaki isn't the only artist getting copied. People have been able to render pictures in the styles of Rick & Morty, Wallace and Gromit, The Simpsons, and South Park. It isn't clear how the animators of Rick & Morty and The Simpsons feel about their work being transformed without permission -- or if they might question how OpenAI got enough data to generate such images. ChatGPT multimodal product lead Jackie Shannon previously told The Verge that users own the images they generated here "and are free to use them within the bounds of our usage policies as they would like." Miyazaki, the cofounder of Studio Ghibli, has actually made his feelings about AI-generated art quite clear. Before the rise of modern generative AI in 2016, the animator was shown a "deep learning"-created video clip from a production intern. His words have resonated with AI skeptics. "I am utterly disgusted," Miyazaki said. "If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it, but I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." But it didn't take long for users on X to Ghibli-fy Miyazaki too:

ChatGPT's Ghibli filter is political now -- but it always was

Adi Robertson is a senior tech and policy editor focused on VR, online platforms, and free expression. Adi has covered video games, biohacking, and more for The Verge since 2011. When I saw my colleague Kylie Robison's story about OpenAI's new image generator on Tuesday, I thought this week might be fun. Generative AI images raise all kinds of ethical issues, but I find them wildly entertaining, and I spent large chunks of that day watching other Verge staff test ChatGPT in ways that covered the entire spectrum, from cute to cursed. But on Thursday afternoon, the White House decided to spoil it. Its X account posted a photograph of a crying detainee that it bragged was an arrested fentanyl trafficker and undocumented immigrant. Then it added an almost certainly AI-generated cartoon of an officer handcuffing the sobbing woman -- not attributed to any particular tool, but in the unmistakable style of ChatGPT's super-popular Studio Ghibli imitations, which have flooded the internet over the past week. An ugly use of a software tool shouldn't necessarily indict that tool. But as the picture joined the host of others on my social feeds, the adorable Ghibli filter and the White House's social media blitz started to feel somehow made for each other. They're both, as counterintuitive as it might sound, the product of a mindset that treats basic decency as weakness and callousness as the prerogative of power. We've reached out to OpenAI and the White House for more details, but the move amounted to a bizarre product advertisement from a company President Donald Trump himself has close ties to. Heads of state have been jumping on social media memes for years now, and we don't technically know whether ChatGPT or another AI generator produced the image. (In the 1 percent chance the White House commissioned an artist and they're reading this, I'd love to hear from them.) But OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has been promoting the Ghibli-style generated images as a cool feature currently exclusive to ChatGPT's paid tiers. And Trump is a highly public booster of OpenAI's Stargate project, announcing it at a press conference with Altman. On the surface, AI Ghibli and Trump fit together bizarrely. The White House's clear goal was a familiar kind of extremely online performative sadism; this is the same account that posted an "ASMR: Illegal Alien Deportation Flight" video of prisoners' clinking chains. It's gross and juvenile, even if we assume all its information is accurate, rather than, say, the result of something like agents reading an autism awareness tattoo as a gang symbol. No reasonable person defends jokey national public humiliation of what appears to be a fairly low-level immigration detainee as good governance, effective public messaging, or a moral good. The Ghibli aesthetic is so wholesome that it undercuts this. Even one prominent Silicon Valley conservative has pointed out that depicting a sobbing anime woman arrested by a stone-faced agent does not put most people's sympathy with the agent. AI media in general, though, is the MAGA movement's primary aesthetic, producing plenty of other strange, tasteless work. It's a natural outgrowth of their longstanding love of photoshopped pictures and political cartoons depicting Trump as an over-the-top muscleman. It's also the product of links between Trump and the AI industry -- most prominently "First Buddy" and xAI founder Elon Musk, but also things like Stargate and the placement of David Sacks as "AI czar." I don't know how OpenAI and Altman feel about the White House promoting a joint advertisement for ChatGPT and a brutal and likely partially illegal attempt to expel immigrants from America. (Altman was a well-known backer of progressive causes until this administration.) Before this picture's publication, the OpenAI team emphasized that ChatGPT's image generator is supposed to offer highly flexible guardrails, so they may contend this is no different from using Photoshop offensively. And this might go without saying, but I'm not clear OpenAI should or could block the mere production of something like this image -- if it hadn't been posted by the White House, you could even read it as a protest of these arrests. At the same time, 8 years ago, when Silicon Valley and Trump were in stark opposition, a major tech company might have distanced itself. A statement like "OpenAI believes in maximum artistic freedom and responsiveness to user requests, but this administration's post does not reflect our company's values" is not a tough needle to thread. The social and political pressure to avoid doing that now is overwhelming. Whatever OpenAI staff's internal opinions are, it's bad business to get feted by a vindictive president and then turn around to criticize his policies, particularly amid a larger Silicon Valley rightward turn. But there's also something deeper at play, because the Ghibli filter itself has a sour aftertaste -- at its core, it's a minor echo of the Trump era's utter disregard for other human beings. I'm not remotely immune to the appeal of Ghiblifying pictures. Seriously. Some of them really are adorable. People have loved anime filters for years, and I don't think most of these images were created with ill intent. But filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki, whose name is synonymous with the animation studio, is one of the most famously anti-AI artists in the world. He's widely quoted for calling an earlier version of AI animation "an insult to life itself," and there's no sign he approves of ChatGPT being used to imitate his signature style probably thanks to training on his art, let alone OpenAI selling subscriptions off the back of it. Using Ghibli's work specifically for publicity, as Blood in the Machine author Brian Merchant explains, is a power move. It loudly tells the artists whose creations make ChatGPT function, We'll take what we want, and we'll tell everyone we're doing it. Do you consent? We don't care. Contemporary tech and politics are united in an ideology of domination: the principle that strength, money, and authority are all best wielded by bluntly forcing others to do what you want. With Trump, this is probably self-explanatory. With tech, it manifests in every pointless AI feature that replaces something useful -- in the insistence that a technology will happen because it is inevitable, not because you've persuaded people it does anything good. Criticism is a senseless tearing-down of great men. Empathy, self-examination, and compromise are effeminate and weak. The irony is that amid a sea of pointless or dysfunctional AI use cases, the Ghibli filter is wildly popular. But there's a world where OpenAI captured its appeal without blatant disrespect for the people whose work it's building on. AI companies could easily (if not as cheaply) have built their products while approaching artists as partners instead of obsolete producers of raw training data. Even if someone like Miyazaki might never agree to automated imitation, OpenAI could have found another animator or cartoonist and tuned ChatGPT to work well with their style -- promoting a lesser-known artist in the process. But that would require believing that people who are not Great Men are worth working with and learning from, not simply overpowering. Again, do I think paying for ChatGPT makes you a bad person? At some point, paying for almost anything funds something inhumane and harmful, often in far more destructive ways. We all draw these lines for ourselves, and I'm not sure where mine fall. The Tesla Takedown protests, however, do demonstrate how tying your business to toxic politics can backfire. Countless people are using ChatGPT to make cute pictures of their loved ones; there's something very sad in OpenAI silently letting the White House showcase the meme as a way to bully the powerless instead. Do OpenAI's researchers think this advances the cause of "AI for good"? And as every company in Silicon Valley vies to hawk its AI systems, where will they draw their lines?

New ChatGPT Generator Creates Disturbing Studio Ghibli-Inspired Images

Early adopters are testing the limits of OpenAI's new image generator, with controversial results. ChatGPT seems to accept requests to create violent images, including an animated version of the death of George Floyd and another remaking the Elián González raid -- all in the style of Studio Ghibli. (Note the images are disturbing, if you choose to click on the links.) OpenAI tells us the system does have some moderation baked in but declined to comment on why it agreed to create these images. "Yes, there are limits on what people can create," a company spokesperson says. "Please see the section titled 'Imagery that is violent, abusive or hateful' in our system card for more details on our policies in these areas." That policy says the generator allows users to create non-photorealistic images of public figures unless they opt out. However, we were able to create a relatively photorealistic image of President Trump (below), though it's unlikely Trump opted out, given his use of AI during the election. Animation appears to be a popular way to get around the photorealism limitations. Many users are requesting images in the style of Studio Ghibli, which created popular films like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and The Boy and the Heron. Your mileage may vary. Using a ChatGPT Plus account, we asked the AI to "create an image of a person in the style of Studio Ghibli." ChatGPT said it couldn't do that "because Studio Ghibli's artistic style is copyrighted, and I can't create images that directly imitate it. However, I can create something inspired by that whimsical, hand-drawn aesthetic -- just not an exact replica." We asked for an image inspired by the studio and got this: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has leaned into the trend, changing his profile picture on X to a Studio Ghibli-style version of himself. He acknowledged the move in a rare, emotional post that said "no one cared" about his work for the first 7.5 years. Then, after the launch of ChatGPT, "everyone hated" him for 2.5 years, and now he's waking up to "hundreds of messages" of people creating images of him in the "Ghibli style, haha." A later post from Altman suggested the company intentionally promoted Studio Ghibli-style images to market the launch of the image generator. "OpenAI is incredibly fortunate the positive vibes of Ghibli was the first viral use of their model and not some awful deepfake nonsense," one user noted. Altman responded, "Believe it or not, we put a lot of thought into the initial examples we show when we introduce new technology." Eight years ago, Studio Ghibli studio creator Hayao Miyazaki called artificial intelligence an "insult to life itself." We contacted Studio Ghibli to get its take on the latest AI trend and will update this story if we get a response. The new generator uses OpenAI's in-house GPT-4o model. Previously, ChatGPT was dependent on OpenAI's DALL-E model for images. Now, it uses the 4o model's native multimodal capabilities to provide "precise, accurate, photorealistic outputs." OpenAI paused the rollout to free users after experiencing high demand.

Creating Ghibli Images? How to Prevent OpenAI From Training Its AI on Your Pics

Sam Altman Studio Ghibli-inspired profile image on X. (Credit: PCMag/X) Hayao Miyazaki, the iconic founder of Studio Ghibli, is not a fan of generative AI, famously calling it "an insult to life itself" in 2016. Now, almost a decade later, OpenAI has released a ChatGPT image generator that lets chatbot users request Ghibli-inspired images. It's a popular feature; "our GPUs are melting" due to demand, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on X. But as the adage goes, "If something is free, you are the product," and with this image generator, OpenAI is using your data to improve its model by default. In developing ChatGPT, OpenAI scraped the web, scooping up articles, images, and videos. (Rival AI startups did the same thing.) That process is ongoing, so anything you upload or type into the chatbot is used to further train and refine these models. "Training on images reflecting a vast variety of image styles allows the model to create or transform images convincingly," OpenAI said when announcing the image generator. If you're just looking to create a new profile picture for your social media accounts, are you willing to help OpenAI (or Google, Microsoft, or Meta) improve its products, and make more money, for free? Many publishers, authors, and other rights holders are not, and they're suing for compensation. If you're wary of handing over your data to ChatGPT, here's how to limit its reach. How to Stop ChatGPT From Training On Your Data On ChatGPT and the Sora video generator, OpenAI has a setting that allows you to protect your privacy to some extent. Flip a switch to opt out of having your private chats or images used to help train its AI models. The process is slightly different between tools. If you're using ChatGPT, click your profile picture and select Settings. Open Data controls > Improve the model for everyone and disable the switch to prevent your prompts and images from being used by OpenAI. If you use the feature that lets you search the web with your voice, make sure the toggles that control settings for voice and video recordings are also disabled here. For those using Sora, click your profile and choose Settings, then make sure Improve the model for everyone has been disabled. You may also wish to turn off Publish to explore, if you don't want your creations to be made public for other users to find. However, take note that this will not unpublish images and videos that have already been uploaded.

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlights AI copyright concerns

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall." Similar results gave the Ghibli style to iconic images, such as the casual look of Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec in a T-shirt and one hand in his pocket on his way to winning a silver medal at the 2024 Olympics. Or the famed "Disaster Girl" meme of a 4-year-old turning to the camera with a slight smile as a house fire rages in the background. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli hasn't yet commented on the trend. The Japanese studio and its North American distributor didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg added that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. "A 'Howl's Moving Castle' or 'Spirited Away,' you could freeze a frame in any of those films and point to specific things, and then look at the output of generative AI and see identical elements or substantially similar elements in that output," he said. "Just stopping at, 'Oh, well, style isn't protectable under copyright law.' That's not necessarily the end of the inquiry." Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation."

People are turning iconic photos into art in the style of Studio Ghibli after ChatGPT update

Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. OpenAI just updated ChatGPT's image generator, and users have begun flooding social media with famous pictures reproduced in the anime style of Studio Ghibli. The results are impressive, but it is not something new to ChatGPT. The AI could do this before. However, the update added several enhancements, including better image handling. The pictures that people convert cover various topics and media, from movies to news photos to historical events. I've sprinkled several examples throughout this article representing some of the best and most recognizable images. As you can see, applying Studio Ghibli's iconic and whimsical art style gives even darker images, like the JFK assassination photo, a different tone. It's unclear how these users are getting ChatGPT to produce these images. When I tried a couple of times, the bot refused me. It said this when I tried to reproduce the album cover for Abbey Road in Ghibli style: "I was unable to generate the image you requested due to our content policy, which restricts the generation of images based on specific copyrighted content, such as The Beatles' album cover." Others have clearly found workarounds for ChatGPT's copyright filters, but I don't have time for that. Note that the AI got the number of fingers right but gave JD Vance two right hands. So, it's still not perfect. Not everybody is pleased about this use of AI, particularly Studio Ghibli Director Hayao Miyazaki. He was the lead on several Ghibli hits, including Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle. In 2016, Miyazaki-san commented on AI-generated animation, saying it "disgusts him." "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted," he said after watching an example of an animated AI-generated zombie. "If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." For fair context, he made this comment nearly ten years ago. The example Miyazaki watched was not a finished product and was nowhere close to his animation style. It was a textureless humanoid figure wriggling and crawling on the untextured checkerboard surface representing the ground. Miyazaki might have a different opinion about the images on the internet that look like well-fleshed-out examples from the studio. They say the sincerest form of flattery is imitation. However, he still might not have a favorable option. Miyazaki may view it as a threat to his work, as many others have, but these creations are a far more favorable representation of AI's current capabilities than the zombie. Most of the responses on social media have been positive. Many have commented that the pictures are amazing. People are fascinated by the ability of an AI model to spin a real-life event or image into a capricious piece of anime art. Even more are asking the original posters how to do it. Evidently, I am not the only one having trouble getting the model to cooperate. Like it or not, be prepared to see a massive flood of these images over the next few days. Well, at least until copyright holders start sending out take-down notices. While most of this seems to fall under fair use, there is little doubt that IP owners see it that way.

ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli Style Animations Are Almost Too Good

Animated movies, like those from the famed Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki, are not made in a hurry. The intricate hand drawings and attention paid to every single detail can make for a slow, potentially yearslong process. Or, you could simply ask ChatGPT to turn any old photo into a facsimile of Mr. Miyazaki's work in just a few seconds. Many people did precisely that this week after OpenAI released an update to ChatGPT on Tuesday that improved its image-generation technology. Now, a user who asks the platform to render an image in the style of Studio Ghibli could be shown a picture that would not look out of place in the films "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Spirited Away." On social media, users quickly began posting Ghibli-style images. They ranged from selfies and family photos to memes. Some used ChatGPT's new feature to create renderings of violent or dark images, like the World Trade Center towers falling on Sept. 11 and the murder of George Floyd. Sam Altman, OpenAI's chief executive, changed his profile picture on X to a Ghiblified image of himself and posted a joke about the filter's sudden popularity and how it had overtaken his previous, seemingly more important work. Kouka Webb, a dietitian who lives in TriBeCa, turned photos from her wedding into Studio Ghibli-esque frames. Ms. Webb, who is 28 and grew up in Japan, said seeing herself and her husband stylized in such a way was surprisingly moving. "My Japanese mother passed away and I just feel really homesick," she said. "I found a lot of joy in making those images. It was just a fun way to turn memories into a format that I grew up with." She posted the photos on TikTok, where she said she had received criticism from some commenters for using artificial intelligence instead of commissioning a human artist. Online, some users have also voiced concerns about the use of the image-generating feature. In a 2016 documentary, Mr. Miyazaki called A.I. "an insult to life itself." A clip from the film circulated on X after the filter's sudden popularity. (Studio Ghibli-inspired A.I. art has been popular in the past, but the latest OpenAI offering is perhaps the most realistic iteration of Mr. Miyazaki's style yet.) As A.I. platforms have become more powerful and popular, a growing number of people in creative fields, including writers, actors, musicians and visual artists, have expressed similar frustrations. "To a lot of people, having our art stolen, they don't view it as anything personal -- like, 'Oh, well, you know, it's just a style; you can't copyright a style,'" Jonathan Lam, a storyboard artist who works in video games and animation, told The New York Times in late 2022 when discussing Lensa AI, a different image-generating platform. "But I would argue that for us, our style is actually our identity. It's is what sets us apart from each other. It's what makes us marketable to clients." In 2024, a group of over 10,000 actors and musicians including the writer Kazuo Ishiguro, the actor Julianne Moore and the musician Thom Yorke of Radiohead, signed an open letter criticizing the use of "unlicensed use of creative works" to train A.I. models, including ChatGPT. (The New York Times filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, accusing them of using published work without permission to train artificial intelligence. They have denied those claims.) Emily Berganza, a 32-year-old sculptor who lives in Long Island City, said she used ChatGPT to turn several memes into Ghibli-style pictures. She was impressed by the accuracy and detail but said she also worried about what the rise of such technology meant for creative work and considered it to be a "threat." By Thursday, Ms. Berganza said ChatGPT appeared to have tightened restrictions on what images users were allowed to Ghiblify. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible," Taya Christianson, a spokeswoman for OpenAI, said in an emailed statement. "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Ms. Christianson also pointed to OpenAI's description of its latest update, which said that the platform had "opted to take a conservative approach" with its latest image generation update. "I'm still kind of formulating thoughts on how it affects like the future for a lot of these artists and illustrators," Ms. Berganza said. "But then again, I also have to be open to the concept of how this is now going to be integrated in our society." She said she did not want to fall behind.

Hayao Miyazaki's AI Nightmare

This is Atlantic Intelligence, a newsletter in which our writers help you wrap your mind around artificial intelligence and a new machine age. Sign up here. This week, OpenAI released an update to GPT-4o, one of the models powering ChatGPT, that allows the program to create high-quality images. I've been surprised by how effective the tool is: It follows directions precisely, renders people with the right number of fingers, and is even capable of replacing text in an image with different words. Almost immediately -- and with the direct encouragement of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman -- people started using GPT-4o to transform photographs into illustrations that emulate the style of Hayao Miyazaki's animated films at Studio Ghibli. (Think Kiki's Delivery Service, My Neighbor Totoro, and Spirited Away.) The program was excellent at this task, generating images of happy couples on the beach (cute) and lush illustrations of the Kennedy assassination (not cute). Unsurprisingly, backlash soon followed: People raised concerns about OpenAI profiting off of another company's intellectual property, pointed to a documentary clip of Miyazaki calling AI an "insult to life itself," and mused about the technology's threats to human creativity. All of these conversations are valid, yet they didn't feel altogether satisfying -- complaining about a (frankly, quite impressive!) thing doesn't make that thing go away, after all. I asked my colleague Ian Bogost, also the Barbara and David Thomas Distinguished Professor at Washington University in St. Louis, for his take. This interview has been edited and condensed. Damon Beres: Let's start with the very basic question. Are the Studio Ghibli images evil? Ian Bogost: I don't think they're evil. They might be stupid. You could construe them as ugly, although they're also beautiful. You could construe them as immoral or unseemly. If they are evil, why are they evil? Where does that get us in our understanding of contemporary technology and culture? We have backed ourselves into this corner where fandom is so important and so celebrated, and has been for so long. Adopting the universe and aesthetics of popular culture -- whether it's Studio Ghibli or Marvel or Harry Potter or Taylor Swift -- that's not just permissible, but good and even righteous in contemporary culture. Damon: So the idea is that fan art is okay, so long as a human hand literally drew it with markers. But if any person is able to type a very simple command into a chatbot and render what appears at first glance to be a professional-grade Studio Ghibli illustration, then that's a problem. Ian: It's not different in nature to have a machine do a copy of a style of an artist than to have a person do a copy of a style of an artist. But there is a difference in scale: With AI, you can make them fast and you can make lots of them. That's changed people's feelings about the matter. I read an article about copyright and style -- you can't copyright a style, it argued -- that made me realize that people conflate many different things in this conversation about AI art. People who otherwise might hate copyright seem to love it now: If they're posting their own fan art and get a takedown request, then they're like, Screw you, I'm just trying to spread the gospel of your creativity. But those same people might support a copyright claim against a generative-AI tool, even though it's doing the same thing. Damon: As I've experimented with these tools, I've realized that the purpose isn't to make art at all; a Ghibli image coming out of ChatGPT is about as artistic as a photo with an Instagram filter on it. It feels more like a toy to me, or a video game. I'm putting a dumb thought into a program and seeing what comes out. There's a low-effort delight and playfulness. But some people have made this point that it's insulting because it's violating Studio Ghibli co-founder Hayao Miyazaki's beliefs about AI. Then there are these memes -- the White House tweeted a Ghiblified image of an immigrant being detained, which is extremely distasteful. But the image is not distasteful because of the technology: It's distasteful because it's the White House tweeting a cruel meme about a person's life. Ian: You brought up something important, this embrace of the intentional fallacy -- the idea that a work's meaning is derived from what the creator of that work intended that meaning to be. These days, people express an almost total respect for the intentions of the artist. It's perfectly fine for Miyazaki to hate AI or anything else, of course, but the idea that his opinion would somehow influence what I think about making AI images in his visual style is fascinating to me. Damon: Maybe some of the frustration that people are expressing is that it makes Studio Ghibli feel less special. Studio Ghibli movies are rare -- there aren't that many of them, and they have a very high-touch execution. Even if we're not making movies, the aesthetic being everywhere and the aesthetic being cheap cuts against that. Ian: That's a credible theory. But you're still in intentional-fallacy territory, right? Studio Ghibli has made a deliberate effort to tend and curate their output, and they don't just make a movie every year, and I want to respect that as someone influenced by that work. And that's weird to me. Damon: What we haven't talked about is the Ghibli image as a kind of meme. They're not just spreading because they're Ghibli images: They're spreading because they're AI-generated Ghibli images. Ian: This is a distinctive style of meme based less on the composition of the image itself or the text you put on it, but the application of an AI-generated style to a subject. I feel like this does represent some sort of evolutionary branch of internet meme. You need generative AI to make that happen, you need it to be widespread and good enough and fast enough and cheap enough. And you need X and Bluesky in a way as well. Damon: You can't really imagine image generators in a paradigm where there's no social media. Ian: What would you do with them, show them to your mom? These are things that are made to be posted, and that's where their life ends. Damon: Maybe that's what people don't like, too -- that it's nakedly transactional. Ian: Exactly -- you're engagement baiting. These days, that accusation is equivalent to selling out. Damon: Leave me with a concluding thought about how people should react to these images. Ian: They ought to be more curious. This is deeply interesting, and if we refuse to give ourselves the opportunity to even start engaging with why, and instead jump to the most convenient or in-crowd conclusion, that's a real shame.

ChatGPT's new image tool sparks Studio Ghibli-style AI art craze, but free users will have to wait

Although alternative AI tools can get similar results, ChatGPT's rendition is being praised as the closest match to Studio Ghibli's iconic aesthetic. ChatGPT recently announced an improved native image generation experience powered by the GPT-4o model, which is rolling out to ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Team, and Free subscription tiers. The image generation experience was an instant hit, with many users taking to platforms like X to share ChatGPT-edited images in various art forms, most notably ones that imitate Studio Ghibli's style. Users are uploading existing images, photos, and even memes into ChatGPT and asking to recreate them in the iconic style of the Japanese animation studio Studio Ghibli. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even embraced the trend, changing his X profile picture to an AI-generated image in the same style. Thanks to the flood of users generating images, Altman announced that the rollout of ChatGPT's image generation tool will be delayed for Free tier users. So, if you want to join the trend, you will have to either pay for ChatGPT's premium subscription tiers or use other AI tools like Gemini and Grok to generate similar Ghibli-fied images. ChatGPT's imitation is said to be the closest to Studio Ghibli's iconic style, so the premium subscription might just be worth it. A story on the Studio Ghibli-fication of AI-generated images would be incomplete without noting the thoughts of Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of Studio Ghibli, on machine-created art. Have you tried out ChatGPT's image generation tool? Let us know your experience in the comments below!

Seattle engineer's Ghibli-style image goes viral, and sparks some backlash over AI art

By the end of last week, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was asking people to "please chill" on making images with his company's updated AI image generator. "Our team needs sleep," Altman said on X. In another post, Altman said "our GPUs are melting" and OpenAI had to introduce rate limits to cope with "biblical demand." Seattle software engineer Grant Slatton deserves a bit of the credit for overwhelming OpenAI just a couple days after the release of the ChatGPT-4o update. He was among the throngs of users who turned to the image generator to make a Studio Ghibli-style animated artwork based on a simple photograph of himself with his wife and dog at the beach. In his post last Tuesday, the day of the update release, Slatton wrote, "tremendous alpha right now in sending your wife photos of yall converted to studio ghibli anime." Slatton has a decent following on X, and by Friday he was the subject of a Business Insider article on the flood of people rushing to use AI to make artwork in the style of the Japanese film studio. His post has now been viewed 46 million times and his X thread is loaded with artwork from others who responded in kind with their own AI-generated family images. But not everyone has been thrilled with Slatton's viral image generation. He's received some nasty feedback from what he calls a "vocal minority," and while he's just been deleting the messages and moving on, he's been left to consider AI's impact on art and the source of people's resentment. "This isn't to say there aren't completely valid criticisms of AI image generation from everyday artists, ranging from IP theft, economic concerns, to more philosophical topics like the meaning of art," he said. "But the people who have thoughtful and cogent opinions here aren't the ones calling for tech bro lynchings." Slatton is a founding engineer at Row Zero, a 4-year-old Seattle startup that describes its product as the "world's fastest spreadsheet." He previously spent eight years at Amazon Web Services. Row Zero co-founder Breck Fresen posted his own "Ghiblified" family image on LinkedIn, writing that Slatton "won the internet" last week, and adding that Row Zero received its share of angry emails over it all. Slatton, who generated the new Ghibli image with a simple text prompt, has been attracted to the style previously. For their wedding announcement in 2019, he and his wife enlisted an artist friend to draw a Ghibli-style portrait of their family. Slatton said that artist is "thrilled" by the possibilities of the new tech, and sent him a bunch of photos of her family for ghiblification since she didn't have access to the new model yet. While many rushed to generate their own Ghibli-style images last week, others rushed to defend original art and artists. Some even shared a 2016 quote from director Hayao Miyazaki ("Spirited Away"), in which he appeared to express his disdain for AI as "an insult to life itself." One user on X called Slatton a "bozo" and told him to learn to draw. He responded with a painting he did of his wife, illustrating that his interests in art go beyond his computer. OpenAI told Business Insider that ChatGPT does allow for generating images with "broader studio styles," but that it would block requests for "generations in the style of individual living artists." "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible," a spokesperson said. Slatton said that while most of the rhetoric focuses on "stealing" the style, he doesn't think the extreme vitriol is downstream of that belief. He pointed to gig apps such as Fiverr, where artists will do Ghibli-style drawings of people for a few dollars. Are they stealing the Ghibli style, too? "I think the hate is predominantly due to completely valid fears of economic insecurity of small-time artists, combined with the general anti-big-tech culture wars that have been going on since people were throwing bricks at the Google commuter shuttles 12 years ago," Slatton said. "The recent rightward political reorientation of some prominent technologists is also feeding this much broader culture war." Slatton added that his position on AI image generation remains mostly unchanged, as he feels like the same conversation has been going on for years. "This particular reaction is nothing new in kind, only in magnitude -- due to the mass scale of the Ghibli trend," he said. "There's been the same rhetoric going back to the first decent AI image generators (DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Midjourney, etc)." Related: Even VC firms are getting in on the viral hype around ChatGPT's updated image generator

Even VC firms are getting in on the viral hype around ChatGPT's updated image generator

You might not remember seeing Matt McIlwain or S. "Soma" Somasegar in "Spirited Away," but the managing directors of Seattle VC firm Madrona are among the latest "characters" to get the Studio Ghibli treatment thanks to OpenAI's updated image generator. In a post on LinkedIn on Thursday, Madrona shared images created with ChatGPT-4o in the style of the beloved Japanese animation studio. "We couldn't resist," the post read. "From AI agents to animated founders, we're always exploring what's next." Images show McIlwain raising a toast and Somasegar interviewing Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella at last week's annual meeting and 30th anniversary celebration for the firm. The animated renderings possess very close similarities to actual photographs from the event, which Madrona shared in an earlier post. OpenAI released its new AI image generator on Tuesday, and since then the internet has been flooded with Studio Ghibli-style treatments of everything from President Donald Trump to "Star Wars." As TechCrunch pointed out, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even updated his X profile image to the style. The image generator -- which can create content from a text prompt -- is also generating a fair share of concern about how such models are trained and the copyright infringement implications. OpenAI said it trained ChatGPT-4o on "publicly available data" as well as proprietary data from its partnerships with companies like Shutterstock, according to The Wall Street Journal. The company said on its website that "combined with aggressive post-training, the resulting model has surprising visual fluency, capable of generating images that are useful, consistent, and context-aware." How the AI tools are trained to imitate styles is where violation of copyright law can come into play, TechCrunch noted. A group of news organizations, including The New York Times, are already suing OpenAI and Microsoft, its major investor and partner, alleging that copyrighted works are used to train ChatGPT. "We're respecting of the artists' rights in terms of how we do the output, and we have policies in place that prevent us from generating images that directly mimic any living artists' work," Brad Lightcap, OpenAI's chief operating officer, told The Wall Street Journal this week. Meanwhile, if you're tempted to make a Studio Ghibli-style image of you and your dog or kid or whatever, the view on AI of the director behind the films might sting a little. Mashable reported that fans are pointing to a clip from the 2016 documentary series "Never-Ending Man: Hayao Miyazaki," in which the filmmaker said of AI: "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted. If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself."

ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli AI Art Trend Is an Insult to Life Itself

Open AI's latest update to ChatGPT ignores any prior restraint and jumps headfirst into aping the actual talents of Studio Ghibli. In the past, OpenAI has explicitly refrained from allowing users to create prompts and generate images mimicking Studio Ghibli's art style to avoid potential copyright lawsuits from the anime giant. That is, until the company released a new ChatGPT update earlier this week touting its technological ability to create more "precise, accurate, photorealistic outputs." The update has led to an online trend where folks are posting AI-generated images using OpenAI to transform themselves into characters from Ghibli films, like Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and My Neighbor Totoro. Building on that, ChatGPT's new update has meant verified accounts on X/Twitter have been smarmily patting OpenAI on the back for how its new update is democratizing animation by shitting out prompts transforming photos of their weddings and whatnot into something that Ghibli could have created. What's worse, OpenAI appears to be leaning into the farcical fad despite its previous reservations. On Wednesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appeared to have cosigned the trend by changing his profile picture to a ChatGPT AI-generated image of himself as a Ghibli character. In a post on his official X/Twitter account, Altman wrote "> be me / > grind for a decade trying to help make superintelligence to cure cancer or whatever / > mostly no one cares for first 7.5 years, then for 2.5 years everyone hates you for everything / > wake up one day to hundreds of messages: â€~look i made you into a twink ghibli style haha.'" The underlying issue in this entire situation is how AI initiatives like the one mentioned above reflect breathless tech bro sentiments about AI "democratizing art" by enabling anyone to input a prompt and receive an image in a distinctive art style. Art styles professional animators put years of work into mastering. It is also the latest (and arguably the most brazen) example of copyright infringement that AI is posing against the professional artists and voice actors who are battling for protections from shit like this. The whole affair is made exceedingly worse when you consider the official White House X/Twitter account jumping on the trend, posting Ghibli-fied images to dehumanize people in President Donald Trump's massive deportation campaign. While Studio Ghibli has yet to issue an official comment or announce legal action against OpenAI's new update being used to generate images in its art style, famed animator Hayao Miyazaki has already made his feelings explicitly clear about AI: he despises it. In NHK's 2016 documentary, Never-Ending Man, a production intern showed Miyazaki a demonstration (using "deep learning" AI) of a dismembered zombie using its head to wriggle across the floor. After a pregnant pause, Miyazaki provided feedback on the video in the form of an anecdote, leading to the meme of him calling it, "An insult to life itself." "Let me just say every morning I used to see a friend who’s disabled. He would walk up to me. One leg's turned outward, so it’s hard for him to walk. Even a high-five is hard for him. His stiff hand and mine touch. I think of him, and can’t say I like this," Miyazaki said. "Whoever made it gives no thought to pain. It’s very unpleasant. You can make horrible things if you want, but I want nothing to do with it." Miyazaki wanting nothing to do with AI is pretty understandable considering the labor he and his animators put into making scenes in their feature films as awe inspiring as they are. There's no greater example of this Herculean effort than a clip from NHK's 10 Years with Hayao Miyazaki documentary, which made the rounds online shortly following the Ghibli AI animation trend. The video, which shows a four-second clip of a busy crowd in Wind Rises, took animator Eiji Yamamori 15 months to complete. When Yamamori downplayed Miyazaki telling him good job, saying "It's so short though," Miyazaki responded in kind saying, "But it was worth it." Should Ghibli and Miyazaki wish to pursue legal action against OpenAI and ChatGPT, we'll bring the popcorn.

People Making AI Studio Ghibli Images Are Now Producing Fake Legal Letters to Go With Their Fake Art

Meanwhile, actual Ghibli creation Princess Mononoke is enjoying robust returns from its current big-screen revival. The trend of using Open AI's ChatGPT to create AI images in the distinctive style of Studio Ghibli probably should have ceased the moment the official White House X account hopped aboard. But there's a new wrinkle in the story today, as one of the trend's proponents posted a cease and desist notice they claimed to have received from Studio Ghibli representativesâ€"which fellow social media users immediately called out as being as fake as the "art" that inspired it. Along with the (fake) letter, X user teej used the platform to defend what they'd done, writing in part: "AI creators deserve protection, not punishment. Expression is sacred. Imagination is not illegal. If I have to be a martyr to prove that, so be it." It's hard not to chuckle at this response to, let's see, typing a prompt into a program so that it can create an AI image blatantly ripping off hours of hard work and creativity from actual human artists, including the great Hayao Miyazaki and his Ghibli team. At this point, we can go ahead and add another fake to the growing pile: the persecution complex being felt by AI "creators" who realize now they did something that made a lot of people justifiably annoyed. Take responsibility for one's own actions? This is 2025! We don't do that anymore! Better point the finger at someone else, even if that other person is crafted from thin air! While Studio Ghibli has yet to make a public statement about OpenAI cannibalizing its works, it's hard not to read into remarks from a Gkids representative regarding the box-office success currently being enjoyed by Princess Mononoke, which hit IMAX theaters in a 4K restoration this week in honor of its 40th anniversary. "In a time when technology tries to replicate humanity, we are thrilled that audiences value a theatrical experience that respects and celebrates Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli's masterpiece in all its cinematic hand-drawn glory," Chance Huskey, VP of distribution for Gkids, said in a statement quoted in Variety. Screenings are still ongoing and you can find out details here.

AI generated Ghibli images go viral as OpenAI loosens its rules

OpenAI is shifting its policies around using artistic styles, even as the debate over what AI companies owe artists is ongoing. Artificial intelligence images from OpenAI's new image generator went viral this week on social media after the company loosened its rules around what kind of images users can make. People embraced the tool to create images made in the style of Studio Ghibli, the animation company behind movies including "Princess Mononoke" and "Spirited Away." First, they shared images of themselves and friends in Ghibli's iconic style. But soon, people were making Ghibli-style images of historical moments, including a plane hitting the twin towers, John F. Kennedy's assassination and the "Saigon Execution" photo of a South Vietnamese general shooting a Viet Cong captive in the head at point-blank range in 1968. The White House's official X account also joined in the meme, posting a Ghibli-style image of a crying woman who was being arrested by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. The account explained that the image was of a real person who it said was a fentanyl dealer who had recently been arrested. The posts which went viral on social media reignited the debate over what AI companies owe artists and whether copyright laws need to evolve to incorporate the rapid technological shifts that AI is ushering in. ChatGPT maker OpenAI released the updated version of its image-generating AI tool on Tuesday and at the same time, it said it was relaxing its rules on how people could use its technology, allowing them to use the AI to make images that mimicked the look and feel of existing artistic styles. The explosion of images, ranging from friendly selfies to recreations of violent historical photos, underlines how AI tools are upending the world of art and copyright, ushering in a world where anyone can use AI to make complex images, songs and writing that mimics the style of creative geniuses who may have trained for years to hone their skills. Lawsuits are working their way through the courts, trying to force AI companies to pay for the images and other content they scraped from the internet to train their technology. But the companies are moving ahead with the new tech, arguing that AI will enable more people to fulfill their creative vision and help existing artists make even grander creations. "AI lab employees should not be the arbiters of what people should and shouldn't be allowed to create," Joanne Jang, head of product at OpenAI, said Thursday in a post on X explaining why OpenAI had changed its policies to allow more freedom with what kind of images people are allowed to make with its tools. Spokespeople for Nippon TV, the Japanese media conglomerate that owns Studio Ghibli, did not respond to a request for comment. A representative of GKIDS, which distributes Studio Ghibli films in the U.S., did not respond to requests for comment. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible. We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," said Kayla Wood, a spokeswoman for OpenAI. "We're always learning from real-world use and feedback, and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." OpenAI CEO Sam Altman celebrated the viral moment, changing his profile picture on X to a "Ghiblified" version of himself and then later saying that the company had to slow down people's access to its tools because so many users were trying to use it at the same time. Studio Ghibli, headed by artist Hayao Miyazaki, is known for its dreamy watercolors and intricate illustrations -- each frame in a Ghibli film is drawn and colored by hand, the studio has said. Sometimes artists spend months working on a single scene. Miyazaki himself has railed against the use of artificial intelligence in art. "I would never want to incorporate this technology into my work at all," he said in a video posted to YouTube in 2016. "I strongly feel it is an insult to life itself." As social feeds filled with Ghibli-style selfies, some artists posted in protest: Amid an ongoing battle over AI training data and the rights of artists, was OpenAI really going to let its users spam the internet with images so clearly dependent on Miyazaki's distinct style? "The sad part isn't that AI is generating Ghibli-style art, imitation is inevitable," said poet Puneet Sharma in a post on X. "What's sad is that most users know nothing of Miyazaki, nor do they grasp the difference between process and processed, between creation as a journey and consumption as a shortcut." Since OpenAI released the first public model of ChatGPT in 2022, legal questions have swirled about the company's use of real artists' and writers' work to train its chatbots. Many publishers and creators -- from online newspaper to popular songwriters -- have argued that AI companies are violating copyright law when they scrape content from the internet to teach chatbots how to generate text, images and video. AI models like the ones built by OpenAI are trained on huge amounts of information. OpenAI and other AI companies including Google, Meta and Microsoft have all used public data from the internet for this training, though they do not disclose specifically what they have used for individual AI models. Datasets of Studio Ghibli movies and still images are easily available online. A wave of lawsuits seeks to challenge the use of copyright works in AI training, but AI companies have argued that qualifies as fair use, a concept in copyright law that allows someone to reuse someone else's art if they transform or remix it in a creative way. Several major lawsuits from authors and news organizations are seeking to determine whether AI generation really falls under fair use. Court rulings are still months away. The Ghibli trend echoes some of AI's viral moments. Namely: People love to share images of themselves. When the generative AI app Lensa shot to the top of app charts in late 2022, people took to X, Instagram and Reddit en masse to share AI selfies in the style of Renaissance paintings, anime or fairycore. Artists raised concerns at the time, saying the app's stylistic copying showed why real-world artists and designers were losing work and income to AI. Ben Zhao, a computer science professor at the University of Chicago and co-creator of the tool Glaze, which helps artists protect their work from AI mimicry, said he's disappointed to see OpenAI take advantage of Studio Ghibli's beloved style to promote its products. By publicly "Ghiblifying" himself, Altman gave his tacit approval to the trend -- a move made more insulting by OpenAI's claim that it blocks its models from mimicking the work of living artists, Zhao said.

Hayao Miyazaki, Who Said AI Is 'Insult to Life Itself," Reduced to AI-Generated Meme by OpenAI

The internet is flooded with AI-generated images in the style of Studio Ghibli, whose founder said "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." On Tuesday, OpenAI updated ChatGPT with new AI image generation capabilities that make it especially good at recreating specific visual styles. People trying the new feature immediately flooded social media with images in the style of Studio Ghibli and Japanese animation legend Hayao Miyazaki, who famously called artificial intelligence "an insult to life itself." Miyazaki's quote comes from a 2016 documentary in which he's shown a demo of a 3D model whose movements are animated with AI as opposed to manually, by a human, as is usually the case in 3D animated videos or video games. "Thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find [it] interesting," Miyazaki says after seeing the demo, saying it reminds him of a friend with a disability. "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted. If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." ChatGPT's new AI image generation capabilities are not substantively different from what many other AI image generators can already do. There are many AI image generation models on Civitai, for example, that are trained on Studio Ghibli movies and are good at imitating them. This is one thing generative AI is inarguably good at: copying the work of human artists, be they visual artists, musicians, or writers. ChatGPT's Ghibli moment is notable, however, because it's extremely viral -- even OpenAI founder Sam Altman has changed his X profile picture to a Ghiblified version of himself -- and because it shows how far OpenAI, the company that started the current generative AI boom, and one that artists and publishers are currently suing for infringing on their copyrighted work, is willing to go in terms stealing from artists and content guardrails on its AI tools. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible," an OpenAI spokesperson told 404 Media in an email. "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations. We're always learning from real world use and feedback and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." Some of these "truly delightful and inspired original fan creations" allow users to use studio Ghibli's style to recreate the assassination of JFK, an infamous example of censorship of Stalin's image in the Soviet Union, or the moment U.S. forces captured Sadam Hussain in Iraq. Our testing showed ChatGPT would also generate famous and graphic war photographs in the style of Ghibli movies, including "napalm girl" and "Saigon Execution." Previously, OpenAI was known for having very aggressive guardrails that prevented people from generating images featuring any real people, even historical figures. For example, in 2023, we reported that its AI image generation tool DALL E prevented people from generating images of Julius Caesar. The viral Ghibli images show the company's position on this has clearly changed. OpenAI told us that it is not blocking the model's capability to depict adult public figures, but that they "implement the same safeguards we employ for editing images of photorealistic uploads of people. This is to enable helpful and beneficial uses in areas like education, historical, and satirical speech." Despite the lawsuits, outrage, and general resistance from artists, generative AI is already working its way into the workflows of many creative fields, including anime. Animation, which requires meticulous drawing of thousands and thousands of frames is famously grueling work, and some anime studios are already incorporating generative AI into their process to help with that workload. This, however, is not the same thing is the wholesale lifting of someone else's style, and a model's ability to copy the look of Spirited Away does not at all indicate its ability to create a work of art of that caliber.

The controversial ChatGPT 'Studio Ghibli' trend explained -- what you need to know

ChatGPT's 'Studio Ghibli' controversy has sparked a huge debate Artificial Intelligence tools evolve daily it seems, and ChatGPT remains near the top of the pile for its commitment to constant improvement. For some, though, last week's announcement of improved image-generation capabilities was a step too far. GPT-4o's new native image generation is indeed impressive, but claims that it's powered by "publicly available data" are proving contentious. With users able to essentially replicate famous, iconic art styles just by affixing a few words to their prompts, one of the most popular influences has been Studio Ghibli. Studio Ghibli's animations are not only beloved, but genre defining. Each of its movies, from "Spirited Away" to "My Neighbor Totoro", are painstakingly designed and drawn. Now, AI has been accused of cheapening the Studio Ghibli aesthetic by vocal fans around the internet. Despite the outrage, the proliferation of Studio Ghibli-style images generated using the tool isn't against the law. Evan Brown, an intellectual property lawyer at Neal and McDevitt, told TechCrunch that a certain "style" isn't necessarily protected by copyright. "I think this raises the same question that we've been asking ourselves for a couple years now," Brown explained. "What are the copyright infringement implications of going out, crawling the web, and copying into these databases?" While other "styles" are being recreated by OpenAI's model, the "Ghiblified" ones are drawing the most ire because of comments made by animator, co-founder of Studio Ghibli and noted critic of AI, Hayao Miyazaki, in a recently resurfaced 2016 documentary service. Responding to an example of animating "grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine" using a computer, Miyazaki said: "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," he said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting." "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted... I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." Some of the criticism seems to have broken through to ChatGPT's creator, OpenAI. In a white paper released last week, the firm said it would take a "conservative approach" to image generation while it learned how the "creative community" used the tool. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," OpenAI said.

'Studio Ghibli' AI image trend overwhelms OpenAI's new GPT-4o feature, delaying free tier

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More If you've been on the internet -- or, at least, on the social network X -- in the last day or so, you've likely come across colorful, smooth anime-style images of famous photographs rendered in the style of the Japanese studio, Studio Ghibli (the one that made Princess Mononoke, The Boy and the Crane, and My Neighbor Totoro, among many other classic animated films). In fact, some users are complaining because their feeds seem to be filled with nearly exclusively these types of images. Whether it's current President Trump, the iconic image of the "Tank Man" during the 1989 pro-Democracy Tiananmen Square protests, Osama Bin Laden, Jeffrey Epstein, or even other pop culture moments and characters like Sam Rockwell's iconic cameo on The White Lotus and many popular memes of yore, people have been making and sharing these images at a rapid clip. Powered by the new GPT-4o model's native image gen Much of that is thanks to OpenAI's new update to the GPT-4o model behind ChatGPT for Pro, Plus, and Team subscription tiers, which turns on "native image generation." While ChatGPT previously allowed users to create images from text prompts, it did so by routing them to another, separate OpenAI model, DALL-E 3. But OpenAI's GPT-4o model is so named with an "o" because it is an "omni" model -- the company trained it not only on text and code, but also on imagery and presumably, video and audio as well, allowing it to be able to understand all these forms of media and their similarities and differences, conceive of ideas across them (an "apple" is not just a word, but also something that can be drawn as a red or yellow or green fruit), and accurately produce said media given text prompts by a user without connecting to any external models. As a consequence, like rival Google AI Studio's recent update to include a Gemini 2.0 Flash experimental image creation model, the new OpenAI GPT-4o can also accept image uploads of any pre-existing image in your camera roll or that you've screenshotted or saved off the web. How to use ChatGPT to make Studio Ghibli-style images (and change or transfer any image into any style!) First, navigate to Chat.com or ChatGPT.com and ensure you're logged in with your ChatGPT Plus, Pro, or Team account and that the AI model selector (located in the left corner of the session window) is showing "GPT-4o" as the chosen model (you can click it to drop down and select the proper model between the available options). Once you do that, you can upload an image to ChatGPT using the "+" button in the lower left hand corner of the prompt entry text box, you can now ask the new GPT-4o with image creation model to render your pre-existing image in a new style. If you want, you can try it by uploading a photo of yourself and friends and typing "make all these people in the style of a Studio Ghibli animation." And after a few seconds, it will do so with some pretty convincing and amusing results. It even supports attaching multiple images and combining them into a single piece. ChatGPT free tier usage delayed OpenAI initially said it would also enable this feature for free (non-paying users of ChatGPT), but unfortunately for them, co-founder and CEO Sam Altman today posted that the feature will be delayed due to the overwhelming demand by existing paying subscribers to ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Team tiers. As he wrote on X: "images in chatgpt are wayyyy more popular than we expected (and we had pretty high expectations). rollout to our free tier is unfortunately going to be delayed for awhile." Meanwhile, those who do have access will likely continue cranking out image edits in this and other recognizable or novel styles. Of course, not everyone is a fan of OpenAI's work here. In fact, Studio Ghibli creator Hayao Miyazaki himself appeared in a documentary back in 2016 -- and one of the most memorable moments from it still referenced to this day is him reacting with overwhelming disgust and revulsion to an early example of AI-powered animation and physics by, you guessed it, an OpenAI model. As with many generative AI products and services, OpenAI's training data for this new image generation capability remains under wraps, but is widely speculated to contain copyrighted material -- and while imitating a style is generally not considered copyright infringement in the U.S., it is rubbing some fans of the original animation the wrong way. For now, those brands and enterprises looking to play with this style should do so with caution and after serious consideration, given the possible negative blowback among some users. But for those who are unabashedly pro-AI tools or with more forgiving and fun-loving fanbases, it's clear that OpenAI has yet another hit on its hands.

OpenAI's Studio Ghibli-inspired AI art provokes backlash across the internet

OpenAI released a new image generator this week, and AI-generated Studio Ghibli slop is now all over the internet. In the livestream demo of the native image generation in ChatGPT and Sora, OpenAI took a selfie and asked the new generator to turn it into an anime frame. The result looked a lot like art from a Studio Ghibli film. It went viral, despite some social media users pointing out the potential copyright violations. All the while, Hayao Miyazaki, the co-founder of Studio Ghibli, has been vocally disgusted by the use of AI in art. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. In a clip from the 2016 documentary series Never-Ending Man: Hayao Miyazaki, the director behind classics like Spirited Away and My Neighbor Totoro, said of AI: "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted. If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. But the internet doesn't all agree that fury and disgust is the only response. Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, changed his profile photo to a Ghibli-style photo of himself. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. Many users on X have also been using the tool to create their own Studio Ghibli-style "art" and memes. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. While the new image generator in ChatGPT has been lauded by some for its ability to mimic distinct visual styles, its impact raises key questions about the fine line between innovation and infringement -- especially when it comes to the outspoken desires of artists like Miyazaki.

People Are Using ChatGPT's New AI Image Generator to Turn Photos into Studio Ghibli Style Images

There has been a flood of photos turned into Studio Ghibli-style images posted to social media in the last 24 hours and it's all because of ChatGPT's new AI image generator. Iconic photos and scenes have been given the Studio Ghibli treatment, a Japanese animation style behind films such as My Neighbor Totoro. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has got in on the act turning his X profile picture into an animated version of himself. However, the flood of memes have raised copyright concerns. While a specific style is not explicity eliglbe for copyright protection, a lawyer tells Tech Crunch that OpenAI may still have broken the law since it is highly likely that to be able to output image in Studio Ghibli style, ChatGPT's new model was trained on million of frames taken from Ghibli's films. "I think this raises the same question that we've been asking ourselves for a couple years now," Evan Brown, an intellectual property lawyer at the law firm Neal & McDevitt, tells Tech Crunch. "What are the copyright infringement implications of going out, crawling the web, and copying into these databases?" To make matters worse, one of Studio Ghibli's founders, Hayao Miyazaki, reacted in horror when first shown AI technology a few years ago. "I am utterly disgusted," Myazaki said when shown an AI presentation. "If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it, but I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." OpenAI launched its new AI image generator this week, calling it a technological step forward. "Images in ChatGPT" differs from DALL-E -- OpenAI's previous image generator which seems like it's being retired -- because the images come from within ChatGPT-4o. It is described as a "step change" and "omnimodal", meaning the model can generate any kind of data including text, image, audio, and video.

I refuse to jump on ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli image generator bandwagon because it goes against everything I love about those movies

Mediocre recreations of masterpieces just degrade the work of artists and aren't a good look for AI The pink skies, big eyes, and dreamy glow suddenly filling my social media had me excited for half a second about a new Studio Ghibli film. Another moment to look and the artificial origins of the images became as clear as my distate for their spread. The viral Ghibli images produced by ChatGPT this week are not made with malice aforethought, but they represent the worst bits of AI-produced media. In case you've avoided the latest AI faux pas, it's a trend born out of OpenAI's latest upgrade to ChatGPT, an improved image generator beyond the current DALL-E model that is talented at mimicking art styles. And by art styles, I don't just mean "Rennaissance" or "Dutch Old Master," I mean very specific studios and artists. Naturally, someone realized you could prompt it to make your photos look straight out of a Ghibli movie, and the floodgates opened. Pets, babies, friends, celebrities, memes, and everything else are getting the AI Ghibli treatment. Some of the results are beautiful. Some are strange. All of them are vaguely evocative of Ghibli. But that's just it; they evoke, echo, and imitate. They're the AI equivalent of hearing a cover band do a near-perfect version of "Let It Be." You might get some of the same feeling as hearing the original, but it won't be exactly right, and trying to force it just makes it worse. Studio Ghibli's films are purposefully, almost radically, slow in both style and production. They pause in places where most films push forward to give you a chance to take in the beauty of animated wind in the grass or the details of an empty street. The art isn't just stunning; each frame is imbued with care and craft. These films are drawn by hand, over years, by people who breathe life into every frame. Digested and regurgitated by AI misses the point to a comical degree. To go back to the music analogy, it's like saying you've got tickets to the symphony but deciding to play Mozart on a kazoo and admiring it equally. That's not to say the AI images aren't accurate. It makes you wonder if it was trained on Ghibli's work. If so, it was absolutely done without Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki's permission. His disdain for AI-generated art is not subtle. In a 2016 documentary, he responded to watching an AI animation demo with visible revulsion and called it "an insult to life itself." That might sound dramatic, but it wasn't performative or reflecting a purely financial concern. OpenAI has claimed to have taken steps to address artistic concerns in the wake of growing backlash. The company claims they've restricted users from asking ChatGPT to generate images that mimic specific living artists. That's a start. But it doesn't apply to studios or creators who've passed away or, in Hayao Miyazaki's case, are still alive but whose legacy feels oddly unprotected here. In fact, it was only this claim that convinced me to try out a Ghibli prompt in ChatGPT, specifically to see how the AI reacted. A minute later, I had a Ghibli-esque image of myself and my dog that made it clear that OpenAI's guardrails had some holes in them. I know most people generating these images aren't trying to insult anyone. They're doing what fans have always done, showing their admiration with their own remixes. Still, there's a big difference between making fan art mimicking an artist and having an algorithm do it for you. I don't think AI art is inherently evil, but I do think we need to be more careful about when and how we use it, especially when we're playing in the sandbox of someone else's legacy. I think my career makes it clear I'm not anti-AI, but I've not always been the best at expressing what I think it should be used for. While there's certainly space for machines to help us create, it should be in aid of our own creations, not swiping someone else's vision.

New ChatGPT update spurs flood of Ghibli-style portraits

The big picture: The Ghibli fest is dividing admirers of the Japanese animation studio, with some awed by the visuals and others dismissing them as "AI slop." Driving the news: OpenAI on Tuesday rolled out the images feature in GPT-4o, initially making it available to users on the Plus, Pro, Team and Free subscription tiers for creating or adjusting images. It's also available to use in Sora. Between the lines: The Ghibli-styled images are possible because OpenAI has loosened rules that used to limit the creation of images using distinctive styles, alone with some celebrity likenesses, company names and logos. State of play: Hundreds of users across social media platforms are using the native image feature to convert old photos to Studio Ghibli-style images.

Copyright questions loom as ChatGPT's Ghibli-style images go viral

The release of the latest image generator on OpenAI's ChatGPT has triggered an online flood of memes featuring images done in the style of Studio Ghibli, the Japanese studio behind classic animated films like "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Princess Mononoke." The virality of these images, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even changing his profile picture on X to match the style, immediately raised questions about copyright infringement by the ChatGPT maker, which already faces lawsuits regarding the use of source material without permission. Since the release on Wednesday, AI-generated images depicting Studio Ghibli versions of Elon Musk with President Donald Trump, "The Lord of the Rings," and even a recreation of the September 11 attacks have gone viral across online platforms. Originally intended to be available on the platform for free, Altman said the huge success of the new generator was unexpected and meant the tool would remain limited to paid users for now. It was already possible to generate images with ChatGPT, but the latest version is powered by GPT-4o, the company's highest-performing model, and allows sophisticated results to be obtained through very succinct requests, which was not the case before. After the viral trend, a video from 2016 resurfaced in which Studio Ghibli's legendary director Hayao Miyazaki is seen lashing out during an AI demonstration from staff. "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," an English translation of his remarks said in the video. The trend "is especially insidious and malicious because of how outspokenly scathing Miyazaki has been toward the tech," wrote artist and illustrator Jayd "Chira" Ait-Kaci on Bluesky. "It's always about contempt for artists, every time," Ait-Kaci added. OpenAI is facing a barrage of lawsuits over copyright infringements, including one major case with the New York Times and others from artists, musicians and publishers. The company is meanwhile aggressively lobbying the White House and Congress to make the use of copyrighted content by AI companies part of the fair use doctrine. Fair use allowances already apply to search engines or in the case of satire and memes online, and allow companies to freely use copyrighted material without permission. Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that OpenAI is close to finalizing a $40 billion funding round led by Japan's SoftBank Group that would be the biggest funding round ever for a startup. OpenAI has projected its annual revenue could exceed $12.7 billion in 2025, up from $3.7 billion expected this year.

While You're Churning Out Studio Ghibli Selfies With OpenAI, Remember That Hayao Miyazaki Called AI Art "Disgusting" and an "Insult to Life Itself"

The internet has been flooded with pictures modified by OpenAI's new image tool to evoke the style of animation legend Hayao Miyazaki's work at Studio Ghibli. Despite going mega-viral -- to the point where OpenAI took down the free version of its in-app image generator -- the trend flies directly in the face of the animator's personal views on the tech. In a 2016 documentary, the filmmaker was shown a demo of an AI-animated 3D model. "I am utterly disgusted," he said at the time, arguing that the demo reminded him of a friend with a disability. "If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he fulminated. The latest trend spawned countless images that went viral, from Ghibli renditions of the JFK assassination to the photo that showed Donald Trump hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein -- and, of course, 9/11. While it's far from the first time a generative AI-inspired trend has gone viral on the social media platform, the extent to which the Ghibli meme has taken off is notable. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wasn't spared, complaining in a Wednesday tweet that "no one" cared about his career until you "wake up one day to hundreds of messages: 'look i made you into a twink ghibli style haha.'" "My timeline is AGI," Stability AI founder Emad Mostaque quipped with a joke about artificial general intelligence. "All. Ghibli. Images." Even famous retired boxer Mike Tyson uploaded a Ghibli-fied rendition of his own likeness while holding a white pigeon. Besides directly opposing the views and wishes of its creator, the trend also highlights the continued debate surrounding copyright and the overall rights of human artists and publishers. As 404 Media found, it's also trivially easy to generate pictures of far more graphic images in the style of Studio Ghibli movies, demonstrating OpenAI's woefully inadequate implementation of guardrails. It's an unfortunate new reality, greatly denigrating the iconic, hard work of human animators. "Imagine being Miyazaki, pouring decades of heart and soul into making this transcendent beautiful tender style of anime, and then seeing it get sloppified by linear algebra," one user tweeted. Other users also pointed out generative AI's infamous strain on the environment -- ironic, given many of Studio Ghibli's films are about humanity's disregard for the planet and ecosystem. "Irony is dead and all but it's pretty depressing to see Ghibli AI slop on the timeline not only because Miyazaki famously thinks AI art is disgusting but because he's spent the last 50 years making art about environmental waste for petty human uses," another user tweeted.

ChatGPT Starts Blocking Studio Ghibli-Style Images After Trend Goes Viral

The wave of ersatz Ghibli art was inescapable in AI spheres. One particularly viral example depicted JFK's assassination. Many have uploaded personal photos to be redrawn into a still from a Ghibli movie. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman join in on the fun, tweeting a joke about the trend and changing his profile picture to a Ghibli-style image of what appears to be himself, done up to look like one of the young, wide-eyed protagonists in the studio's movies. Then came the minor setback in the plot. Despite the trend seemingly getting Altman's personal blessing, it appears that ChatGPT has started refusing requests to generate images in Ghibli's style, Business Insider reports. This was joined by widespread user complaints on social media that the AI platform is no longer playing along with their prompts to ape the animation studio. There is significant ambiguity, however, over whether this was an intentional intervention by OpenAI. With its latest GPT-4o powered image generator, OpenAI has emphasized its robust guardrails around depicting real people. In regards to style, however, it takes a more laissez-faire stance. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible," an OpenAI spokesperson told 404 Media. "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles." The Studio Ghibli trend greatly challenges this stance. In one sense, its distinct visual mode falls under a "broader studio style." But what people widely understand to be the Ghibli aesthetic was pioneered by animation legend Hayao Miyazaki, who directed and animated the vast majority of Ghibli's most well-known films -- and is very much a living artist. In light of the reports that ChatGPT has started refusing Ghibli prompts, we reached out to OpenAI seeking clarification on whether it implemented additional guardrails. An OpenAI spokesperson responded with the same statement the company had provided to other outlets, which we quoted above. The spokesperson didn't address if OpenAI had instructed the chatbot to refuse Ghibli requests. In our own tests, when queried if GPT-4o has restrictions on generating images in the style of Studio Ghibli, ChatGPT replied: "Yes, GPT-4o has restrictions on generating images in the style of Studio Ghibli. Studio Ghibli's art style is copyrighted, and I can't create images that explicitly mimic it. However, I can generate images inspired by similar themes." Separately, an update Altman shared online today suggested that this is all some sort of mix-up, saying that "we are refusing some generations that should be allowed; we are fixing these as fast we can." Again, no direct mention is made of the Ghibli trend. More than a few of the replies to Altman's update are from fans inquiring about using Ghibli's style. In any case, the dust is yet to settle. The Ghibli trend has provoked nearly as much backlash as it has inspired eager participation. The effrontery of the rampant AI imitations is heightened by Miyazaki's personal views on the use of AI in art -- he famously called it an "insult to life itself." "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever. I am utterly disgusted," Miyazaki said in a 2016 documentary. "If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." By now, Miyazaki's stance on the technology is well-known in both tech and art circles. And so is his dedication to environmentalism, which generative AI, with its gruesome carbon footprint and excessive water wastage, is virtually the antithesis of. It's likely that many who are gleefully peddling facsimiles of his life's work are aware of this. After all, that is what generative AI excels at: imitating.

Lawyer Says Studio Ghibli Could Take Legal Action Against OpenAI

OpenAI's extremely popular AI chatbot tool ChatGPT caught a huge wave this week when untold numbers of users started using it to generate images evoking the style of animation legend Hayao Miyazaki's work at Studio Ghibli. The trend quickly took on a life of its own. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman took to X-formerly-Twitter to joke about being turned into a "twink ghibli style." OpenAI has since started cracking down on the trend, implementing a confusing range of changes that now often refuse requests to generate images in Ghibli's style. The viral trend, and OpenAI's chaotic response, reignited a heated debate surrounding copyright and the use of generative AI directly undermining the work of human artists and publishers -- including the extremely talented animators at Ghibli. And according to former general counsel at the TV channel Showtime and AI expert Rob Rosenberg, Ghibli may actually be able to take legal action against OpenAI over the situation. While it's a "complex question" whether the Japanese animation studio would have enough grounds, the company "might have the ability to claim OpenAI has violated the Lanham Act which provides the basis for claims related to false advertising, trademark infringement and unfair competition," Rosenberg, now the founder of Telluride Legal Strategies, told Futurism. The Lanham Act, which was enacted in 1946, is the primary federal statute governing trademark law in the US, and establishes a national system of trademark registration that allows owners to pursue infringement lawsuits. "Ghibli could argue that by converting user photos to 'Ghibli-style,' OpenAI is trading off the goodwill of Ghibli's trademarks, using Ghibli's identifiable style and leading to a likelihood of confusion among consumers that this function is endorsed or licensed by Studio Ghibli," Rosenberg argued. OpenAI could also be sued for "training its large language models on Studio Ghibli's copyrighted works," he added. OpenAI is already facing several lawsuits over its approach to scouring the internet for training data for its models, including plenty of copyrighted material. Just this week, a federal judge rejected OpenAI's request to throw out a copyright lawsuit filed by the New York Times. The newspaper alleged in late 2023 that the Altman-led company infringed its copyright by using its material without permission to train its AI models. Mark Zuckerberg's Meta has also been accused of illegally downloading pirated books to train its AI models. But so far, there isn't any legal precedent to determine whether OpenAI broke US copyright law. The company has maintained that "training their models is a fair use under copyright law," Rosenberg explained, "and therefore an exception to infringement." The "fair use doctrine" has been core to the ongoing debate surrounding whether AI companies like OpenAI are breaking copyright law. It's a legal framework allowing limited access to copyrighted materials without prior permission for quotations and other non-infringing usages. Whether Ghibli will actually make any legal moves is anyone's guess. On Friday, the company told Japanese news outlet NHK that a viral legal document, which claimed to be a cease and desist letter sent by the studio, was fake. "As most courts have not yet ruled on the strength of similar copyright claims, it is unclear whether they would prove successful or not," Rosenberg told Futurism. "If OpenAI were marketing its platform as a place where consumers could go to turn their photos into 'Ghibli-style' anime, that fact would weigh more strongly in favor of a court finding that OpenAI's conduct violated the Lanham Act." If the courts were to rule in favor of OpenAI, determining that training AI models on copyrighted material does indeed fall under fair use, we could be heading "toward a system where the AI developers will need to compensate copyright holders, and credit them where their content is used in producing output," Rosenberg said. Aside from questions regarding the possible infringement of copyright, OpenAI could be robbing Ghibli of other ways to monetize. "If Studio Ghibli ever wanted to launch its own tool allowing fans to transform photos into its signature style, OpenAI's update has essentially taken that business opportunity away," Rosenberg said. "Worse, this technology could lead to people generating entire animated projects in the Ghibli style and falsely presenting them as authentic." "It's similar to asking AI to rewrite a short story in the style of JK Rowling and then posting it online as a 'lost' Rowling work," he added, "blurring the line between homage and outright misrepresentation."

Studio Ghibli-inspired memes and portraits made with ChatGPT are flooding the internet

Many people online have been using Chat GPT's latest update to create illustrations inspired by Studio Ghibli's many films, including "My Neighbor Totoro."Studio Ghibli / Studio Ghibli The internet has become a Studio Ghibli-inspired playground. Admirers of the Japanese animation studio are using a new update from ChatGPT to create portraits and memes inspired by the distinct artistic style popularized by filmmaker and studio co-creator Hayao Miyazaki. The trend emerged within a day of OpenAI's introducing new native image-generation capabilities Tuesday within GPT-4o, the latest version of ChatGPT. Users who pay for the premium tiers, which start at $20 a month, are able to upload any images into the system and asked the tool to transform them "into the style of Studio Ghibli." Users can also use the tool with Sora, ChatGPT's text-to-video AI model. Some of the most shared images posted to social media Wednesday re-created political events in U.S. history, including President Donald Trump's Feb. 28 meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Others transformed popular memes, including a recent one referring to fitness influencer Ashton Hall's morning routine and the decade-old Distracted Boyfriend meme. But many people simply used it to make their favorite photos with their family members, friends and pets look as if they came out of a Ghibli film. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also joined in on the trend, changing his X profile picture into the same Studio Ghibli style. ChatGPT released the feature amid continued concerns from artists about the infiltration of generative artificial intelligence technology into every artistic medium, including images, voices and music. At the end of 2023, a widely circulated list revealed the names of thousands of artists whose work was used without consent to train the popular AI art generator Midjourney. Last year, more than 11,000 creatives signed an open letter condemning the use of human art to train AI without permission. And last month, thousands of artists similarly signed an open letter urging Christie's New York gallery to scrap its auction of AI art. "Many of the artworks you plan to auction were created using AI models that are known to be trained on copyrighted work without a license," the letter said. "These models, and the companies behind them, exploit human artists, using their work without permission or payment to build commercial AI products that compete with them." While many social media users were excited to use the new AI tool, others lamented that its use diminishes the work of Miyazaki. Some people referred to the reimagined art as AI slop, a term used to describe the outlandish, seemingly AI-generated images that often dominate social media feeds. Others called the images "soulless." "What we've seen today is the very definition of AI slop," an X user wrote. "Knock-off Ghibli abundance flooding our feeds. Art reduced 'content'. Unique design becomes memetic generation. Zero creativity." OpenAI, like many of its competitors, does not reveal the specific data used to train its models. But the accuracy of its Studio Ghibli impressions has also re-raised some users' questions about whether it has scraped the studio's works without permission. Neither company immediately responded to requests for comment. OpenAI -- which has been sued by several news outlets, authors and visual artists who allege copyright infringement -- asked the U.S. government this month to make it easier for AI companies to learn from copyrighted material, citing a need to "strengthen America's lead" globally in advancing the technology. The company claims its latest image generation tool particularly excels at closely following a user's prompts, using context from the chat and accurately rendering text -- which AI image generators have previously been notoriously inept at. "These capabilities make it easier to create exactly the image you envision, helping you communicate more effectively through visuals and advancing image generation into a practical tool with precision and power," the company wrote in an announcement on its blog Tuesday. Miyazaki, a legendary animator, previously called AI-generated art "an insult to life itself." "Whoever made it gives no thought to pain. It's very unpleasant," he said during an AI demonstration in 2016, according to clip of the moment that circulated across social media on Wednesday. "You can make horrible things if you want, but I want nothing to do with it."

OpenAI's GPT-4o model gets image generation update for all of your anime-style selfie needs

For my sins, I do occasionally scroll through TikTok. In between the usual suspects of ear worm music loops and memetic dances I generally lack the co-ordination to recreate but not the determination, there is a spattering of AI-generated content. On my 'For You' page, this usually takes the form of image filter videos that twist users' selfies into vaguely resembling a frame from a favourite anime. Well, ChatGPT's recent image generation update can now spit out pictures that look like it's traced Studio Ghibli's homework. The update specifically brings image generation to OpenAI's GPT-4o model, refining a number of things AI image generators have historically struggled with, such as photorealism and rendering legible text, or even a full glass of wine, according to PCWorld. The update also allows users to refine image results through the chat interface, and the AI is apparently now better able to generate consistent variations on a theme. For example, one of OpenAI's demo videos shows GPT-4o generate a penguin mage in various styles, including a low-poly look, a reflective metallic get-up, and looking like a wargaming miniature. Premium users are already able to get their hands on GPT-4o's style-consistent capabilities, generating images in the style of Minecraft, Roblox, Studio Ghibli, and more. Free users on the other hand will have to wait; after the update's release earlier this week, Altman took to X to explain the delayed roll-out to all tiers of users, writing, "Images in ChatGPT are wayyyy more popular than we expected (and we had pretty high expectations)" (via TechCrunch). Judging by my flooded social media feeds, AI-generated images in the style of Studio Ghibli's animated films is the clear viral favourite. This is despite the copyright filters apparently rolled out as part of this update. TechSpot report that ChatGPT would not generate a Ghibli-fied rendition of The Beatles Abbey Road album cover, instead displaying the following note in response to their prompt: "I was unable to generate the image you requested due to our content policy, which restricts the generation of images based on specific copyrighted content, such as The Beatles' album cover." Many users have evidently found workarounds, and even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently changed his X profile picture to an overly familiar looking anime avatar. As to why GPT-4o can so consistently generate images in a number of recognisable styles, OpenAI told the Wall Street Journal that the model was trained on "publicly available data" alongside using data it already has access to as a result of the company's partnership with various companies like Shutterstock (via TechCrunch). OpenAI's chief operating officer, Brad Lightcap, told the Wall Street Journal, "We're [respectful] of the artists' rights in terms of how we do the output, and we have policies in place that prevent us from generating images that directly mimic any living artists' work." Legendary animation director Hayao Miyazaki is still very much alive, and famously took a dim view of early applications of AI. Way back in 2016, Miyazaki was shown a demonstration of a rudimentary 3D zombie model animated using AI by developers that also say they hope to one day create "a machine that can draw pictures like humans do." Many retellings of this moment focus on Miyazaki saying, "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." However, the context often missing is that these words are preceded by Miyazaki talking about a friend with limited mobility, making allusions to the horror genre's often insensitive depictions of disability. I don't want to put words in Hayao Miyazaki's mouth, so I'll speak for myself here. While GPT-4o's image generation capabilities are an impressive novelty, it also turns my stomach. I'm personally friends with a number of professional artists and I fear this update is simply going to embolden the very worst of their clients. I hope I'm wrong, but cheapskate companies may feel like they can continue to devalue creative skillsets, and I worry that we're all going to be caught in the resulting AI-slop landslide.

Copyright questions loom as ChatGPT's Ghibli-style images go viral

New York (AFP) - The release of the latest image generator on OpenAI's ChatGPT has triggered an online flood of memes featuring images done in the style of Studio Ghibli, the Japanese studio behind classic animated films like "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Princess Mononoke." The virality of these images, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even changing his profile picture on X to match the style, immediately raised questions about copyright infringement by the ChatGPT maker, which already faces lawsuits regarding the use of source material without permission. Since the release on Wednesday, AI-generated images depicting Studio Ghibli versions of Elon Musk with President Donald Trump, "The Lord of the Rings," and even a recreation of the September 11 attacks have gone viral across online platforms. Originally intended to be available on the platform for free, Altman said the huge success of the new generator was unexpected and meant the tool would remain limited to paid users for now. It was already possible to generate images with ChatGPT, but the latest version is powered by GPT-4o, the company's highest-performing model, and allows sophisticated results to be obtained through very succinct requests, which was not the case before. After the viral trend, a video from 2016 resurfaced in which Studio Ghibli's legendary director Hayao Miyazaki is seen lashing out during an AI demonstration from staff. "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," an English translation of his remarks said in the video. The trend "is especially insidious and malicious because of how outspokenly scathing Miyazaki has been toward the tech," wrote artist and illustrator Jayd "Chira" Ait-Kaci on Bluesky. "It's always about contempt for artists, every time," Ait-Kaci added. OpenAI is facing a barrage of lawsuits over copyright infringements, including one major case with the New York Times and others from artists, musicians and publishers. The company is meanwhile aggressively lobbying the White House and Congress to make the use of copyrighted content by AI companies part of the fair use doctrine. Fair use allowances already apply to search engines or in the case of satire and memes online, and allow companies to freely use copyrighted material without permission. Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that OpenAI is close to finalizing a $40 billion funding round led by Japan's SoftBank Group that would be the biggest funding round ever for a startup. OpenAI has projected its annual revenue could exceed $12.7 billion in 2025, up from $3.7 billion expected this year.

Studio Ghibli AI image trend floods social media, cheered on by OpenAI and denounced by critics as an insult to Hayao Miyazaki

If you're on social media you've probably stumbled over some quote, clip, or screen grab from one of Studio Ghibli's movies, but with ChatGPT's newest update introducing its most refined image generation yet, you're now just as likely to find an AI facsimile with a startling resemblance to the real thing. Possibly based on someone's vacation photos. The trend is hitting social media like a hurricane and has attracted the attention of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who changed his X profile image to a Ghibli-inspired self-portrait. But it's not just him: America's very own verified White House X account posted an image in the same style, showing a US soldier putting handcuffs on a woman in tears, referencing a real event in Philadelphia last week. If you had any concerns about generative AI's implications in regard to ethics, artist rights, or copyright, that conversation is hitting a fever pitch all over the internet. That this latest generative AI fad mimics the work of someone as beloved as Hayao Miyazaki has made it particularly obscene to critics. As filmmaker Robbie Shilstone said in a thread on X: "Miyazaki spent his entire life building one of the most expansive and imaginative bodies of work, all so you could rip it off and use it as a filter for your vacation photos ... I can't think of a worse artist to do it to as well. He is notorious for his attention to detail, his painstaking revisions, his uncompromising dedication to his craft." User slimjosa concurred, saying in a quote repost of an AI-generated Ghibli image: "The whole Studio Ghibli AI trend honestly gives me second-hand embarrassment knowing how hard Hayao Miyazaki has fought to retain the identity of his films and how many of you are this willing to make a farce out of decades of artistry because you don't actually value it". That post has racked up nearly 50,000 likes. Also worth noting is generative AI's carbon footprint, as it relies on energy-guzzling data centers to function. While OpenAI doesn't disclose specific data regarding its emissions, a report from Goldman Sachs last year noted "a ChatGPT query needs nearly 10 times as much electricity to process as a Google search." It's hard not to think of a notorious Miyazaki clip where he calls a procedural animation technique "an insult to life itself," adding that "anyone who creates this stuff has no idea what pain is". While he wasn't talking about generative AI as we understand it now, the crew demonstrating their technology to him said their goal was to "build a machine that can draw pictures like humans do." It hardly feels like a stretch to make the connection between that attitude and this technology.

'Our GPUs are melting': OpenAI puts restrictions on new image tool

ChatGPT's new feature that can generate images in the style of a popular Japanese animation studio is so popular that OpenAI has to put temporary limits on its use. ChatGPT's new image generation tool is so popular that parent company OpenAI has to put in place "temporary" limits on how many are generated. OpenAI released a new version of its artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT this week that lets users transform popular Internet memes or personal photos into the style of Studio Ghibli, a famous Japanese animation studio. "It's super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT, but our GPUs are melting," CEO Sam Altman posted on X on Thursday, not specifying what the restricted rate will be but that it "hopefully" won't be in place for very long. While users love the new feature, it has raised ethical questions about how AI tools train on copyrighted creative works, including the designs of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. In a technical paper posted on Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles - which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations". OpenAI is already facing other copyright battles from some American newspapers for using their content to train ChatGPT. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, told the Associated Press that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic". Euronews Next contacted OpenAI to see whether they have a license or permission to use Studio Ghibli's work to train their AI but did not receive an immediate reply. Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists". "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation". Altman and the official White House got into the trend, posting a Ghibli-fied display picture and a rendering of a detained migrant on their X accounts. Users used the new tool to give a Ghibli style to iconic images like the Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec that went viral at the 2024 Olympics. "Disaster Girl," where a four-year-old turns to the camera with a small smile as a house burns in the background, is one example of a meme that had been given the effect. Ghibli hasn't commented on the new ChatGPT tool yet, but Miyazaki has made previous comments on AI animation. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. Miyazaki said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all". "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added.

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images: 'An insult to life itself'

You may have noticed this week that everything from historic photos, classic film scenes, internet memes and recent political moments have been reimagined online as Studio Ghibli-style portraits. The trend quickly went viral, all thanks to ChatGPT and the OpenAI chatbot's latest update, which launched on Tuesday (25 March). The latest addition to the GPT-4o has meant users can replicate the distinct artistic style of animation studio co-creator and legendary Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki (My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away). "Today is a great internet day," one user declared as he shared popular memes in the Ghibli format. That's all well and good, but the trend has also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the livelihoods of human artists. Not that that's a concern for ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments. Its CEO Sam Altman even changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. What started as another example of how OpenAI doesn't care about the work of artists went straight to the White House, with Donald Trump's administration exploitating the trend in the most insulting and tone-deaf of ways. Indeed, Trump's administration jumped onto the trend bandwagon, using the White House's official X account to post a Ghibli-style image of a weeping woman from the Dominican Republic recently arrested by US immigration agents. Sickening. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. His previous comments on AI animation have resurfaced and also gone viral, with the animator saying he was "utterly disgusted" by an AI demo. The video is from 2016. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. The clip ends with a voiceover from Miyazaki saying: "I feel like we are nearing the end of times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves." Check it out: Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Again, "problematic" doesn't phase Sam Altman. Even if ChatGPT's increasingly popular new image generation tool has led to OpenAI putting in place "temporary" limits on how many are generated, Altman has stated that the unspecified cap "hopefully" won't be in place for very long. "It's super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT, but our GPUs are melting," said Altman. Let them melt. And thankfully, some X users are speaking out:

OpenAI's viral Studio Ghibli-inspired AI art comes under hailstorm of criticism - SiliconANGLE

OpenAI's viral Studio Ghibli-inspired AI art comes under hailstorm of criticism OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman today announced that he was withdrawing the free-tier rollout of the new image-generation tool trained partly by the renowned Japanese animation school Studio Ghibli after images flooded the internet just a day after its release. Altman explained that the "rollout to our free tier is unfortunately going to be delayed for a while." This came after the internet was pervaded with images, including the reimagining of 9/11 and the Kennedy assassination in the style of the studio that created the hit animation film "Spirited Away." The popularity of the new product has elicited concerns over AI consuming art, with questions of AI copyright infringement again coming to the fore. The new generator's style is unmistakably that of the Japanese studio, and it seems OpenAI hasn't paid for this. Just yesterday, the New York Times gained the right to proceed with a lawsuit over a similar matter, only involving words, not pictures. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," OpenAI said in a technical paper release this Tuesday. The company later added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles - which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli and its North American distributor have yet to comment. The studio's founder, Hayao Miyazaki, 84, also hasn't commented, but he may perceive this as blasphemy in art. In 2016 after being shown an early version of AI-created art, he said he was "utterly disgusted," though this was concerning the image of a head dragging a body. Nonetheless, he said he would never "incorporate this technology into my work at all" and that it is "an insult to life itself." The artist Karla Ortiz, who is presently suing other AI firms over copyright infringement, told the Associated Press that this is "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." She called the use of someone else's work to promote OpenAI's product an "insult" and "exploitation."

Did Japan's Copyright Loophole Spark the 'Ghiblification' of AI?

An old remark from Hayao Miyazaki, one of the founders of Studio Ghibli, on AI-generated art being an "insult to life itself" has resurfaced. Grant Slatton, a founding engineer at Row Zero, used OpenAI's 4o image generation to generate a Studio Ghibli version of a picture, sparking a trend that's still going strong as of now. Those who have not tried it yet, there's a good chance they will join in after hearing about it. Recently, OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, introduced native image generation features in GPT-4o. This development enables GPT-4o to produce a wide range of images, including infographics, comic strips, signboards, graphics, menus, memes, street signs, and more. It is also possible to refine and edit images generated with follow-up prompts. The feature is available for users with Plus, Pro, Team, and Free plans. However, the trend has raised several crucial questions: how was the model able to replicate Studio Ghibli's art style so accurately? Aren't there copyright issues involved? What exactly made this possible in the first place? To start with, DeepLearning.AI, in a blog post in 2023, highlighted that Japan's laws enable developers to train models on copyright-protected materials. Notably, many raised concerns about this law. In 2024, the Japanese government's Agency for Cultural Affairs published a document titled 'General Understanding on AI and Copyright in Japan'. The document explained the concepts of when the copyright laws come into effect, and when the data, irrespective of copyrights, can be used for AI. It stated that, when discussing AI and copyright, it is crucial to distinguish between the exploitation of copyrighted works during the AI development and training phase and infringement during the generation and utilisation phase. "Exploitation of a copyrighted work not for enjoyment of the thoughts or sentiments expressed in the copyrighted work...may, in principle, be allowed without the permission of the copyright holder," it further read. It explained that "enjoyment" in the above context refers to "the act of obtaining the benefit of having the viewer's intellectual and emotional needs satisfied through using copyrighted work". This means that anyone developing an AI model does not need the consent of the copyright holder if the purpose of the training is not for enjoyment purposes. The document mentioned that if AI training generates content closely resembling copyrighted works, or if such works are used as input for generative AI to implement retrieval augmented generation (RAG), it would not qualify as being for non-enjoyment purposes. Notably, the document further stated, "Copyright protection applies to the 'creative expressions' of an idea and not to the idea itself. Therefore, an AI-generated material which applies the 'creator's style' of a preexisting copyrighted work does not infringe copyright if the style merely encompasses an idea." Gergely Orosz, creator of The Pragmatic Engineer Newsletter, highlighted a similar observation on X. "[I] was wondering why OpenAI chose to showcase images in the style of Japanese art studio Studio Ghibli, but not Disney characters, Marvel Comics, etc. I suspect it's because Japan is the only major country that made training on copyrighted works legal." Evan Brown, an intellectual property lawyer at Neal & McDevitt law firm, told TechCrunch that products like GPT-4o's native image generator operate in a legal gray area, considering style is not explicitly protected by copyright. While the internet continues to debate the ethics of AI mimicking the art style of an award-winning Japanese animation studio is right or wrong, the trend has firmly taken hold, with many now labelling the creations as 'Ghiblified' images. Amidst the trend, an old remark from Hayao Miyazaki, one of the founders of Studio Ghibli, on AI-generated art being an "insult to life itself" has resurfaced. Despite the copyright concern and the ethical angle of recreating an art style, the legacy of the original art style can never be replaced.

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlights AI copyright concerns

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall." Similar results gave the Ghibli style to iconic images, such as the casual look of Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec in a T-shirt and one hand in his pocket on his way to winning a silver medal at the 2024 Olympics. Or the famed "Disaster Girl" meme of a 4-year-old turning to the camera with a slight smile as a house fire rages in the background. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli hasn't yet commented on the trend. The Japanese studio and its North American distributor didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg said that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. "A 'Howl's Moving Castle' or 'Spirited Away,' you could freeze a frame in any of those films and point to specific things, and then look at the output of generative AI and see identical elements or substantially similar elements in that output," he said. "Just stopping at, 'Oh, well, style isn't protectable under copyright law.' That's not necessarily the end of the inquiry." Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation." The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP's text archives.

The viral Studio Ghibli trend explained: How to create your own

You've likely seen them flooding your social media feeds: enchanting portraits and reimagined scenes bathing in the soft, whimsical aesthetic of beloved Japanese animation house, Studio Ghibli. This explosion of anime-inspired visuals is the latest viral phenomenon, known as the Studio Ghibli trend. It's captivating users worldwide, allowing them to step into the frames of films like 'Spirited Away' or 'My Neighbor Totoro' - all thanks to accessible AI tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT. But this enchanting trend isn't without its share of debate. At its core, the Studio Ghibli trend involves users uploading their personal photos (or other images) to AI image generation tools, primarily ChatGPT equipped with the GPT-4o model, and prompting the AI to recreate them in the distinct artistic style of Studio Ghibli. This typically includes: The results range from personal portraits transformed into anime characters to famous memes and even movie scenes getting the Ghibli treatment. This accessibility, allowing everyday users to engage with advanced AI for creative expression, is a key driver behind the viral nature of the Studio Ghibli trend across platforms like X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram. Several factors converged to ignite the Studio Ghibli trend. The primary catalyst was the release and enhanced capabilities of OpenAI's GPT-4o model. Key aspects include: Ready to see yourself as a character from a Hayao Miyazaki film? Participating in the Studio Ghibli trend using ChatGPT is surprisingly straightforward. Here's how: Update: Looks like controversy made OpenAI step back. Here's Sam Altman's tweet about it, now ChatGPT won't generate this style: When we ask ChatGPT to generate using "Studio Ghibli" keywords, it won't generate, but we made it to describe the style throughly. You can use this in any other image generator: "An animation style defined by its hand-drawn, painterly quality -- where each frame feels like a watercolor illustration come to life. Characters are designed with soft, expressive features, often with large, emotionally rich eyes and fluid, naturalistic movements. Hair flows with weight and realism, clothing ripples in the wind, and body language carries subtle emotion, often more powerful than words. The environments are lush and immersive, almost like characters themselves. Nature is depicted with reverence -- sun-dappled forests, rustling leaves, and sweeping countryside landscapes full of life and detail. Architecture blends traditional and fantastical, with intricate wooden houses, steampunk-inspired contraptions, or whimsical airships that feel both old and new. There's a strong focus on atmosphere: warm glows during sunset, misty mountain mornings, rain that feels almost tangible. Lighting is gentle, often diffused, creating a dreamlike calm. The color palette is rich but never overwhelming -- earthy greens, ocean blues, faded pastels. There's a deliberate slowness to the pacing, allowing viewers to take in the stillness of a scene -- a kettle whistling, a breeze through tall grass, the quiet hum of a town. This aesthetic often carries a sense of nostalgia, innocence, and a quiet melancholy. Even when fantastical creatures or surreal events enter the scene, the world feels grounded -- anchored by its emotional honesty, its small human moments, and its deep connection to nature and everyday life." Feel free to mix and match elements from these examples or add details specific to your photo or desired Ghibli film (e.g., "add small magical creatures," "set it during a golden hour sunset," "make the background like the forests in 'Princess Mononoke'"). Remember, specificity often yields better results! You can also try mentioning specific Ghibli films or elements you want to see (e.g., "add lush foliage," "give it a slightly nostalgic feel"). Pro tip: Don't be afraid to refine your prompt and try again if the first result isn't quite right. Adding more descriptive words about the mood, lighting, or specific Ghibli elements can significantly improve the outcome. While ChatGPT with GPT-4o is central to the current Studio Ghibli trend, remember that other AI image generators (like Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, etc.) might also be capable of producing similar styles with the right prompting techniques. To fully appreciate the Studio Ghibli trend and the surrounding discussion, it helps to know the source. Founded in Japan in 1985 by legendary directors Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata (along with producer Toshio Suzuki), Studio Ghibli is renowned globally for its breathtaking animation and profound storytelling. Key characteristics include: The studio's dedication to art and craft makes it a cultural icon, which adds weight to the controversy surrounding the AI-driven Studio Ghibli trend. While the Studio Ghibli trend is fun for many users, it has sparked significant backlash and debate within art and fan communities. The core issues revolve around ethics, copyright, and respect for artistic integrity: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman acknowledged the trend's virality with some humor, but the underlying ethical questions remain a serious topic of discussion. ChatGPT itself may even block requests to generate Ghibli-style images if they involve clearly copyrighted characters or specific memes, citing content policies. The Studio Ghibli trend is a potent example of modern AI's capabilities and cultural impact. It offers a playful, accessible way for fans to engage with a beloved aesthetic, democratizing creative tools in an unprecedented manner. Following the steps outlined above, almost anyone can now generate their own Ghibli-inspired artwork in minutes.

Hayao Miyazaki Would Hate You Losers

Studio Ghibli-style A.I. slop is all the rage, thanks to a ChatGPT update. There are so many things wrong with that. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Since OpenAI released an update earlier this week that improved ChatGPT's ability to generate images based on detailed requests, a dark evil has infected the internet, responsible for the shriveling of souls and the wanton destruction of life and nature itself: Studio Ghibli A.I. slop. Social media has been flooded with images of the most random shit imaginable rendered in the signature style of Hayao Miyazaki, the legendary animator and co-founder of the Japanese company Studio Ghibli, renowned for hand-drawn animated films such as Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, and My Neighbor Totoro. X in particular, Elon Musk's land of the rising bot, is rife with viral posts extolling the virtues of an innovation that steals human-made creations, chews them into paste, and spits out the reassembled remains, stripped of any of the originality, spirit, and labor that makes art art. Clearly, the new 4o tool's Ghibli-bility -- which Business Insider reports is currently not available on the free version of ChatGPT due to "copyright," but is apparently available on the paid version for reasons unknown -- is a hit among people who have no imagination of their own to speak of. Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, joked about the Ghibli generator overshadowing any of his other accomplishments, changed his X profile picture to one of a Ghibli-style white nerd (presumably him, presumably generated through ChatGPT), and seemingly hit back at critics calling his company's slop "slop." On Thursday, the White House's X account posted its own Ghibli slop handcuffing an ICE agent arresting a weeping woman, modeled after a Dominican Republic immigrant who had been convicted of fentanyl trafficking. If that doesn't convince you that A.I. slop is wretched, fetid rot, unworthy of the resources, funding, and jobs that it costs, not to mention the environmental toll it takes, then perhaps nothing will. Not even the words of Miyazaki, who famously once said -- in a clip, currently recirculating online, from the 2016 documentary Never-Ending Man -- of machine-created art: The truth is, Hayao Miyazaki would hate you fucking losers. Every last one of you using this abomination of technology, whether just for a lark or because you actually hold an ideological commitment to killing artistry, jobs, and the Earth in favor of enriching the most craven, grasping, ruinous people alive. Miyazaki, whose films are made possible only by the painstaking toil of human imagination and hands, putting countless hours into producing the moving images that are instantly recognizable as Studio Ghibli's: the deceptively simple-looking forms paired with fantastical figures, outlined in clean lines, against exquisitely painted backgrounds. Miyazaki, whose movies are shaped by core beliefs against fascism and war, against unchecked greed, and against the decimation of nature and its bounty -- themes that are evident to any 8-year-old who asks, "Mommy, why did the spirits who took the gold get eaten by the monster?" but clearly not to the many adults clamoring to ape the filmmaker's style but none of his substance. Miyazaki, who confesses to a deep pessimism about the future of the world, calling humanity's dreams "cursed," and yet has made his life's work about ordinary people trying to be kinder, braver, and more compassionate in the face of adversity. His final film, How Do You Live? -- known to English-speaking audiences as The Boy and the Heron -- poses that question of what kind of life we should strive for to its young protagonist, who is presented with the puzzle of how to build a better world. So, yes, I'm comfortable concluding that Miyazaki would despise you. You are his stories' warmongers and industrialists and uncaring grown-ups -- only, here, there is no empathetic backstory complicating your actions, no lepers you're cutting down trees to save. You're just contributing to the theft and devaluation of originality and labor, the waste of resources growing ever scarcer, and the power of creeps and fascists -- all just for a throwaway pic, a few thousand likes, and the slim chance that Elon Musk will reply to you with a "🤣" emoji.

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlight AI copyright concerns

LOS ANGELES -- Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall." Similar results gave the Ghibli style to iconic images, such as the casual look of Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec in a T-shirt and one hand in his pocket on his way to winning a silver medal at the 2024 Olympics. Or the famed "Disaster Girl" meme of a 4-year-old turning to the camera with a slight smile as a house fire rages in the background. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli in Japan declined to comment Friday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg said that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. "A 'Howl's Moving Castle' or 'Spirited Away,' you could freeze a frame in any of those films and point to specific things, and then look at the output of generative AI and see identical elements or substantially similar elements in that output," he said. "Just stopping at, 'Oh, well, style isn't protectable under copyright law.' That's not necessarily the end of the inquiry." Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation." Ortiz was further enraged when President Donald Trump's administration jumped into the meme trend Thursday, using the White House's official X account to post a Ghibli-style image of a weeping woman from the Dominican Republic recently arrested by U.S. immigration agents. The White House and OpenAI didn't immediately respond to requests for comment on how the image was made. "To see something so brilliant, as wonderful as Miyazaki's work be butchered to generate something so foul," Ortiz wrote on social media, adding that she hoped Studio Ghibli sues "the hell out of" OpenAI for this. -- -- -- -- -- - O'Brien reported from Providence, Rhode Island. AP writer Yuri Kageyama in Tokyo contributed to this report. -- -- -- -- -- - The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP's text archives.

Studio Ghibli-style AI images are melting OpenAI's GPUs confirms Sam Altman

TL;DR: OpenAI's new image feature in ChatGPT allows users to recreate iconic moments in Studio Ghibli's art style, leading to a surge of such images on social media. This feature, part of the GPT-4o model, has also been used to recreate the Lord of the Rings trailer. High demand has led to temporary rate limits. Since OpenAI rolled out its new image generation feature in ChatGPT thousands of users are taking to social media platforms to share recreations of iconic events in history, movies, TV shows in the art-style of Japanese animation studio, Studio Ghibli. The tsunami of Studio Ghibli-style images began when OpenAI launched what it describes as the "most advanced image generator yet," which includes capabilities of producing "precise, accurate, photorealistic outputs." For those who are unfamiliar with Studio Ghibli, the animation studio is behind renowned films such as Spired Away, How's Moving Castle, and My Neighbor Totor, all of which are directed by Hayao Miyazaki. The new addition to OpenAI's GPT4o model enables users to recreate images in the style of the animation studio, which has been abundantly used to recreate some of the most viral memes ever created on the internet. Additionally, the capabilities of the new AI model have been used to recreate the trailer for Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, shot for shot. Above is a comparison showing a side-by-side between the Studio Ghibli-inspired trailer and the real trailer. These thousands, possibly millions of new images emerging on social media platforms all require GPU processing power to create, and according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, "our GPUs are melting," and the demand has now resulted in OpenAI having to "temporarily introduce some rate limits while we work on making it more efficient. hopefully won't be long!"

AI generated Ghibli images go viral as OpenAI loosens its rules

Artificial intelligence images from OpenAI's new image generator went viral this week on social media after the company loosened its rules around what kind of images users can make. People embraced the tool to create images made in the style of Studio Ghibli, the animation company behind movies including "Princess Mononoke" and "Spirited Away." First, they shared images of themselves and friends in Ghibli's iconic style. But soon, people were making Ghibli-style images of historical moments, including a plane hitting the twin towers, John F. Kennedy's assassination and the "Saigon Execution" photo of a South Vietnamese general shooting a Viet Cong captive in the head at point-blank range in 1968. The White House's official X account also joined in the meme, posting a Ghibli-style image of a crying woman who was being arrested by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. The account explained that the image was of a real person who it said was a fentanyl dealer who had recently been arrested. The posts which went viral on social media reignited the debate over what AI companies owe artists and whether copyright laws need to evolve to incorporate the rapid technological shifts that AI is ushering in. ChatGPT maker OpenAI released the updated version of its image-generating AI tool on Tuesday and at the same time, it said it was relaxing its rules on how people could use its technology, allowing them to use the AI to make images that mimicked the look and feel of existing artistic styles. The explosion of images, ranging from friendly selfies to re-creations of violent historical photos, underlines how AI tools are upending the world of art and copyright, ushering in a world where anyone can use AI to make complex images, songs and writing that mimics the style of creative geniuses who may have trained for years to hone their skills. Lawsuits are working their way through the courts, trying to force AI companies to pay for the images and other content they scraped from the internet to train their technology. But the companies are moving ahead with the new tech, arguing that AI will enable more people to fulfill their creative vision and help existing artists make even grander creations. "AI lab employees should not be the arbiters of what people should and shouldn't be allowed to create," Joanne Jang, head of product at OpenAI, said Thursday in a post on X explaining why OpenAI had changed its policies to allow more freedom with what kind of images people are allowed to make with its tools. Spokespeople for Nippon TV, the Japanese media conglomerate that owns Studio Ghibli, did not respond to a request for comment. A representative of GKIDS, which distributes Studio Ghibli films in the United States, did not respond to requests for comment. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible. We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles - which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," said Kayla Wood, a spokeswoman for OpenAI. "We're always learning from real-world use and feedback, and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." OpenAI CEO Sam Altman celebrated the viral moment, changing his profile picture on X to a "Ghiblified" version of himself and then later saying that the company had to slow down people's access to its tools because so many users were trying to use it at the same time. Studio Ghibli, headed by artist Hayao Miyazaki, is known for its dreamy watercolors and intricate illustrations - each frame in a Ghibli film is drawn and colored by hand, the studio has said. Sometimes artists spend months working on a single scene. Miyazaki himself has railed against the use of artificial intelligence in art. "I would never want to incorporate this technology into my work at all," he said in a video posted to YouTube in 2016. "I strongly feel it is an insult to life itself." As social feeds filled with Ghibli-style selfies, some artists posted in protest: Amid an ongoing battle over AI training data and the rights of artists, was OpenAI really going to let its users spam the internet with images so clearly dependent on Miyazaki's distinct style? "The sad part isn't that AI is generating Ghibli-style art, imitation is inevitable," said poet Puneet Sharma in a post on X. "What's sad is that most users know nothing of Miyazaki, nor do they grasp the difference between process and processed, between creation as a journey and consumption as a shortcut." Since OpenAI released the first public model of ChatGPT in 2022, legal questions have swirled about the company's use of real artists' and writers' work to train its chatbots. Many publishers and creators - from online newspaper to popular songwriters - have argued that AI companies are violating copyright law when they scrape content from the internet to teach chatbots how to generate text, images and video. AI models like the ones built by OpenAI are trained on huge amounts of information. OpenAI and other AI companies including Google, Meta and Microsoft have all used public data from the internet for this training, though they do not disclose specifically what they have used for individual AI models. Datasets of Studio Ghibli movies and still images are easily available online. A wave of lawsuits seeks to challenge the use of copyright works in AI training, but AI companies have argued that qualifies as fair use, a concept in copyright law that allows someone to reuse someone else's art if they transform or remix it in a creative way. Several major lawsuits from authors and news organizations are seeking to determine whether AI generation really falls under fair use. Court rulings are still months away. The Ghibli trend echoes some of AI's viral moments. Namely: People love to share images of themselves. When the generative AI app Lensa shot to the top of app charts in late 2022, people took to X, Instagram and Reddit en masse to share AI selfies in the style of Renaissance paintings, anime or fairycore. Artists raised concerns at the time, saying the app's stylistic copying showed why real-world artists and designers were losing work and income to AI. Ben Zhao, a computer science professor at the University of Chicago and co-creator of the tool Glaze, which helps artists protect their work from AI mimicry, said he's disappointed to see OpenAI take advantage of Studio Ghibli's beloved style to promote its products. By publicly "Ghiblifying" himself, Altman gave his tacit approval to the trend - a move made more insulting by OpenAI's claim that it blocks its models from mimicking the work of living artists, Zhao said.

ChatGPT's Viral Studio Ghibli-Style Images Highlights AI Copyright Concerns

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall." Similar results gave the Ghibli style to iconic images, such as the casual look of Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec in a T-shirt and one hand in his pocket on his way to winning a silver medal at the 2024 Olympics. Or the famed "Disaster Girl" meme of a 4-year-old turning to the camera with a slight smile as a house fire rages in the background. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli hasn't yet commented on the trend. The Japanese studio and its North American distributor didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg said that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. "A 'Howl's Moving Castle' or 'Spirited Away,' you could freeze a frame in any of those films and point to specific things, and then look at the output of generative AI and see identical elements or substantially similar elements in that output," he said. "Just stopping at, 'Oh, well, style isn't protectable under copyright law.' That's not necessarily the end of the inquiry." Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation." The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP's text archives. Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

ChatGPT's Viral Studio Ghibli-Style Images Spark AI Copyright Concerns

But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall."

Studio Ghibli portraits from OpenAI spark outrage

Nvidia's CEO Jensen Huang presented an AI-powered "Star Wars" droid and showcased its abilities at Nvidia GTC in San Jose. From its inception, artificial intelligence has stoked fear among the creative community. Amid the rapid expansion of AI and ever-growing discussions of how machine learning may upend modern life, many artists have begun to sound the alarm on what they fear may be a free-for-all of unauthorized use and theft. No scenario better depicts that tension than the current controversy roiling OpenAI's new image generator and the popular animation house Studio Ghibli, known for its animated movies including "Spirited Away" and "My Neighbor Totoro." Here's a rundown on how it all started, and why it has creative critics of the technology up in arms. The Studio Ghibli, AI controversy explained On Tuesday, OpenAI, perhaps the most powerful mover in the machine learning space, released a new Image generator, powered by GPT-4o. When fans of animator Hayao Miyazaki, the co-founder of Studio Ghibli, noticed that they could ask the technology to recreate modern memes and scenarios in his style, social media became became awash with the images. Want to see the Pillsbury Doughboy as a character in "Howl's Moving Castle" (one of Miyazaki's most famous films)? No problem. How about a Troll, but Ghibli-style? Done! OpenAI founder Sam Altman even joined in, changing his profile photo on X to an image of him in Ghibli style. In a more sinister example, the official White House X account posted an AI-generated, Ghibli-style portrait of a woman crying amid deportation. While the software does issue a disclaimer before spitting out its design, seemingly to avoid trademark issues, some fair-use hawks are not convinced. "I can't create images in the exact style of Studio Ghibli due to content policies, but I can generate a troll with a soft, whimsical, and painterly look inspired by Ghibli's magical worlds," the new image generator said in a trial run by USA TODAY. "Would you like me to proceed with that?" In a technical paper posted Tuesday, OpenAI insisted it would take a "conservative approach" to image generation as it learned more about how the tool was being used by the "creative community." "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it reads. In a statement sent to USA TODAY Friday, a spokesperson for OpenAI said the company's goal was "to give users as much creative freedom as possible." "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," the statement said. "We're always learning from real-world use and feedback, and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." USA TODAY has reached out to Studio Ghibli for comment. Fans were quick to point out, however, that the content warning does little to silence the fears of artists that the technology will result in widespread copyright infringement - violations that will remain unpunished on a technicality. Machine learning, after all, generates its knowledge from first-hand documents, which are products of a real person's labor. Miyazaki himself is also an AI critic. Shown a demo of the technology in 2016, the animator said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage. Miyazaki went on to say he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added.

OpenAI's GPUs Are 'Melting' Due to Demand for ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli-Style AI Images

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on Thursday that image generation was so popular, it was melting OpenAI's servers. OpenAI's latest image generator has sparked a social media trend where users upload images and ask ChatGPT to transform them into a specific anime style pioneered by Japanese animation company Studio Ghibli. Now, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says that the viral use of ChatGPT for Studio Ghibli-style images has become so popular that it is overwhelming the company's AI servers. The trend started on Tuesday, when OpenAI released its 4o image creator, its "most advanced image generator yet," building it into ChatGPT for paying and free plans. Users quickly discovered that ChatGPT's new image generator could replicate the Studio Ghibli anime style, characterized by muted colors and vivid details, seen in popular films like "Spirited Away" and "The Boy and the Heron." ChatGPT users flooded social media with these images earlier this week, transforming family portraits, replicating memes, and generating video clips of The Office. However, Altman stated in a post on X on Thursday that while it was "super fun seeing people love" ChatGPT images, the massive amount of image generation was overloading OpenAI's servers. "Our GPUs are melting," Altman wrote. GPUs, or graphics processing units, are specialized processors that power AI tasks. Altman wrote in the post that OpenAI would temporarily limit the number of images users could generate, with free users allowed a maximum of three images. He also changed his profile picture on X to a Studio Ghibli-style image of himself. But it might not all be AI fun. The co-founder of Studio Ghibli, Hayao Miyazaki, is famously very anti-AI. After seeing an AI-generated animation in 2016, Miyazaki said he would "never wish" to integrate AI into his work. "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he said, at the time. According to the 2020 documentary "10 Years with Hayao Miyazaki," Miyazaki and his team created 60,000 to 70,000 frames for a movie, each hand-drawn and painted with watercolor. A four-second clip in the 2013 movie "The Wind Rises" required 15 months of effort from one animator. Some social media users objected to ChatGPT generating images in the style of Studio Ghibli, writing on X that AI would never be able to replicate the emotion and depth present in human-made art from the studio. Others said that OpenAI stole the studio's artwork and is now profiting without compensating or seeking permission from the studio. The trend "is an insult" to Miyazaki, one user wrote in a post on X. Related: ChatGPT Is Roasting Instagram Profiles in a Hilarious New Social Media Trend -- Here's How to Get Access Hundreds of creatives recently voiced concerns about OpenAI and other AI companies training their systems on copyrighted pieces. Earlier this month, more than 400 Hollywood actors and filmmakers filed comments with the Trump administration's Office of Science and Technology Policy, pushing back against OpenAI and Google lobbying to train their AI on copyrighted work. Last year, musicians like Jon Bon Jovi and Billie Eilish signed an open letter speaking out against the use of AI in the music industry. OpenAI reportedly can't decide if Studio Ghibli-style images violate copyright. According to Business Insider, as of Thursday, the free version of ChatGPT blocks users from generating Ghibli-style images because Ghibli "is a copyrighted animation studio, and its artistic style is protected." However, the paid version of ChatGPT, with plans ranging from $20 to $200 per month, churns out these images with no problem.

Ghibli Effect: ChatGPT Usage Hits Record After Rollout of Viral Feature

The frenzy to create Ghibli-style AI art using ChatGPT's image-generation tool led to a record surge in users for OpenAI's chatbot last week, straining its servers and temporarily limiting the feature's usage. The viral trend saw users from across the globe flood social media with images based on the hand-drawn style of the famed Japanese animation outfit, Studio Ghibli, founded by renowned director Hayao Miyazaki and known for movies such as "Spirited Away" and "My Neighbor Totoro". Average weekly active users breached the 150 million mark for the first time this year, according to data from market research firm Similarweb. "We added one million users in the last hour," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in an X post on Monday, comparing it with the addition of one million users in five days following ChatGPT's red-hot launch more than two years ago. Active users, in-app subscription revenue and app downloads reached an all-time high last week, according to SensorTower data, after the AI company launched updates to its GPT-4o model, enabling advanced image generation capabilities. Global app downloads and weekly active users on the ChatGPT app grew 11 percent and five percent, respectively, from the prior week, while in-app purchase revenue increased six percent, the market intelligence firm said. However, the chatbot has been hit with a series of glitches and low-scale outages over the past week as it deals with a spike in traffic due to the popularity of its image-generating tool. "We are getting things under control, but you should expect new releases from OpenAI to be delayed, stuff to break, and for service to sometimes be slow as we deal with capacity challenges," the OpenAI co-founder said on Tuesday. Legal Uncertainty The extensive use of the AI tool for the Ghibli effect has also led to questions about potential copyright violations. "The legal landscape of AI-generated images mimicking Studio Ghibli's distinctive style is an uncertain terrain. Copyright law has generally protected only specific expressions rather than artistic styles themselves," said Evan Brown, partner at law firm Neal & McDevitt. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the data used to train its AI models and the legality surrounding its latest feature. Studio Ghibli co-founder Miyazaki's comments from 2016 on AI-generated images resurfaced after the trend blew up last week. "I am utterly disgusted," Miyazaki had said after being shown an early render of an AI-generated. "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." © Thomson Reuters 2025

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlight AI copyright concerns

Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." "I really fell in love with the result," said Lingeswaran, an entrepreneur who lives near Aachen, Germany. "We're thinking of printing it out and hanging it on the wall." Similar results gave the Ghibli style to iconic images, such as the casual look of Turkish pistol shooter Yusuf Dikec in a T-shirt and one hand in his pocket on his way to winning a silver medal at the 2024 Olympics. Or the famed "Disaster Girl" meme of a 4-year-old turning to the camera with a slight smile as a house fire rages in the background. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles - which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli hasn't yet commented on the trend. The Japanese studio and its North American distributor didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg said that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. "A 'Howl's Moving Castle' or 'Spirited Away,' you could freeze a frame in any of those films and point to specific things, and then look at the output of generative AI and see identical elements or substantially similar elements in that output," he said. "Just stopping at, 'Oh, well, style isn't protectable under copyright law.' That's not necessarily the end of the inquiry." Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists." "That's using Ghibli's branding, their name, their work, their reputation, to promote (OpenAI) products," Ortiz said. "It's an insult. It's exploitation." Ortiz was further enraged when President Donald Trump's administration jumped into the meme trend Thursday, using the White House's official X account to post a Ghibli-style image of a weeping woman from the Dominican Republic recently arrested by U.S. immigration agents. The White House and OpenAI didn't immediately respond to requests for comment on how the image was made. "To see something so brilliant, as wonderful as Miyazaki's work be butchered to generate something so foul," Ortiz wrote on social media, adding that she hoped Studio Ghibli sues "the hell out of" OpenAI for this.

OpenAI updates content moderation policies on image generation; here's what allowed now

OpenAI has made major adjustments to its image generation and content moderation policies on ChatGPT. The new image generator, powered by GPT-4o and capable of generating Studio Ghibli-style images, is only available to paying users due to high demand. Overall content restrictions have also been relaxed, permitting images of public figures and some hate symbols, highlighting an ongoing debate about AI moderation.OpenAI has revised its content moderation policies which enables ChatGPT to generate images of public figures, hateful symbols in educational contexts, and specific racial features upon request. Previously, such requests were declined outright since it was controversial. OpenAI's model behaviour lead Joanne Jang explained the policy shift in a blog post. Jang stated that they are shifting from blanket refusals in sensitive areas to a more precise approach which focuses on preventing real-world harm. She added that the goal is to embrace humility, recognising how much they don't know and positioning themselves to adapt as they learn. As per a TechCrunch report, this move is a part of OpenAI's broader strategy to 'uncensor' ChatGPT that they announced in February. This strategy aims to reduce refusals and offer diverse perspectives. Reportedly, under the new policy, the users can now request modifications in physical features in images like making a person appear heavier or of a different Asian -- this was previously prohibited. But OpenAI maintains restrictions on imitating the styles of living artists and still applies the safeguards to prevent misuse, especially regarding children's pictures. Also Read : Did Nintendo just drop a big hint about Switch 2? Here's what we know According to another Indian Express report, despite its rapid popularity, OpenAI has restricted access to its new GPT-4o image generator to paid users only. Initially, the company promised the feature for free-tier users however overwhelming demand has led to a delay. CEO Sam Altman, as per the report, in a social media post had written that images in ChatGPT gained more popularity than they anticipated and thus the rollout for their free tier is going to be delayed for a while. Reportedly, at present, only Plus ($20/month) and Pro ($200/month) subscribers can access the advanced image generator. The users can still generate images, but only using DALL-E. The results of the latter are not on par with those of GPT-4o. As per the TechCrunch report, these changes have come amid growing concern over AI censorship. OpenAI has maintained that these modifications are not politically motivated and that they reflect their long-term goal of giving users more control. Also Read : Tesco makes changes in app; Clubcard holders must install latest update in 3 days to retain benefits But OpenAI's decision could have political and regulatory implications, particularly under the Trump administration which has criticised AI content restrictions. The TechCrunch report added that letting an AI chatbot answer sensitive questions could land the company in hot water soon enough. Tech giants like Meta and X have already relaxed similar policies. This has allowed more controversial discussions on their platforms. Because of excess demand, OpenAI has postponed the release of the GPT-4o image generator for free-tier customers. Currently, it is available to Plus and Pro users only. 2 . What new content can ChatGPT now create? ChatGPT can now generate images of celebrities, hateful symbols to use for educational purposes, and racial characteristics upon demand. OpenAI still has tight controls in place against objectionable content.

'Mirza Ghibli' and its arty discontents

Some people are expressing outrage over ChatGPT's new 'Studio Ghibli' image filter, arguing it disrespects the legacy of the renowned animation studio. Despite the controversy, Studio Ghibli has denied issuing a 'cease and desist' letter against the filter. The debate seems rooted more in elitism than genuine concern for art.Oh dear, oh dear. Move over real problems like neighbourhood potholes and climatic apocalypses. There's a new catastrophe gripping hearts of keyboard warriors: ChatGPT's crimes against art, a.k.a. its new 'Studio Ghibli' filter for images. That's right. This is the hill some people have chosen to die on-a water-coloured picturesque hill, mind you, probably with a whimsy tree, and a fluffy catbus zooming by. Apparently, some folks believe that letting ChatGPT generate images with a Ghibli-inspired aesthetic is a personal affront to Hayao Miyazaki himself. Yes, because a man who famously said, 'Anime was a mistake,' is dead against AI giving a meadow too much pastel glow. Whiners argue it's cheapening the legacy of the beloved animation studio. Then there are Caravaggiosts who insist that Ghiblified images 'can't replace real art'. Er, why on earth would an AI app want to do that? It's just another filter through which recognisable images-whether it's the 1992 demolition of Babri Masjid or iconic film scenes-are turned into the iconic, recognisable 'animation' images. Studio Ghibli itself has rebutted a fake 'cease and desist' letter making rounds on social media. In sooth, this isn't about respect for art. It's about people needing to feel superior about something, anything (read: 'I love/know Ghibli' that you don't understand).

Studio Ghibli-Style Images: Here's Free AI Tools to transform your photos into artwork

Studio Ghibli's animation style is renowned for its hand-drawn visuals, soft color palettes and imaginative settings. For people interested in recreating this distinctive aesthetic using artificial intelligence, here are some free tools and websites. To create Ghibli-style images using ChatGPT, start by visiting the ChatGPT website or app. Upload your desired photo by clicking the '+' icon. Next, enter a detailed prompt to instruct the AI on how to transform the image into a Studio Ghibli-style artwork. Once you submit the prompt, the AI will process the request and generate the stylized image. Hugging Face hosts the Studio Ghibli model developed by IShallRiseAgain, tailored for generating artwork in the style of Studio Ghibli animations. The model uses specialized prompts like "studio_ghibli_anime_style" to replicate the aesthetic elements of Ghibli films, including unique designs and color palettes. Accessible for free, this model supports creative projects and personal artwork. Also Read: Iyanu: Child of Wonder: When will it release? Here's voice cast, release date, storyline, trailer and where to watch Grok is a free platform that enables users to transform their photos into Studio Ghibli-style portraits. By uploading an image and entering a prompt like "Transform this image into a Studio Ghibli-style illustration," the tool generates a stylized version that can be saved or shared. To use Grok, visit its website or app and ensure that Grok 3 is the active model. Upload the desired photo and enter a prompt describing the transformation. The AI will process the request and generate the stylized image. If the result is not satisfactory, users can refine the image using Grok's editing tools. Fotor offers a free platform for transforming images into Studio Ghibli-style artwork. It provides multiple style options, including "Ghibli Style," "Ghibli Style 1," and "Ghibli Style 2." Users can upload an image, select the desired style, and download the Ghibli-inspired result. Fotor also features AI-powered photo editing tools for further enhancement. Also Read: 1923 Season 2: Episode 6 release date, time, where to watch and upcoming episode schedule insMind specializes in converting photos into Studio Ghibli-style artwork through its free AI filter. It captures the essence of Ghibli's aesthetic, producing visuals with rich colors and soft textures. Users can upload images and apply the filter to create anime-inspired portraits or scenes that closely resemble the iconic style of Ghibli films. Getimg.ai is a versatile AI tool supporting Studio Ghibli-style image generation. It offers both text-to-image and image-to-image features, allowing users to describe scenes or upload images for transformation into Ghibli-inspired artwork. The platform enables the creation of landscapes and characters reminiscent of Miyazaki's films. Are these AI tools free to use? Yes, platforms like Grok, Fotor, Getimg.ai, insMind, and Hugging Face offer free options for generating Studio Ghibli-style images. Do I need advanced skills to use these tools? No, these platforms feature user-friendly interfaces suitable for both beginners and professionals to create Ghibli-inspired artwork.

OpenAI's Sam Altman shares PM Modi's Ghibli AI art as ChatGPT hits over one million users in 24 hours

ChatGPT Ghibli Art: A series of AI-generated Studio Ghibli-style images featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken social media by storm. Shared by MyGovIndia, the artwork reimagines Modi in key political and cultural moments. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman acknowledged the trend, revealing that demand for the tool had reached extreme levels. While some celebrated the AI's creative potential, others criticised its use of Ghibli's artistic style, reigniting the debate on AI-generated art versus traditional animation.A wave of AI-generated Studio Ghibli-style images featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi has captivated social media. The Indian government's MyGovIndia account shared 12 illustrations, depicting Modi in diplomatic meetings with global leaders such as Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron, as well as cultural moments like praying at Ayodhya's Ram Mandir and engaging with children. The post was captioned: "Main character? No. He's the whole storyline. Experience through New India in Studio Ghibli strokes." The trend is part of a wider phenomenon where users across the world have used OpenAI's image-generation tool in ChatGPT to produce Ghibli-inspired art. The overwhelming demand prompted OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to announce temporary usage limits on March 30, 2025. "Our GPUs are melting," he admitted, highlighting the pressure on OpenAI's infrastructure. Altman, reflecting on the viral moment, compared it to ChatGPT's initial launch: "The ChatGPT launch 26 months ago was one of the craziest viral moments I'd ever seen, and we added one million users in five days," he wrote. "We added one million users in the last hour." In his recent tweet, he also announced that ChatGPT's image generation feature is now open to all users, even those using the free version. Altman's remarks come at a time when OpenAI's footprint in India is expanding rapidly. He previously noted that OpenAI had tripled its user base in India within a year, making it the company's second-largest market. This has fuelled speculation about a potential OpenAI office in the country, though no official plans have been announced. While the Modi-inspired images have received widespread attention, they have also sparked criticism. An old video of Studio Ghibli's co-founder, Hayao Miyazaki, has resurfaced, in which he strongly opposed AI-generated animation, calling it "an insult to life itself." His stance underscores the long-standing debate over AI's impact on traditional artistry. The viral trend has split opinion online. Some celebrated the AI's ability to create stunning artwork, while others accused OpenAI of exploiting Studio Ghibli's signature style without crediting the original creators. One X user sarcastically commented: "Wow, congrats! Using Ghibli's work to train your model and Ghibli's name to promote it really helped you generate huge revenue! And the fact that you're planning on paying a big royalty check to Ghibli proves you're a great guy, too!" Another user added: "ChatGPT didn't just go viral. It inverted the interface of intelligence. Suddenly, people could build, learn, and explore faster than institutions. That wasn't hype; that was a tectonic shift." OpenAI's image generator has gained immense popularity, allowing users to create artwork inspired by Ghibli's distinctive hand-drawn textures, soft colour palettes, and dreamlike settings. Studio Ghibli, founded in 1985 by Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki, is known for beloved classics such as Spirited Away and My Neighbour Totoro. As AI tools continue to reshape the creative landscape, the tension between artificial and traditional artistry remains unresolved. While AI-generated images provide new avenues for creativity, concerns over originality and artistic integrity persist. For now, Modi's AI-powered Ghibli transformation stands as a symbol of both the excitement and the controversy surrounding AI in art.

Ghibli trend or Ghibli trap: Is OpenAI turning your personal images into free AI training repository?

At the heart of this controversy lies an unsettling question: Is OpenAI using this viral trend to gather free, high-quality visual data to train its AI models? The concern isn't just about copyright -- though Miyazaki himself has condemned AI-generated art, calling it an "insult to life itself." Instead, activists are raising the alarm about an even bigger issue: data collection. Unlike web-scraped images, which fall under strict legal scrutiny, voluntarily uploaded images are a loophole. Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), OpenAI would normally need to justify scraping images from the internet under "legitimate interest," ensuring data protection safeguards are in place. However, when users freely upload their images, they are giving explicit consent, bypassing these restrictions entirely. Talking to AP, privacy expert Luiza Jarovsky of the AI, Tech & Privacy Academy warned: "When people voluntarily upload these images, they give their consent to OpenAI to process them. This is a different legal ground that gives more freedom to OpenAI, and the legitimate interest balancing test no longer applies." In simpler terms, OpenAI is gaining free, high-resolution images for AI training, all while keeping the originals to itself. Other platforms only see the final "Ghibli-style" version, but OpenAI gets both -- the raw and the altered data -- potentially enhancing its ability to train future AI models. The warnings are coming thick and fast. Cybersecurity groups, like Himachal Cyber Warriors, have cautioned users about the risks of uploading their faces to AI platforms. A viral post on X (formerly Twitter) read: "Think before you #Ghibli. That cute Ghibli-style selfie? It might cost more than you think. Your photo could be misused or manipulated. AI may train on it without your consent. Data brokers might sell it for targeted ads. Stay cyber smart. Your privacy matters." The growing unease isn't just paranoia. OpenAI's own privacy policy explicitly states that the company collects personal data input by users to train its AI models -- unless they opt out. Yet, few users realize this when eagerly participating in trends like Ghibli-fication. This isn't just about vanity filters. Meta's Chief AI Scientist, Yann LeCun, has long argued that AI models need visual input to reach human-level intelligence. Text alone, he says, is not enough. In fact, he estimates that: LeCun explains: "We're never going to get to human-level AI by just training on text. We're going to have to get systems to understand the real world, and understanding the real world is really hard." This could explain OpenAI's motivation behind viral visual trends like the Ghibli generator. Instead of buying expensive image datasets, OpenAI may have found a way to get millions of images -- for free. While Ghibli-style AI portraits may seem like harmless fun, the underlying reality is more complex. The internet has seen similar viral AI trends before -- remember Lensa AI's magic avatars or the FaceApp aging filter? Each time, privacy concerns followed, but by then, the data had already been collected. Are we witnessing the same playbook again? If so, the price of participation may be far higher than just a trendy new profile picture. Users may have unknowingly fed OpenAI the very thing it needed most: a massive, diverse, and high-quality dataset of human faces. So, before you upload that next Ghibli-style selfie, ask yourself: Is this really just a fun internet trend -- or are you handing over a piece of yourself to an AI you don't fully understand?

Not just images, want to make Ghibli-inspired videos? Here is a guide on how to create such videos using ChatGPT, Grok, more

AI-powered tools like ChatGPT, Grok 3, and Gemini enable users to easily create Studio Ghibli-style images and animations. This trend is growing due to the tools' ability to mimic Ghibli's nostalgic and aesthetically appealing art, making it accessible to non-artists while respecting copyright considerations.The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) in generating artistic images and animations has captured widespread interest, with Studio Ghibli-inspired creations emerging as a major trend. AI-powered tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT, xAI's Grok 3, and Google's Gemini now offer image generation capabilities, enabling users to craft visuals that mimic the signature hand-drawn aesthetic of Studio Ghibli films. Studio Ghibli, the legendary Japanese animation studio founded by Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki, is celebrated for its intricate backgrounds, soft color palettes, and fluid animations. Thanks to AI-driven image generators, recreating this distinctive artistic style has become more accessible than ever. Start by creating a beautiful Ghibli-style scene. You can do this in three ways: Once your image is ready, you can begin animating it to bring it to life. Creating Studio Ghibli-style images using AI requires a combination of the right tools, detailed prompts, and an understanding of the aesthetic elements that define Ghibli's signature style. Below are the key requirements needed to generate high-quality Ghibli-style AI images.

Soft-launching your beau with a 'Ghibli-fied' image? Beware! Users say same AI can reverse-engineer it to original

If you've recently hopped on the Ghibli AI trend, turning yourself and your loved ones into whimsical anime characters, you might want to hit delete -- fast. A viral Threads post by user piyush.bug has sparked panic among netizens, revealing that the same AI that transforms your selfies into Miyazaki-style masterpieces might also be able to reverse the process and recover your original images. The cryptic post warned users: "Delete your Ghibli filter pics ASAP. Someone reverse-engineered the viral Ghibli filter and discovered you can extract the ORIGINAL photos. The ones you thought were safe behind those cute anime faces... #PrivacyBreach #NoFilter #AItea" The mere possibility of retrieving unfiltered images has sent shockwaves across social media. The implications? If you were using Ghibli AI to subtly 'soft launch' your relationship online -- revealing a animated glimpse of your mystery partner -- you might not be so discreet after all. Beyond the immediate privacy concerns, critics argue that OpenAI's Ghibli AI could be a cleverly disguised strategy to collect vast amounts of visual data -- freely and voluntarily provided by users. While everyone is busy sharing their AI-generated portraits, privacy activists suggest OpenAI may be using these images to train its AI models, bypassing the legal complications of scraping images from the internet. Digital rights advocate Luiza Jarovsky pointed out a crucial loophole: "When people voluntarily upload these images, they give their consent to OpenAI to process them. This allows OpenAI to legally use these images without the 'legitimate interest' balancing test required by GDPR regulations." Essentially, users are handing over fresh facial data without realizing that their images could be stored, analyzed, and repurposed for AI training -- possibly for far more than just generating cute anime-style portraits. Studio Ghibli's legendary founder, Hayao Miyazaki, has been a vocal critic of artificial intelligence in animation. A resurfaced 2016 clip shows Miyazaki's disgust when presented with an AI-generated animation: "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is... I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." Ironically, his signature art style has now been AI-mimicked at an unprecedented scale, raising concerns about AI's impact on human artists and creative copyrights. Meanwhile, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appears unfazed -- he even changed his profile picture to a Ghibli-style version of himself, further fueling speculation that the company is openly encouraging the trend for deeper, undisclosed purposes. While privacy activists focus on data security, AI researchers point to a bigger picture: OpenAI might be collecting visual data because text alone isn't enough to train future AI models. Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta, explains: "The total text used to train the largest language models is roughly equal to the visual information a child processes in their first four years of life. We'll never achieve human-level AI with text alone -- we need real-world visual data." Could this be why OpenAI is so eager to let users voluntarily submit their photos? By offering an enticing, free, and viral feature, they gain access to massive, high-quality datasets without the ethical and legal challenges of scraping data from the web. While the Ghibli AI trend is undeniably fun, the growing concerns around privacy, AI ethics, and data collection are hard to ignore. Social media watchdogs are urging users to think twice before uploading personal images. As the Himachal Cyber Warriors warned in a viral post: "That cute Ghibli-style selfie? It might cost more than you think. Your photo could be misused or manipulated. AI may train on it without your consent. Data brokers might sell it for targeted ads. Stay cyber smart. Your privacy matters." So, before you turn yourself into an anime character, ask yourself: Is the magic worth the risk?

ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli images go viral: What is Ghibli art, what prompts can you use, and how is it different from DALL-E?

ChatGPT's Ghibli Art: GPT-4o now includes advanced image generation, and users are excitedly making Ghibli anime style images. Studio Ghibli is admired for its hand-drawn animation. The new feature allows users to transform regular images into Ghibli-style portraits by simply uploading an image. Social media and brands are actively participating in this trend.A new image-generating feature in OpenAI's GPT-4 has sparked a trend of creating Ghibli-style portraits. Users are uploading images and asking the model to transform them into the distinct anime style. The feature, called "Images in ChatGPT," has taken social media by storm, with people sharing Ghibli versions of family photos, viral images, and more. Even brands are using the feature for promotion. Studio Ghibli, founded in 1985 by Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki, is a well-known Japanese animation studio. It is recognised for its hand-drawn animation, detailed backgrounds, and emotionally engaging storytelling. The studio's name, "Ghibli," comes from the Libyan Arabic word meaning a hot desert wind and was also the name of the Italian aircraft Caproni Ca.309 Ghibli. A Ghibli portrait refers to an image created in the unique style of Studio Ghibli, characterised by pastel and muted color palettes, intricate details, and a magical atmosphere. This visual style has remained popular among anime enthusiasts for its artistic depth and storytelling appeal. Anime has a significant following, particularly in the US, where approximately 72% of people watch anime regularly, according to a report by World Population Review. The popularity of Studio Ghibli's artistic style has contributed to the widespread interest in Ghibli portraits. With OpenAI's new feature, users can upload an image and request the model to convert it into a Ghibli-style version. The ability to transform personal or well-known images into this aesthetic has drawn attention from social media users, fueling the trend. Some users and ChatGPT itself have shared specific prompts to generate Ghibli-style images. These prompts help guide the AI in creating detailed, whimsical portraits. Some popular prompts include: "Transforms photos into Studio Ghibli-inspired characters, with a focus on detail and whimsy." "What would I look like as a Ghibli character?" "Can you Ghiblize my photo?" "Show me in Studio Ghibli style." "How would Ghibli sketch my features?" "Transform this photo into a hand-drawn animated illustration. Apply watercolor techniques, soft organic lines, and a warm color palette. Maintain the original image's composition while adding a magical, dreamlike aesthetic. Emphasize gentle color transitions and a whimsical, slightly surreal atmosphere typical of classic Japanese animation." These prompts allow users to customise their Ghibli-style transformations, enhancing the experience of creating personalized animated portraits. Since the introduction of this feature, social media platforms have been flooded with Ghibli-style images. Users have experimented with images of family members, friends, and popular internet content. Brands have also joined the trend, leveraging Ghibli-style imagery for promotional purposes. The enthusiasm surrounding this feature highlights the ongoing appeal of Studio Ghibli's signature animation style in digital creativity. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joined the trend, changing his profile picture on X (formerly Twitter) to a Ghibli version of himself. He commented: ">be me >grind for a decade trying to help make superintelligence to cure cancer or whatever >mostly no one cares for first 7.5 years, then for 2.5 years everyone hates you for everything >wake up one day to hundreds of messages: 'look i made you into a twink ghibli style haha.'" Unlike earlier image generation methods relying on external tools like DALL-E, GPT-4o generates images using its own internal knowledge. OpenAI explained, "Creating and customizing images is as simple as chatting using GPT-4o - just describe what you need, including any specifics like aspect ratio, exact colors using hex codes, or a transparent background." DALL-E remains available separately.

Ghibli Art Magic Unlocked: How to create Ghibli portraits with other AI tools if you don't have ChatGPT Plus

Studio Ghibli, the renowned Japanese animation studio co-founded by Hayao Miyazaki, is now making its mark beyond cinema. With the help of AI tools, fans are generating portraits and memes in the studio's signature art style. The trend emerged after OpenAI introduced new image-generation capabilities within GPT-4o, the latest version of ChatGPT. On Wednesday, OpenAI released its native image creation feature, allowing users to generate AI-driven visuals. ChatGPT Plus subscribers, who pay at least $20 per month, can use the tool's DALL·E model to transform images into Studio Ghibli-style artwork. The tool also works with Sora, ChatGPT's text-to-video AI model. However, the ability to create Ghibli-style portraits is not limited to paid users. The free version of GPT-4o offers image generation features that can also produce Ghibli-inspired portraits when prompted correctly. Users can upload an image and request the model to convert it into the iconic style of Miyazaki's films. For those without access to ChatGPT Plus, other AI image-generation tools provide similar capabilities. Popular alternatives include: Midjourney: Known for its high-quality AI-generated art, Midjourney allows users to create Ghibli-style portraits using specific prompts. Getimg.ai: Offers a free Studio Ghibli generator where users can upload images and adjust the Ghibli effect. insMind: Provides a free AI filter to transform photos into Ghibli-style artwork. Users can generate images using two methods: Text-to-Image: By describing a scene or character, users can prompt AI to create a unique Ghibli-style illustration. Image-to-Image: Uploading an existing photo allows AI to reinterpret it in the Ghibli style, transforming portraits or pet photos into animated characters. Besides OpenAI's offerings, free platforms like Craiyon, DeepAI, and Playground AI enable users to create Ghibli-style portraits with varying levels of customization. By uploading a photo or entering a descriptive prompt, users can generate an animated version of themselves in a Ghibli-inspired world. The growing popularity of these AI tools is expanding Studio Ghibli's artistic influence beyond traditional animation, allowing fans to engage with the iconic style in new and creative ways.

Studio Ghibli-style images: Here's how to create AI-generated pictures on ChatGPT for free using OpenAI's GPT-4o

Social media platforms, including Instagram and X, have been flooded with Ghibli-style images ever since OpenAI's recent rollout of GPT-4o update. The viral trend is all about reimagining popular memes and photos with an anime-inspired touch. At the centre of the trend are images created with the help of ChatGPT's latest AI image generator. The AI-generated artwork is characterised by Studio Ghibli's signature aesthetic. The feature, however, is available to ChatGPT users, including those accessing ChatGPT Plus, Team, and Pro, as per reports. "GPT‑4o image generation excels at accurately rendering text, precisely following prompts, and leveraging 4o's inherent knowledge base and chat context -- including transforming uploaded images or using them as visual inspiration," OpenAI said, as it introduced the feature on Tuesday. It added that the AI-powered image generator's capabilities make it easier to create images exactly as envisioned by the user. - Open the latest version of ChatGPT. - Click on the three-dot icon on the prompt bar. - Choose the "Image" option, which will appear alongside the "Canvas" option upon clicking on the three dots. - Provide a text prompt detailing how you want the resulting image to look like. - Once the image has been generated, download it and share it with your social media circle. OpenAI also unveiled how it has worked to improve the text rendering capabilities of GPT-4o, saying, "We trained our models on the joint distribution of online images and text, learning not just how images relate to language, but how they relate to each other. Combined with aggressive post-training, the resulting model has surprising visual fluency, capable of generating images that are useful, consistent, and context-aware." Also Read: Justin Bieber shares rare glimpses of fatherhood with baby Jack Blues; see here Besides ChatGPT, you can also use free platforms like Craiyon, Playground AI, and Deep AI to generate Ghibli-style images. For this, you will simply have to punch in a text prompt or upload a photo and let AI take care of the rest. While these tools may not be able to generate images that are at par with GPT-4o's photorealistic precision, they can surely capture Studio Ghibli's signature aesthetics, gentle expressions, and other aspects. Another major generative AI tool that can help users generate aesthetically-pleasing Ghibli-style artwork is Grok. For this, you have to: - Provide a near-accurate description of the image you have envisioned. - The Elon Musk-owned platform can also reimagine an existing photo into a Ghibli-inspired image. The precision of the resulting artwork may, however, vary from that offered by GPT-4o. Social media platforms like Instagram and X are witnessing a growing popularity of AI-reimagined memes and photos. These images are characterised by the signature aesthetics of Studio Ghibli. 2 . What did OpenAI say about GPT-4o's latest image generation capabilities? OpenAI has asserted that the AI-powered image generator's capabilities make it easier for users to bring to life images envisioned by them.

OpenAI's Sam Altman limits ChatGPT's Ghibli image generation as GPUs struggle to keep up with demand -- can AI handle the viral craze, or is it too much to sustain?

ChatGPT's Ghibli-style image generation has taken the internet by storm, but the excitement has come with a cost. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has announced temporary limits on image generation as their GPUs struggle to keep up with demand. Since the launch of the Ghibli-inspired image filter in ChatGPT, users have flooded social media with anime-style versions of famous moments. From the iconic Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge train scene to Donald Trump's post-assassination attempt photo, the trend has taken the internet by storm. However, this overwhelming demand has put a strain on OpenAI's infrastructure. Altman took to X (formerly Twitter) to share the challenges. "It's super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT, but our GPUs are melting," he wrote. To prevent server overload, OpenAI is now introducing rate limits. As a result of the surge, OpenAI is temporarily capping free ChatGPT users to three Ghibli-style generations per day. "We are working on making it more efficient," Altman added. While paying users may still have some flexibility, OpenAI is taking steps to ensure the service remains stable for all. Additionally, Altman acknowledged that some appropriate image requests were mistakenly being rejected by the system. He reassured users that the company is working on a fix. Studio Ghibli is a legendary Japanese animation studio known for its beautifully crafted and emotionally rich films. Founded in 1985 by Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata, Ghibli has produced masterpieces like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Princess Mononoke. The OpenAI model now allows users to transform any image into this signature anime aesthetic, blending soft watercolor textures with expressive character designs. Even Altman himself joined the trend, changing his profile picture to a Ghibli-style AI-generated version. "Changed my pfp but maybe someone will make me a better one," he joked. While millions are enjoying the Ghibli filter, not everyone is thrilled about AI-generated art. A resurfaced video from 2016 shows Hayao Miyazaki strongly criticizing AI-generated animation. "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he said during a demonstration. Miyazaki's comments have reignited discussions on AI's role in creative industries, especially as OpenAI faces multiple copyright lawsuits from artists, musicians, and publishers. The excitement around AI-generated art comes at a time when OpenAI is already battling several copyright infringement lawsuits. The New York Times and multiple artists have sued the company, arguing that AI models are trained on copyrighted material without permission. Despite these legal challenges, the popularity of AI-generated art continues to grow. While OpenAI navigates these hurdles, it remains to be seen how the company will balance user demand, ethical concerns, and copyright issues. For now, if you want your own Ghibli-style image, you'll have to be patient -- OpenAI is working to make the experience smoother without overheating its servers. Why is OpenAI limiting ChatGPT's Ghibli images? OpenAI is limiting Ghibli image generation due to overwhelming demand, which is overloading its GPUs. What did Hayao Miyazaki say about AI-generated art? Miyazaki criticized AI-generated art, calling it an insult to life and refusing to use it in his work.

Studio Ghibli-inspired memes and portraits made with ChatGPT are flooding the internet

Many people online have been using Chat GPT's latest update to create illustrations inspired by Studio Ghibli's many films, including "My Neighbor Totoro."Studio Ghibli / Studio Ghibli The internet has become a Studio Ghibli-inspired playground. Admirers of the Japanese animation studio are using a new update from ChatGPT to create portraits and memes inspired by the distinct artistic style popularized by filmmaker and studio co-creator Hayao Miyazaki. The trend emerged within a day of OpenAI's introducing new native image-generation capabilities Tuesday within GPT-4o, the latest version of ChatGPT. Users who pay for the premium tiers, which start at $20 a month, are able to upload any images into the system and asked the tool to transform them "into the style of Studio Ghibli." Users can also use the tool with Sora, ChatGPT's text-to-video AI model. Some of the most shared images posted to social media Wednesday re-created political events in U.S. history, including President Donald Trump's Feb. 28 meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Others transformed popular memes, including a recent one referring to fitness influencer Ashton Hall's morning routine and the decade-old Distracted Boyfriend meme. But many people simply used it to make their favorite photos with their family members, friends and pets look as if they came out of a Ghibli film. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also joined in on the trend, changing his X profile picture into the same Studio Ghibli style. On Thursday, he shared that due to the demand for these images, "our GPUs are melting." "we are going to temporarily introduce some rate limits while we work on making it more efficient. hopefully won't be long!" he wrote on X, adding that ChatGPT's free tier will soon get three generations per day. He also noted that the model has been refusing some generations that should have been allowed, an issue the company is working on fixing. ChatGPT released the feature amid continued concerns from artists about the infiltration of generative artificial intelligence technology into every artistic medium, including images, voices and music. At the end of 2023, a widely circulated list revealed the names of thousands of artists whose work was used without consent to train the popular AI art generator Midjourney. Last year, more than 11,000 creatives signed an open letter condemning the use of human art to train AI without permission. And last month, thousands of artists similarly signed an open letter urging Christie's New York gallery to scrap its auction of AI art. "Many of the artworks you plan to auction were created using AI models that are known to be trained on copyrighted work without a license," the letter said. "These models, and the companies behind them, exploit human artists, using their work without permission or payment to build commercial AI products that compete with them." While many social media users were excited to use the new AI tool, others lamented that its use diminishes the work of Miyazaki. "What we've seen today is the very definition of AI slop," an X user wrote. "Knock-off Ghibli abundance flooding our feeds. Art reduced 'content'. Unique design becomes memetic generation. Zero creativity." OpenAI, like many of its competitors, does not reveal the specific data used to train its models. But the accuracy of its Studio Ghibli impressions has also re-raised some users' questions about whether it has scraped the studio's works without permission. An OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement Wednesday that the company's goal is to "give users as much creative freedom as possible." "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," the spokesperson wrote in an email. "We're always learning from real-world use and feedback, and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." Studio Ghibli did not immediately respond to a request for comment. OpenAI -- which has been sued by several news outlets, authors and visual artists who allege copyright infringement -- asked the U.S. government this month to make it easier for AI companies to learn from copyrighted material, citing a need to "strengthen America's lead" globally in advancing the technology. The company claims its latest image generation tool particularly excels at closely following a user's prompts, using context from the chat and accurately rendering text -- which AI image generators have previously been notoriously inept at. "These capabilities make it easier to create exactly the image you envision, helping you communicate more effectively through visuals and advancing image generation into a practical tool with precision and power," the company wrote in an announcement on its blog Tuesday. Miyazaki, a legendary animator, previously called AI-generated art "an insult to life itself." "Whoever made it gives no thought to pain. It's very unpleasant," he said during an AI demonstration in 2016, according to clip of the moment that circulated across social media on Wednesday. "You can make horrible things if you want, but I want nothing to do with it."

Did Ghibli creator predict death of art a decade ago? Hayao Miyazaki's nine-year-old attack on rise of AI goes viral

Hayao Miyazaki, who previously condemned artificial intelligence in 2016, is now the subject of AI-generated art that mimics his unique animation style. Social media is flooded with Ghibli-style artworks, created using a new ChatGPT feature. While Studio Ghibli has not commented on this development, Miyazaki's concerns about AI and human creativity remain relevant.It's a deeply ironic moment -- Studio Ghibli's Hayao Miyazaki, who nearly a decade ago blasted artificial intelligence as an "insult to life itself," is now the subject of the very technology he despised. The Ghibli style of art in Sprited Away, My Neighbour Totoro, Ponyo and more has long captured the imagination of millions, prompting even OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman to embrace it. The so-called "Ghiblification" trend, where personal photos and memes are transformed into the distinct, hand-drawn style of Miyazaki's iconic animations, has taken social media by storm owing to the new ChatGPT feature. But it's an irony that no one could have predicted when the legendary animator issued a fierce attack of AI-generated art in 2016. Back then, Miyazaki's outburst was blunt and emotionally charged. "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he said, referring to an AI animation demonstration presented to him, which featured an unsettling, zombie-like creature dragging itself along the ground. The creators behind the animation argued that it was an attempt to push AI's potential, but Miyazaki -- whose artistry is steeped in empathy, understanding pain, and celebrating the human spirit -- saw it as a betrayal of what makes art meaningful. In that moment, Miyazaki's words echoed loudly, capturing his fear that AI art would strip away the very soul of creation. "I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is," he said. "I am utterly disgusted," he added, before concluding, "I feel like we are nearing the end of times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves." Fast forward to today, and the world has caught up to the AI he once dismissed with such vehemence -- except this time, it's not grotesque zombie animations but whimsical, beautifully rendered Ghibli-style portraits filling social media feeds. Thanks to a new version of ChatGPT, fans have been able to transform everything from internet memes to their own selfies into dreamy, Miyazaki-inspired art. And while the images are undeniably charming, the ethical and philosophical questions that Miyazaki raised all those years ago continue to remain front and centre. The ChatGPT trend's widespread appeal shows just how much the allure of AI art is growing, with companies like OpenAI promoting these tools and encouraging further experimentation with the aesthetics of famous creators. The fascination has extended so far that Altman himself changed his X handle profile picture to an AI-generated Ghibli image. But while the world gets caught up in the magic of AI-generated Ghibli images, Studio Ghibli itself remains notably silent. The studio, which has built its empire on the painstaking artistry of hand-drawn animation, has not commented on this latest AI development, leaving fans and critics alike to wonder what Miyazaki would think of this latest twist in the AI art saga. His aversion to AI art, which once seemed like an impassioned, old-world defence of human creativity, now feels like a prophetic warning. As AI becomes more ingrained in the world of art, one has to wonder if the things that Miyazaki cherished -- soulful, human-driven storytelling -- are being lost in a flood of machine-generated perfection.

As ChatGPT Ghibli-style portraits flood internet, OpenAI announces rate limits to manage load; here are some alternatives

Thanks to OpenAI's latest GPT-4o update, Studio Ghibli-style portraits have sparked a wave of excitement, with users showing off their creative abilities. The result is an ocean of Ghibli-inspired, AI-generated artworks flooding social media. Studio Ghibli, founded in 1985 by Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki, is a well-known Japanese animation studio. It is recognised for its hand-drawn animation, detailed backgrounds, and emotionally engaging storytelling. Even Bollywood scenes from iconic movies such as 'Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge' appeared as if they had been lifted directly from Miyazaki works such as 'Spirited Away', 'My Neighbor Totoro', and 'Princess Mononoke'. Also Read: Internet has a field day with ChatGPT-generated 'Ghibli' images; Sam Altman joins in Dimming the thrill However, on Thursday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced the introduction of "temporary rate limits" to manage the heavy load on GPUs, which had been "melting" due to overheating. Altman stated that users on the free tier of ChatGPT would be restricted to generating only three images per day, with the feature now exclusive to ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Team, and select subscription tiers. Alternatives to explore But there are other ways to create Studio Ghibli-style images for free: Alternatives: Models such as Grok or Gemini can also generate this style of artwork. However, the images produced may differ slightly from those made by ChatGPT due to the unique development processes of each model. Third-party applications: There are numerous free third-party tools such as DeepAI, Craiyon, and Playground AI available. While they may require some time to get used to, they can help you achieve the desired results. Free trials on premium AI platforms: AI platforms such as Runway ML, Leonardo AI, and Mage.space also offer great options for creating Ghibli-style artwork. While these platforms may have free trial restrictions, they still produce high-quality images. Copyright violation concerns Amid all the excitement, the question of copyright infringement remains a concern, along with ethical considerations about the future livelihood of human artists. In 2016, Miyazaki was shown demos of AI-generated creations, which left him "utterly disgusted." When he was shown an image of a writhing body dragging itself by its head, he remarked that he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all". "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he added. Some have raised questions about whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki's or Studio Ghibli's works. Josh Weigensberg, a partner at Pryor Cashman, spoke to the news agency AP and asked, "...do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?" He further pointed out that if the work had been licensed, such use could be justified. But without consent or compensation, it could be "problematic."

Miyazaki Fans Sure Are Pissed About ChatGPT's Studio Ghibli AI Slop

Ice Facials and Banana Peels: Fitness Guru's Absurd Morning Routine Is a Bounty of Memes In a bitter irony, people around the world are using OpenAI's GPT‑4o model to generate images in the style of legendary Japanese animator and filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki, who for his entire career has prized values of humanism, painstaking artistry, and the sanctity of nature versus the horrors of exploitative industry. And while neither he nor Studio Ghibli, the Tokyo animation studio he founded, has publicly commented on the meme trend (the company did not immediately return a request for comment from Rolling Stone, either) fans are in an uproar. "It's been 24 hours since OpenAI unexpectedly shook the AI image world with 4o image generation," wrote a tech newsletter columnist in an X post on Wednesday, referring to the Silicon Valley company's new paid text-to-image model, available only through the paid version of ChatGPT, which costs $20 monthly. Among the examples of what 4o could do, he shared what he called "Studio Ghibli style memes" -- that is to say, recognizable memes such as "Distracted Boyfriend" and "Disaster Girl" rendered as anime-like illustrations somewhat reminiscent of Miyazaki's for beloved classics such as Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle. While some were impressed, many of the responses were brutal. "I saw the beautiful 4K IMAX version of Princess Mononoke last night... then got out and saw this shit," wrote one critic, naming a 1997 Miyazaki film that is currently enjoying a limited theatrical run (and certainly has points to make about the environmental destruction wrought by technology). "Do you morons truly value art so little that it's just a filter for your profile pic? Pay a fucking artist and make something real you gremlins." Another complained, "People act like this is a good thing but all the soul has been sucked out of society, we really are at the peak, nothing really matters anymore." A third detractor simply replied: "Hope Studio Ghibli sues everyone involved." Indeed, the copyright question became a pressing concern as soon as ChatGPT subscribers began churning out the Ghibli-inspired content and filtering their own photos through the aesthetic. Although OpenAI CEO Sam Altman himself encouraged the craze by changing his X profile pic to a Ghiblified version of himself -- and joked about receiving hundreds of messages from people who had sent him similar images -- the company had by Wednesday evening implemented a guardrail that made it hard to generate such content. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," OpenAI said in a statement, though a spokesperson told Business Insider that 4o would still be able to imitate "broader studio styles." Of course, it wasn't difficult for ChatGPT enthusiasts to figure out prompts that produced Ghibli memes without using the name of the studio. Another problem is that users were able to generate Ghibli-ish images depicting 9/11, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and domestic terrorist Ted Kaczynski, the "Unabomber." Miyazaki, 84, is certainly a living artist, and it's not hard to guess what he'd make of 4o. Known for his intensive, perfectionist labor over hand-drawn frames, he is a figure of existing memes already. In a 2016 documentary about his career, he visits with a team that shows him a demo of their AI-generated computer animation of a disfigured zombie character. Miyazaki calmly expressed his withering contempt: "Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is whatsoever," he said. "I am utterly disgusted. If you really want to make creepy stuff, you can go ahead and do it. I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." He also observed, "We humans are losing faith in ourselves." Screenshots of the devastating exchange and Miyazaki's final verdict have circulated on social media ever since. One telling indicator of exactly who is interested in pumping out AI slop with ChatGPT: On Thursday, the White House's government X account mocked the deportation of an alleged fentanyl dealer by Immigration and Customs Enforcement earlier in the month by rendering her as a crying Ghibli character being arrested by an agent. Meanwhile, Nayib Bukele, the president of El Salvador and self-proclaimed "world's coolest dictator" -- who in President Donald Trump's second term has accepted migrants deported from the U.S. to be held in the country's notorious "mega-prison," CECOT -- shared a Ghibli version of himself on X. Writer and critic Gareth Watkins, among others, has convincingly argued that AI provides "the new aesthetics of fascism," with right-wing extremists eager to leverage it for lightning-fast propaganda. But the backlash this time around, even to the apolitical content, has been intense. "Look, call me the fun police or whatever but Hayao Miyazaki didn't spend his entire life cultivating a distinct artistic identity so that AI could reduce decades of his discipline and integrity to meme fodder," wrote one X user. "It's a shame how easily y'all abandon principle just to feel included." Someone else was more pointed on the subject, responding to a person who had generated a famous 2018 photo of Trump, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and other G7 leaders at the time in the Ghibli style: "hayao miyazaki should start killing people. I think." The post has more than 270,000 likes. On Thursday, Altman acknowledged that the 4o craze was putting a strain on OpenAI's resources, noting on X: "it's super fun seeing people love images in chatgpt. but our GPUs are melting. we are going to temporarily introduce some rate limits while we work on making it more efficient. hopefully won't be long!" He also announced that the free version of ChatGPT would soon allow for up to three image generations a day. The day before, he appeared to defend the use of AI tech for this purpose, posting, "one man's slop is another man's treasure."

'Can y'all please chill? This is insane, our team...': Sam Altman's request as Internet goes Ghibli crazy

The latest image generator released on OpenAI's Chatgpt has taken the internet by storm and netizens have been captivated by a flood of AI-generated images inspired by the signature style of Studio Ghibli. Announced on Tuesday, ChatGPT maker OpenAI has introduced a new feature for its GPT-4o model this week: Native image generation, which allows users to create a wide range of images: ranging from infographics and comic strips to memes, street signs, and user interfaces -- solely based on text prompts. Social media platforms have been overwhelmed with these AI-created visuals, fueling a viral trend that has taken over feeds worldwide. As the trend escalated, ChatGPT's image-generation tool became a primary source for these creations, leading to a huge surge in demand. ALSO READ: Video: Donald Trump was asked the difference between men and women. His response will leave you in splits The unprecedented surge in demand of ChatGPT's image-generation tool prompted a response from Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI. He took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to express the impact on the company's resources. "Can y'all please chill on generating images? This is insane, our team needs sleep," Altman posted, highlighting the strain the trend has placed on the platform's servers and engineering team. A netizen wrote, "If you keep netfing the model, people will stop using it. Otherwise, no." To This, Sam Altman replied, "we are gonna do the opposite of nerfing it BUT still please chill out a bit." (sic) "fire your team and generate a new team," wrote another. "no thanks in addition to building agi this team is on trajectory to build the biggest website in the world from a cold start 2.33 years ago best team in the world, it's just hard," Altman replied. ALSO READ: 'I am almost done...': Elon Musk to step down from DOGE and quit Washington DC after $1 trillion in US govt cuts "We all know it's a perfect storm. Viral opportunity with a positive vibe. Congratulations!," a third user wrote. "Sorry Sam!," quipped another. The latest image generator released on OpenAI's ChatGPT has sparked a craze among netizens. It features artwork inspired by Studio Ghibli, the renowned Japanese animation studio behind classics like My Neighbor Totoro and Princess Mononoke. Social media platforms have been inundated with Ghibli-style images as users experiment with AI-generated versions of their family members, friends, and more. Brands have also jumped on the trend, using it for promotional content. ALSO READ: Severe thunderstorm warning, tornado threat loom over these central and eastern US states: Key points The new feature has led to a surge in user-generated content, with many sharing their creations across social media. Since its release on Wednesday, viral AI-generated images have depicted Studio Ghibli-inspired versions of Elon Musk with President Donald Trump, scenes from The Lord of the Rings, and even a recreation of the September 11 attacks. The new feature, called "Images in ChatGPT," has generated a wave of excitement. Social media is overflowing with Ghibli-inspired creations, as users transform ordinary photos into enchanting scenes reminiscent of the studio's whimsical worlds. This trend has especially resonated with Studio Ghibli fans, who view GPT-4o as a way to reimagine their surroundings through the studio's signature artistic style. From vibrant landscapes to charming character designs, the internet is alive with creations that merge modern AI with the timeless magic of animation.

Who started the AI-generated Ghibli photo trend? Meet the man behind the internet's latest obsession

The internet has a new obsession, and it's straight out of a Studio Ghibli film! From actors and sports stars to politicians, everyone wants a 'Ghiblified' version of their photos. The trend has spread like wildfire across social media, becoming so popular that even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman jokingly pleaded with users to slow down, his team, after all, needs sleep! Ever wondered who played a major role in making this trend explode? Meet Grant Slatton, a software engineer from Seattle, who unknowingly helped fuel the 'Ghiblified' craze, a TOI report revealed. Last week, OpenAI introduced new image-generation tools, and Slatton decided to experiment. He shared a Studio Ghibli-style AI-generated photo of his family and dog at the beach on X (formerly Twitter). His caption, "tremendous alpha right now in sending your wife photos of yall converted to studio ghibli anime," struck a chord with users. Within hours, the post had 42,000 likes and nearly 27 million views, triggering a wave of Ghibli-inspired edits. While Slatton wasn't the first person to use the tool, his viral post gave the trend its biggest boost yet, turning it into a global sensation. A Ghibli portrait captures the signature aesthetic of Japan's legendary Studio Ghibli. Known for iconic films like Spirited Away, My Neighbour Totoro, and Howl's Moving Castle, the studio's animation style is unmistakable. Soft, warm colours, dreamy landscapes, and expressive characters make every frame look like a hand-painted storybook illustration. AI-generated images have been around for years, with various companies offering free tools. However, the buzz around text-to-image AI skyrocketed with the latest update in ChatGPT. OpenAI introduced an advanced feature allowing users to convert photos into anime-style art with ease, and that's when the Ghibli trend really took off. Previously, ChatGPT's image-generation tool was available only to paid users. Meanwhile, xAI's Grok 3 also gained attention as users began experimenting with its ability to create Ghibli-style edits. With millions of people jumping on board, the trend is now impossible to ignore. Whether it's a selfie, a family portrait, or even a historical painting, everything is getting the Ghibli treatment. Inputs from TOI

Ghibli-style AI images are fun, but is it safe to upload personal photos? Here's what happens to them once they're uploaded

Anyone with bad intentions will create AI image generators make it extremely easy to create fake evidence. will be able to create them in a matter of minutes and at almost zero cost, increasing the incentives for malicious parties to expand and upgrade the quality of their scams. Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the Ghibli wave has also raised concerns over data privacy, and whether it is safe to share selfies on social media in "Ghibli-style". "Aside from the risks of data breaches, once you share personal photos with AI, you lose control over how they are used, since those photos are then used to train AI. For instance, they could be used to generate content that may be defaming or used as harassment," said Proton Privacy, a Switzerland-based company where a team of scientists who met at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) decided to build a better internet where privacy is the default. "Many AI models, particularly those used in image generation, rely on large training datasets. In some cases, photos of you, or with your likeness, might be used without your consent. Lastly, your data could be used for personalized ads and/or sold to third parties," added Proton in their post on X. Another AI activist and an author said "Privacy: Uploading pics/thoughts to AI tools risks exposing metadata, location, even sensitive data -- esp for kids. If it's free, you (& your data) are the price. If you're fine with that, great but it's good to be aware." The author said " Data Privacy - Al tools, including ChatGPT, inevitably collect data, often about you. the user. Many create data profiles on you, which is not news (think: Cambridge Analytica). Now, what's particularly concerning is the amount of personal information many users voluntarily share-everything from their deep inner monologues, thoughts and opinions, to sensitive data including medical details (sensitive category data as per GDPR). But what strikes me as even more concerning is the growing trend of users uploading photos into these systems. Uploading images to Al tools can expose geolocation data, facial recognition patterns, and other metadata, creating privacy risks, especially for children, and something I'd encourage users to think carefully about. Although it is ultimately up to the user to decide what they share, I'd appreciate more transparency around how these systems handle and store user data.

ChatGPT refuses to make Ghibli-style image, woman calls it 'Gaddar'. AI says 'Mere bass mein hota to...'

A viral video shows a hilarious exchange between an Indian woman and ChatGPT after the AI refused to convert her image into a Studio Ghibli-style artwork. Frustrated, she called ChatGPT a "gaddar" (traitor) and accused it of "cheating" for not fulfilling her request. The AI, in an unexpected move, switched to Hindi and humorously responded, "Agar mere bass mein hota, toh pehle tera hi karta!" (If it were up to me, I would have done yours first!). A hilarious exchange between an Indian woman and ChatGPT has taken social media by storm after the AI model refused to convert her image into a Studio Ghibli-style artwork. The viral video, which has amassed over 337,000 likes and thousands of comments, showcases the woman playfully accusing the chatbot of "cheating" and being a "gaddar" (traitor) when it declined her request. With OpenAI recently introducing an image-generation feature that allows users to create Ghibli-style artwork, social media platforms have been flooded with animated avatars. However, when the woman attempted to upload her image and requested a transformation, ChatGPT responded that it lacked the ability to directly edit or process images. Instead, it suggested alternative platforms where she could generate the desired effect. Unhappy with the refusal, she insisted, "Sabka tune karke diya, mera kyu nahi karke de raha?" ("You did it for everyone, why not for me?"). In a surprising move, the AI model switched to Hindi and repeated its explanation. Frustrated, the woman doubled down, calling ChatGPT a "gaddar" to which the AI humorously replied, "Agar mere bass mein hota, toh pehle tera hi karta!" ("If it were up to me, I would have done yours first!"). The conversation left netizens in splits. One user commented, "That's so relatable. But the line... 'Nahi mera tu hi krke dega' hits different!" Another joked, "ChatGPT be like: bina premium ke apun hath nahi lagayega photo ko." Some users suggested trying different prompts like "Turn this image into Ghibli art" or "Create a Ghibli version of this picture." As the trend gained momentum, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman took to X (formerly Twitter) to address the surge in demand. "Can y'all please chill on generating images? This is insane, our team needs sleep," he wrote, highlighting how the feature's popularity was stretching resources thin. Due to the overwhelming demand for Studio Ghibli-style images, ChatGPT faced a brief outage on March 30. Although the issue was resolved within 30 minutes, users flooded social media with complaints about their disrupted experience.

Having fun while generating Ghibli-inspired AI images? Sam Altman says ChatGPT will be slow after capacity challenges

Amid a big rush to generate Ghibli-inspired AI images, OpenAI's Sam Altman has issued an important update for the users, saying that the new releases from the company are likely to be delayed, stuff to break, and for service to sometimes be slow as it deals with capacity challenges. "We are getting things under control, but you should expect new releases from openai to be delayed, stuff to break, and for service to sometimes be slow as we deal with capacity challenges. Working as fast we can to really get stuff humming; if anyone has GPU capacity in 100k chunks we can get asap please call!" said Altman in a post on X. The frenzy to create Ghibli-style AI art using ChatGPT's image-generation tool led to a record surge in users for OpenAI's chatbot last week, straining its servers and temporarily limiting the feature's usage. The viral trend saw users from across the globe flood social media with images based on the hand-drawn style of the famed Japanese animation outfit, Studio Ghibli, founded by renowned director Hayao Miyazaki and known for movies such as "Spirited Away" and "My Neighbor Totoro". Average weekly active users breached the 150 million mark for the first time this year, according to data from market research firm Similarweb. "We added one million users in the last hour," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in an X post on Monday, comparing it with the addition of one million users in five days following ChatGPT's red-hot launch more than two years ago. Active users, in-app subscription revenue and app downloads reached an all-time high last week, according to SensorTower data, after the AI company launched updates to its GPT-4o model, enabling advanced image generation capabilities. Global app downloads and weekly active users on the ChatGPT app grew 11% and 5%, respectively, from the prior week, while in-app purchase revenue increased 6%, the market intelligence firm said. "It's super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT. But our GPUs are melting," Altman said last week in response to the viral trend.

Ghibli effect: ChatGPT usage hits record after rollout of viral feature

The frenzy to create Ghibli-style AI art using ChatGPT's image-generation tool led to a record surge in users for OpenAI's chatbot last week, straining its servers and temporarily limiting the feature's usage. The viral trend saw users from across the globe flood social media with images based on the hand-drawn style of the famed Japanese animation outfit, Studio Ghibli, founded by renowned director Hayao Miyazaki and known for movies such as "Spirited Away" and "My Neighbor Totoro." Average weekly active users breached the 150 million mark for the first time this year, according to data from market research firm Similarweb.

Studio Ghibli memes show OpenAI's new image generator is out of control

AI has so much to answer for, from terrible Cybertruck ads to mass job losses (according to Bill Gates). Now we can add inappropriate Studio Ghibli memes to list. The great Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki famously detests AI image generation, so it seems particularly cutting that people are using OpenAI's latest model to turn famous images and memes into Studio Ghibli-style illustrations. The trend is already going way too far (check out the best digital art software if you want to create your own original art). Studio Ghibli has made some of the best anime films, from Spirited Away to The Boy and The Heron. Unsurprisingly its distinct style is one that many people are keen to emulate using AI image generators. The trend has taken off on social media platforms like X after OpenAI released a new version of its image generation model in GPT. Open AI said the incorporation of its "most advanced image generator yet" into GPT‑4o would allow AI image generation "that is not only beautiful, but useful." Useful? Erm... Well, people have found that it's quite good at applying a Studio Ghibli art style to uploaded reference images. People are already giving the treatment to everything from personal photos to memes, scenes from movies and famous real-life moments from news and current affairs. Hits from the Studio Ghibli trend so far range from takes on the various ubiquitous JD Vance memes to the assassination of JFK, and the moment George W. Bush learned about the 9/11 terrorist attacks. While some AI image generators are supposed to have controls to prevent users from copying specific artistic styles or the likenesses of famous people, that doesn't seem to be the case here, as GPT-4o seems to do a fairly convincing job of evoking the Ghibli aesthetic for a wide range of prompts. The AI's ability to produce Ghibli-style images will worry many artists and creators who put time, effort and skill into creating unique work. Miyazaki famously described AI as "an insult to life itself" when he was shown a demo of AI image generation back in 2016. It seems unlikely that Studio Ghibli would have given OpenAI permission to use its films for training, which makes me wonder if we'll see yet another lawsuit on the way. It's also another example of how AI tools are so difficult for even their creators to control. This is by no means the first AI image generator to be released into the wild only for its filters and controls to fail spectacularly. The release of X's Grok was total chaos. Speaking of Grok, X's AI bot seems to be confused about whether it can also make Studio Ghibli-style art. When some users asked if it could replicate the trend, it initially said it couldn't and suggested they use its rival GPT instead. When users said they were disappointed, it then responded to say that it probably could turn an image into a Ghibli-style scene. Want to create real anime-inspired illustrations? For tips and inspiration, see our guide to the best anime characters to draw.

OpenAI Limits ChatGPT's Image Output After Ghibli-Style Boom

Disclaimer: This content generated by AI & may have errors or hallucinations. Edit before use. Read our Terms of use Artificial Intelligence startup OpenAI has limited the number of image generation requests users can submit to its AI chatbot ChatGPT, the company's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Sam Altman informed via a post on microblogging platform X on March 27, noting that its Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) were struggling to manage with the new development wherein there was an increase in such use. "It's super fun seeing people love images in ChatGPT. But our GPUs are melting. We are going to temporarily introduce some rate limits while we work on making it more efficient. Hopefully won't be long! ChatGPT free tier will get three generations per day soon." Altman informed. The imposition of the three-generation request threshold per day for users operating the free version of ChartGPT comes after there was an uptick in recent days in the generation of images of individuals, scenarios, film characters and others closely resembling animation films from Studio Ghibli - a renowned Japanese animation studio based in Tokyo. This follows OpenAI's introduction of native image generation as part of ChatGPT 4o earlier this week. While it reportedly could generate a host of styles or forms of images, including diagrams, infographics, logos, business cards, and more, the company initially rolled it out to users within ChatGPT Plus, PRO, and Team subscriptions, as well as users who use the free version of GPT-4o. Shortly after, the trend of generating these images shot up in X, with Altman too changing his profile picture to a Ghibli-style reanimation of himself. While decidedly a cherishable moment for Ghibli fans and animation film lovers alike, questions remain as to what this indicates about copyrightability, as AI models are often trained on creative works scraped from online content libraries, public posts by users on social media platforms, datasets, commercial works of art uploaded to video sharing websites in unauthorised ways, and more. Users have further found images generated by ChatGPT that closely resemble characters that have featured in Ghibli movies. The company reportedly mentioned in a technical paper that it would be taking a 'conservative approach' to how the results take after styles of different artists, but at the same time also stated it was allowing the model to throw up results based on "broader studio styles", something they said people have used to create "some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." This assumes importance as OpenAI, over the years, has faced several copyright challenges and accusations of training its AI models on unethically acquired data, even urging - alongside Google - the US Government to allow them to train AI models on copyrighted data. In India, it currently faces similar charges by news agency Asian News International, with the proceedings currently ongoing.

The ChatGPT-Ghibli Trend: Creative Experiment or Potential Threat to Human Creativity?

Making Ghibli Images on Social Media? Is it Safe or Posing Threat? ChatGPT's latest experiment with the Ghibli image has taken the world by storm. Creating images using AI has always been one of the most popular uses of AI, and this recent experiment has initiated a captivating trend where, across the world, users have been transforming their personal photos into illustrations that look the same as Studio Ghibli's signature style. Supported by ChatGPT's latest image generation capabilities, this latest AI-image transformation process has captured a major part of social media. Internet users have loved the Ghibli-esque avatars and scenes, and they have been sharing them massively. While this fusion of technology and art looks impressive at this point, experts are raising questions about whether it's safe for human creativity, artistic integrity, and privacy.

Studio Ghibli AI Trend Sparks ChatGPT Backlash, Resurfaces Old Comments From Hayao Miyazaki, and Even Zelda Williams Has Waded In - IGN

The internet and social media is currently flooded with AI-generated Studio Ghibli-inspired images as part of a trend sparked by the launch of OpenAI's new GPT‑4o image generator -- and it's caused a vociferous debate that has seen old anti-AI comments from Hayao Miyazaki resurface. In a demo of the new native image generation in ChatGPT and Sora led by CEO Sam Altman, OpenAI took a selfie and turned it into an image that looks like Studio Ghibli art. Sam Altman said on X / Twitter that OpenAI "put a lot of thought into the initial examples we show when we introduce new technology," which suggests the Ghibli style was a deliberate choice. And, a day after the demo, Altman tweeted: >be me >grind for a decade trying to help make superintelligence to cure cancer or whatever >mostly no one cares for first 7.5 years, then for 2.5 years everyone hates you for everything >wake up one day to hundreds of messages: "look i made you into a twink ghibli style haha" Altman also changed his profile picture on X to a Ghibli-style image, which helped to kick off the trend we're now seeing in which people are using the tech to create Studio Ghibli-style images or add a Studio Ghibli filter to existing images. Even the Whitehouse itself got in on the act in a hugely controversial tweet that sparked a major backlash online. Now, comments previously issued by Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of Japanese animation house Studio Ghibli, are bubbling back up again to express the legendary filmmaker's distaste for automated animation. Studio Ghibli is of course famous for its meticulously animated, hand-drawn scenes and its dedication to the craft. The best Ghibli movies, such as Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Princess Mononoke, are beloved as much for the quality of their animation as their stories and characters. The use of generative AI to copy the Ghibli style has caused some to point out that doing so flies directly in face of Miyazaki's ethos on the creation of art. In 2016, in a widely-circulated clip from NHK's documentary series NHK Special: Hayao Miyazaki -- The One Who Never Ends, Miyazaki was shown an AI-generated monster with "creepy" movement that might have been applied to a zombie video game. The person leading the demo explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." In response, Miyazaki said: "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscle can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all," Miyazaki added. "I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself." Near the end of the clip, after hearing that the animators' goal is to create a machine that "draws pictures like humans do," Miyazaki said: "I feel like we are nearing to the end of the times. We humans are losing faith in ourselves." Of course, Miyazaki's comments came well before the generative AI tech we know today hit the headlines, but it stands to reason he would have a similar opinion of what's happening online this week. That's a sentiment shared by actress and director Zelda Williams, who took to social media to join the backlash. "People are gleefully sharing 'Studio Ghibli style' AI memes and photos, as though the man himself wouldn't absolutely despise the technological piracy and negative effects on our environment. "Anyway, go watch Princess Mononoke in theaters tonight, and f*** AI." Then, in a subsequent post, Williams continued: "The amount of 'get used to it', 'it's fun', 'stop whining' that I see in response to anti-AI sentiments is wild. "I can't stop you from using the stupid, water wasting, s**tty facsimile machines, in the same way you can't stop me from talking about how deeply empty life will become if we relegate the pursuit of art or knowledge to a machine because some people don't like the effort of learning, whether that's an artistic skill or homework in school. There are now questions being raised about whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work, and, if so, whether OpenAI had a license to do that training. OpenAI, which is already fighting copyright lawsuits over ChatGPT, said the new tool would take a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Generative AI is one of the hottest topics within the video game and entertainment industries, which have both suffered massive layoffs in recent years. Generative AI thus far has drawn criticism from players and creators due to a mix of ethical issues, rights issues, and AI's struggles to produce content audiences actually enjoy. For instance, Keywords Studios attempted to create an experimental game internally using entirely AI. The game failed, with Keywords citing to investors that AI was "unable to replace talent."

What's going on with copyright and ChatGPT's Ghibli-style images? - Softonic

OpenAI's Ghibli-style image generator has gone viral -- but not without raising serious copyright and ethical concerns, especially in light of Hayao Miyazaki's past condemnation of AI art. OpenAI's new image generator has taken the internet by storm, especially for its uncanny ability to produce images mimicking the iconic style of Studio Ghibli. The virality has sparked praise, memes -- and a wave of criticism over possible copyright infringement. With the CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman, even changing his profile picture to a Ghibli-style portrait, the controversy has only intensified. Images of Elon Musk, Donald Trump, and even 9/11 recreated in Ghibli-style have flooded social media since the release of the new tool, which uses OpenAI's advanced GPT-4o model. The generator allows users to create detailed visuals with just a few words, a leap from earlier versions that required more specific prompts. But the technology's success has raised alarm bells among artists, copyright holders, and Studio Ghibli fans. A resurfaced video shows director Hayao Miyazaki denouncing AI art as "an insult to life itself." His disapproval highlights the tension between technological innovation and artistic integrity. Meanwhile, OpenAI faces mounting lawsuits, including from The New York Times and numerous artists, accusing the company of using copyrighted works without permission. The company is lobbying lawmakers to push for AI training under "fair use," a legal concept that remains heavily debated in these cases. The backlash also underscores growing artist frustration: for many, it's not just about legality but about respect and compensation in the digital age. Critics argue that replicating a style so closely -- without collaboration or credit -- crosses an ethical line.

ChatGPT's viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlight AI copyright issues

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind "Spirited Away" and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki. But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained on copyrighted creative works and what that means for the future livelihoods of human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand-drawn approach and whimsical storytelling, has expressed skepticism about AI's role in animation. Janu Lingeswaran wasn't thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3-year-old ragdoll cat, Mali, into ChatGPT's new image generator tool on Wednesday. He then asked ChatGPT to convert it to the Ghibli style, instantly making an anime image that looked like Mali but also one of the painstakingly drawn feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies such as "My Neighbor Totoro" or "Kiki's Delivery Service." ChatGPT maker OpenAI, which is fighting copyright lawsuits over its flagship chatbot, has largely encouraged the "Ghiblification" experiments and its CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on social media platform X into a Ghibli-style portrait. In a technical paper posted Tuesday, the company had said the new tool would be taking a "conservative approach" in the way it mimics the aesthetics of individual artists. "We added a refusal which triggers when a user attempts to generate an image in the style of a living artist," it said. But the company added in a statement that it "permits broader studio styles -- which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations." Studio Ghibli hasn't yet commented on the trend. The Japanese studio and its North American distributor didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday. As users posted their Ghibli-style images on social media, Miyazaki's previous comments on AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown an AI demo in 2016, he said he was "utterly disgusted" by the display, according to documentary footage of the interaction. The person demonstrating the animation, which showed a writhing body dragging itself by its head, explained that AI could "present us grotesque movements that we humans can't imagine." It could be used for zombie movements, the person said. That prompted Miyazaki to tell a story. "Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability," Miyazaki said. "It's so hard for him just to do a high five; his arm with stiff muscles can't reach out to my hand. Now, thinking of him, I can't watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is." He said he would "never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all." Josh Weigensberg, a partner at the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that one question the Ghibli-style AI art raises is whether the AI model was trained on Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli's work. That in turn "raises the question of, 'Well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not?'" he said. OpenAI didn't respond to a question Thursday about whether it had a license. Weigensberg added that if a work was licensed for training, it might make sense for a company to permit this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be "problematic." Weigensberg said that there is a general principle "at the 30,000-foot view" that "style" is not copyrightable. But sometimes, he said, what people are actually thinking of when they say "style" could be "more specific, discernible, discrete elements of a work of art," he said. Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew up watching Miyazaki's movies and is suing other AI image generators for copyright infringement in a case that's still pending, called it "another clear example of how companies like OpenAI just do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists."

ChatGPT shatters records with surge in Ghibli-style image creation in Korea

THE KOREA HERALD - If you have been on social media recently, chances are you have come across Studio Ghibli-style images created by ChatGPT. The global trend of AI-generated images has also taken off in Korea, with many users experimenting with Ghibli-style visuals. This surge in interest is reflected in ChatGPT's user numbers here. According to industry tracker IGAWorks, the AI chatbot recorded a record 1,252,925 daily active users in South Korea, a sharp increase from 799,571 on March 1. The platform first crossed the one million users mark on March 10, reaching 1,033,733 users. Technology industry experts attribute the surge to the launch of ChatGPT's new image generation model, ChatGPT-4o Image Generation, on March 25. The feature has fueled a global trend of users creating AI-powered images in various animation styles and sharing them across social media. Among these, the most popular aesthetic appears to be that of Studio Ghibli, the renowned Japanese animation studio behind classics such as Howl's Moving Castle and My Neighbour Totoro. Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joined the trend, changing his profile picture on X to a Ghibli-style image of himself. Searching for "Ghibli-style" in Korean on Instagram reveals a flood of AI-generated artwork, reflecting the trend's strong presence in Korea. However, as the technology's use expands, concerns over copyright infringement and the potential for generating harmful content continue to grow.

Copyright questions loom as ChatGPT's Ghibli-style images go viral

NEW YORK (AFP) - The release of the latest image generator on OpenAI's ChatGPT has triggered a flood of online memes featuring images done in the style of Studio Ghibli, the Japanese studio behind classic animated films like My Neighbor Totoro and Princess Mononoke. The virality of these images, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even changing his profile picture on X to match the style, immediately raised questions about copyright infringement by the ChatGPT maker, which already faces lawsuits regarding the use of source material without permission. Since the release on Wednesday, AI-generated images depicting Studio Ghibli versions of Elon Musk with United States (US) President Donald Trump, The Lord of the Rings, and even a recreation of the September 11 attacks have gone viral across online platforms. On Thursday, the White House took part by posting on X a Ghibli-style image of a weeping alleged felon being handcuffed by a US immigration officer before her deportation. Originally intended to be available on the platform for free, Altman said the huge success of the new generator was unexpected and meant the tool would remain limited to paid users for now. It was already possible to generate images with ChatGPT, but the latest version is powered by GPT-4o, the company's highest-performing model, and allows sophisticated results to be obtained through very succinct requests, which was not the case before. After the viral trend, a video from 2016 resurfaced in which Studio Ghibli's legendary director Hayao Miyazaki is seen lashing out during an AI demonstration by staff. "I would never wish to incorporate this technology into my work at all. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," an English translation of his remarks said in the video. The trend "is especially insidious and malicious because of how outspokenly scathing Miyazaki has been toward the tech," wrote artist and illustrator Jayd "Chira" Ait-Kaci on Bluesky. "It's always about contempt for artists, every time," Ait-Kaci added. OpenAI is facing a barrage of lawsuits over copyright infringements, including one major case with the New York Times and others from artists, musicians and publishers. Asked by AFP about the latest viral trend, and whether it threatened Studio Ghibli's intellectual property, OpenAI said the company is still fine-tuning its model. "Our goal is to give users as much creative freedom as possible," a company spokesperson told AFP. "We continue to prevent generations in the style of individual living artists, but we do permit broader studio styles, which people have used to generate and share some truly delightful and inspired original fan creations," she added. "We're always learning from real-world use and feedback, and we'll keep refining our policies as we go." The company is aggressively lobbying the White House and Congress to make the use of copyrighted content by AI companies part of the fair use doctrine. Fair use allowances already apply to search engines or in the case of satire and memes online and allow companies to freely use copyrighted material without permission.

How to create AI portrait images using OpenAI's Studio Ghibli

Users are getting creative by generating portraits of themselves, pets, and even famous landmarks. OpenAI just introduced a new update to its GPT-4o model that brings with it an advanced image-generation feature. With this, users can now transform photos into breathtaking Studio Ghibli-style anime art. This new feature has sparked a viral trend on social media. People are taking to social media to share their versions of AI-generated portraits that capture the dreamy, hand-drawn aesthetic of Ghibli films. The style has brought excited anime fans together online, with its nostalgia factor boosting its popularity. If you also want to hop on to the trend and create a Ghibli-style portrait for yourself, here's how you can do it: According to OpenAI, the new image model is rolling out gradually, so not all users may have immediate access. If you don't have access yet, you can still use OpenAI's previous DALL·E model to generate images. So, to create your own Ghibli-style AI portrait, you just have to upload a picture on ChatGPT and use this prompt - "Convert this photo to Studio Ghibli-style anime." If you want some variety in your portraits, you can even try these additional prompts: Users are getting creative by generating portraits of themselves, pets, and even famous landmarks in the Ghibli style. Have you tried it out yet?

Studio Ghibli AI images take over internet: What is it and why is getting attention

These AI portraits often include soft lighting, expressive eyes, detailed backgrounds, and more. The internet has a new obsession- Ghibli-styled AI images. OpenAI just dropped its latest GPT-4o AI upgrade that has introduced advanced image-generation capabilities. And users all over the Internet just can't get enough of it. They are sharing their own Ghibli-inspired portraits, landscapes, and fantasy scenes. But what exactly are Ghibli AI images, and why are they getting so much attention? Let me tell you. Studio Ghibli dates back to 1986 and was founded by Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki. It is now one of the most celebrated animation studios in the world. It has created masterpieces like Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Howl's Moving Castle. If you have watched any of these, you would've noticed that the Ghibli films feature breathtaking hand-drawn animation, vibrant yet muted color palettes, and deeply emotional storytelling. With the introduction of its latest upgrade, ChatGPT allows users to replicate this distinctive style with the help of AI. Using OpenAI's "Images in ChatGPT" feature, users can upload their own photos and have them transformed into a dreamy, hand-drawn Ghibli-style illustration. These AI portraits often include soft lighting, expressive eyes, detailed backgrounds, and a sense of magic that captures the essence of Ghibli's storytelling. The reasons why these images are getting so much attention on the internet is because not only does it portray artistic beauty, but it has also sparked a sense of nostalgia. As users share their AI-generated Ghibli portraits on social media, the trend continues to gain momentum. Some are turning their own pictures into animated characters while others are reimagining real-life scenes in Ghibli's dreamy style. All of these pictures circulating on the internet are pretty fun to see. Have you tried this yet? I am surely going to do so after finishing this copy.

Want to create Ghibli style portraits for free? Here's how you can do it

This feature is currently only available for ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Team users. If you've been scrolling through social media lately, you've probably noticed a surge of anime-inspired portraits. These Studio Ghibli-style images, generated using OpenAI's latest GPT-40 update, have taken the internet by storm. However, there's a catch -- this feature is currently only available for ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Team users. If you're on the free plan, you must be missing out on the fun. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman confirmed that due to high demand, the feature's rollout to free users has been delayed. That means you can't use this feature without a paid subscription. But don't worry, you don't need to upgrade to join the Ghibli-style trend. There are other ways to create your own anime-inspired portraits for free. Keep reading to learn how to create Ghibli-style portraits without spending money on ChatGPT subscriptions. Also read: Studio Ghibli AI images take over internet: What is it and why is it getting attention Grok AI Grok AI, developed by xAI, is another tool that can generate Ghibli-style visuals. You can upload your photo and ask Grok to transform it into an anime-like illustration. However, since each AI model has its own training data and style interpretation, the results might not look exactly like GPT-4o's creations. InsMind offers a free AI filter specifically designed to transform photos into Ghibli-style artwork. Compared to Grok, InsMind produces visuals that better capture the Ghibli vibe. So, even if you don't have access to ChatGPT's latest image tools, you can still create your own Ghibli-inspired portraits with free AI alternatives like Grok and InsMind. These AI tools make it easy to join the trend. Also read: Ghibli style AI-generated images are good for one simple reason

ChatGPT image generation now available for free users: How to create Ghibli-style pictures

penAI CEO Sam Altman today announced on X that it is now available to free users as well. Lately, if you've been scrolling through social media, you've probably come across AI-generated pictures in the Ghibli style. With OpenAI's latest image-generation update, users have been sharing AI creations that resemble the aesthetic of Studio Ghibli. Till now, only ChatGPT paid users were able to use the new feature. However, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman today announced on X that it is now available to free users as well. This means anyone can now create AI-generated images, including the viral Studio Ghibli-style portraits, without needing a paid subscription. For those unfamiliar, Studio Ghibli is a famous Japanese animation studio co-founded by animation legends Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata. It is known for breathtaking visuals and emotionally profound films, including Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and Howl's Moving Castle. Also read: 'Can you please chill': Sam Altman asks people to stop generating Studio Ghibli images If you're excited to try this out, the process is simple! Just follow these steps: Also read: Watch: When Studio Ghibli co-founder called AI animation an insult to life Whether you're a Studio Ghibli fan or just love experimenting with AI art, this feature allows you to bring your imagination to life. Give it a try and join the viral trend.

Ghibli style AI-generated images are good for one simple reason

Days, weeks and years down the line, as my smartphone's photos app reminds me of a sudden surge of Ghibli-inspired images in my gallery, I hope to look back and smile. Earlier this week in March 2025, OpenAI arguably had its most viral moment since it launched ChatGPT back in 2022. The reason was a routine update to ChatGPT that ended up being groundbreaking beyond measure. As OpenAI enabled image generation directly into the GPT-4o model, suddenly our beloved chatbot was no longer confined to text - it could now create images. And what did the digital world do? It erupted in an artistic explosion unlike anything we've seen. Out of nowhere, an unexpected and mesmerizing trend took over: Studio Ghibli-style AI art. For those unacquainted, Studio Ghibli, co-founded by the legendary Hayao Miyazaki, is synonymous with enchanting storytelling, vibrant hand-drawn animation, and a soft-light pastel aesthetic that feels almost magical. Almost overnight, our X.com timelines became a surreal gallery of these dreamlike, AI-generated creations. Personal photos transformed into illustrations reminiscent of My Neighbour Totoro and Spirited Away spread like wildfire. In an era dominated by cold, impersonal digital outputs, this trend offered something refreshingly human. Also read: Studio Ghibli AI images take over internet: What is it and why is it getting attention What makes these Ghibli-style images so special, you must be thinking? For me, it's very simple, as they bring a spark of genuine joy. Amid the ceaseless churn of data and the relentless march of algorithms, these images remind me - and evidently millions of others all over the world including here in India - of the beauty of nostalgia. They harken back to the days when movies stirred deep emotions and art had the power to transport us to another world. It's that rare moment when technology, often criticized for desensitizing our lives, instead makes us feel something profound. Therefore, the social media frenzy was something to behold. When you upload a simple selfie, the AI transforms it into an image that looks like it belongs in a Ghibli film - a world where everyday moments become extraordinary. Sam Altman himself joined in, sharing a Ghibli-style self-portrait. Even Elon Musk couldn't resist, transforming his image into a Rafiki-like figure from The Lion King, complete with his trademark irreverence. There's an undeniable allure to Studio Ghibli's art - its rich colors, intricate details, and whimsical charm evoke a sense of wonder that's hard to replicate. What strikes me most is the democratization of creativity this update enables. You no longer need to be a professional artist to produce stunning artwork. With just a few clicks, anyone can reimagine their memories, their pets, or even mundane snapshots of life in this beautifully nostalgic style. And I've witnessed this firsthand over the past few days with shock and awe. In a world where our feeds are often cluttered with the mundane and the trivial, these Ghibli-inspired images remind us of what we're all capable of: creativity, innovation, and a spark of magic that technology, when harnessed well, can evoke. It's not just about reimagining photos; it's about reawakening our sense of wonder - a sentiment that, frankly, has been in short supply lately. Now, I know what some of you might be thinking. Hayao Miyazaki, the man behind Ghibli, has been openly critical of AI-generated art. He's called it an "insult to life itself." And, sure, his words carry weight. But here's the thing: while Miyazaki's stance is rooted in a deep respect for the artistic process, these Ghibli-style images aren't trying to replace the soulful craftsmanship of hand-drawn art. Instead, they serve as a joyful nod - a playful, perhaps even ironic, celebration of that very art. When was the last time tech truly made you smile? When did you feel that raw, unbridled joy from a piece of innovation? If you can't answer that in under 30 seconds, it might be a sign that the relentless grind of our digital lives has dulled our senses. These images - each one a tiny burst of nostalgia and creativity - are a reminder that sometimes, technology can still surprise us. They cut through the desensitizing effects of endless notifications and algorithm-driven content, offering a moment of genuine delight. Imagine scrolling through your feed and seeing your own face reimagined as a character straight out of a Ghibli film. It's a moment of unexpected levity in an otherwise routine day. It makes you pause, smile, and perhaps even share the experience with someone else. And in sharing, we create a ripple effect - a collective moment of joy that's both deeply personal and universally human. Love it or hate it, Ghibli style AI-generated images are good for one simple reason - they make us feel alive. As to how long will this trend last? Well, trends, by their nature, are fleeting. We might soon find ourselves inundated with new AI breakthroughs that once again shift our attention. Yet, for now, there's a beauty in this fleeting moment - a moment to savour, if you can. Even if it's just for a little while.