The recent explosion of AI-generated artwork in Studio Ghibli’s style has ignited excitement and controversy across social media. OpenAI’s latest image-generation tool, launched on March 25, has enabled users to create stunning visuals that closely mimic the hand-drawn aesthetic of legendary animator Hayao Miyazaki’s studio.

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.

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.