Recent AI Ghibli trend brings back Miyazaki's comments on machine-made art

Modified Mar 27, 2025 20:00 GMT

Recent AI Ghibli trend brings back Miyazaki's comments on machine-made art (Image via Studio Ghibli)

With the recent ChatGPT trend of turning pictures into Studio Ghibli-style artworks, fans have brought back Hayao Miyazaki's comments about machine-made art he shared years ago. While the comments weren't specifically about AI artworks, they gave fans an idea about the Japanese filmmaker's views on using machine-made art.

As anime fans would know, Hayao Miyazaki is a Japanese animator, filmmaker, and manga artist. He co-founded Studio Ghibli alongside Toshio Suzuki and Isao Takahata. Since then, he has directed and contributed to countless films, making him widely regarded as one of the most accomplished filmmakers in the history of animation.

Miyazaki's comment on machine-made art years ago sparks debate over new AI Ghibli art trend

Years ago, Hayao Miyazaki attended a presentation by Nobuo Kawakami on an artificial intelligence model that learned certain movements. He explained how they succeeded in instructing the machine to depict a creepy, grotesque-looking movement, which could be applied to zombie video games.

In response, the filmmaker shared that he had been meeting a friend with a disability. When thinking about him, he found it difficult to think of the grotesque movement on the screen as interesting.

"I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself," he stated.

He shared that whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is; he was utterly disgusted. While the filmmaker was okay with others creating creepy stuff, he never wished to incorporate the same technology into his work.

Studio Ghibli Founder Hayao Miyazaki (Image via Studio Ghibli)

After the presenters explained that they were merely experimenting to build a machine that could draw pictures like humans, Miyazaki shared that he felt they were nearing the end of times, as humans were losing faith in themselves.

While these comments were about the machine-made art he saw during the presentation, it is well-known that the filmmaker was generally against using artificial intelligence in his works. This is also evident in his movies, which almost always feature hand-drawn drawings.

Hence, when people started indulging in the trend of using ChatGPT to turn pictures into Studio Ghibli-style art, many anime fans became vocal against it, conveying how the studio's founder felt about AI.

Fans' reaction to the AI Ghibli trend and Miyazaki's comments

Expand Tweet

Most fans spoke against the usage of artificial intelligence for artwork. They believed the ones who used it for art were thieves and would never find anything wrong with it.

Meanwhile, another fan added that the ones who were fine with the recent trend of AI usage were the ones who were too lazy to pick up a pencil and draw something on their own.

"Those thieves don't care about art though. That's the problem," one fan said.

"They will eat up any slop to avoid picking up a pencil," another fan added.

"He is a great artist but that was a boomer take. The entire industry is computer animated now," another fan said.

"This was 8 years ago. Look at the thing they're presenting. It's terrible! He was rightfully disgusted. Doesn't mean today's tech is," other fan said.

Some fans believed that Hayao Miyazaki's comments on AI back then did not apply to the current situation. Most animation studios now use computers to speed up their production process, and the same can be predicted to happen in the future.

Meanwhile, another fan tried to correct others. While Miyazaki was right to feel disgusted during the presentation, the same might not be the case for today's machine-learning technology, as it has advanced through time.