Los Angeles – Studio Ghibli fans, the famous Japanese animation study behind “Spirited Away” and other beloved films, were delighted this week when a new version of Chatgpt allowed them to transform the popular Internet memes or personal photos in the distinctive style of Founder of Ghibli Hayao Miyazaki.
But the trend also highlighted ethical concerns about artificial intelligence tools trained in creative works with copyright and what that means for future human artists. Miyazaki, 84, known for his hand -drawn approach and his capricious narrative, has expressed skepticism about AI’s role in animation.
Janu Lingeswaran was not thinking much about that when he uploaded a photo of his 3 -year -old Ragdoll cat, Mali, in the new Chatgpt image generator tool on Wednesday. Then he asked Chatgpt to turn him in the Gibli style, instantly by making an anime image that seemed to Mali, but also one of the thorough feline characters that populate Miyazaki movies like “My Neighbor Totoro” or “Kiki’s Delivery Service.”
“I really fell in love with the result,” Lingeswaran said, a businessman who lives near Aachen, Germany. “We are thinking of printing and hanging it on the wall.”
Similar results gave iconic images in the style, such as the casual aspect of the Turkish Yusuf Dikec pistol shooter In a shirt and a hand in his pocket on his way to win a silver medal at the 2024 Olympic Games. Or the famous “disaster girl” of a 4 -year -old boy who turns to the camera with a slight smile while a fire of the house is unleashed in the background.
Chatgpt maker openai, which is Fight against copyright demands About his flagbot, he has largely encouraged the “Giblification” experiments and his CEO Sam Altman changed his profile on the social media platform X to a portrait in the style of Ghibli. In a technical article published on Tuesday, the company had said that the new tool would adopt a “conservative approach” in the way in which the aesthetics of individual artists mimic.
“We add a rejection that is triggered when a user tries to generate an image in the style of a living artist,” he said. But the company added in a statement that “it allows broader study styles, which people have used to generate and share some creations of truly delicious and inspired original fans.”
Studio Ghibli in Japan declined to comment on Friday.
While users published their Ghibli -style images on social networks, the previous comments of Miyazaki about AI animation also began to resurface. When Miyazaki was shown a demonstration of AI in 2016, he said he was “completely disgusted” by the screen, according to documentary images of the interaction. The person who demonstrates the animation, which showed a twisted body crawling by his head, explained that AI could “present grotesque movements that humans cannot imagine.” It could be used for zombie movements, said the person.
That led Miyazaki to tell a story.
“Every morning, not in recent days, I see my friend who has a disability,” Miyazaki said. “It is very difficult for him to only make a great five; his arm with rigid muscle cannot reach my hand. Now, thinking about him, I can’t see these things and find him interesting. Who believes this has no idea what pain is.”
He said that “I would never want to incorporate this technology in my work at all.”
“I firmly feel that this is an insult to life itself,” he added.
Josh Weigensberg, a partner of the law firm Pryor Cashman, said that a question posed by the art of Ghibli’s style is whether the AI model was trained in the work of Miyazaki or Studio Ghibli. That in turn “raises the question of” well, do they have a license or permission to do that training or not? “, Said.
Operai did not answer a question on Thursday about whether he had a license.
Weigensberg added that if a job had a license for training, it could make sense that a company allows this type of use. But if this type of use is happening without consent and compensation, he said, it could be “problematic.”
Weigensberg said there is a general principle “in view of 30,000 feet” that “style” is not with copyright. But sometimes, he said, what people are really thinking when they say “style” could be “more specific, discernible and discreet elements of a work of art,” he said.
“A ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ or ‘Spirited Away’, could freeze a frame in any of those films and point out specific things, and then look at the exit of generative and see identical elements or substantially similar elements at that exit,” he said. “Simply stopping in,” oh, well, the style is not protected under the copyright law. ‘That is not necessarily the end of the investigation. “
Artist Karla Ortiz, who grew watching Miyazaki’s films and is Sue other Ia Image generators For the infraction of copyright in a case that is still pending, he called it “another clear example of how companies as OpenAi simply do not care about the work of artists and the livelihoods of artists.”
“That is to use the brand of Gibli, its name, its work, its reputation, promote products (OpenAi),” said Ortiz. “It’s an insult. It is exploitation.”
Ortiz was more enraged when the administration of President Donald Trump jumped to the meme trend on Thursday, using the official White House account to publish a Ghibli -style image of a crying woman from the Dominican Republic recently arrested by US immigration agents. The White House and Operai did not immediately respond to requests for comments on how the image was made.
“Seeing something as bright, as wonderful as Miyazaki’s work is killed to generate something so disgusting,” Ortiz wrote on social networks, and added that he expected Studio Gibli to demand “The Hell Out of” OpenAi for this.
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O’Brien reported from providence, Rhode Island. The AP Yuri Kageyama writer in Tokyo contributed to this report.
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