Who is Grant Slatton? Meet the man behind the viral Ghibli-AI trend

If you've been anywhere on social media in the past few days, you must've noticed a barrage of animated images being published by all your family and friends. This is all thanks to OpenAI's new image generation model, which is letting users convert their portraits and images into a "Studio Ghibli" style. The viral trend came into the limelight thanks to an engineer named Grant Slatton.

On March 25, 2025, following OpenAI’s release of enhanced image-generation tools, Slatton shared an AI-generated image of his family and dog at the beach, styled in the iconic animation aesthetic of Studio Ghibli.

The post quickly gained massive traction, racking up over 45,000 likes and attracting nearly 49 million views. Its popularity encouraged countless others to share their own Ghibli-style creations, propelling the trend across various social media platforms.

In India, Gujarat led the charts for Ghibli searches, with heavy interest also seen from Maharashtra and Uttarakhand.

The phenomenon became so widespread that OpenAI’s servers struggled to handle the volume of requests, forcing the company to implement temporary rate limits and restrict specific image prompts. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even asked pleaded users to slow down with their requests as he claimed that OpenAI GPUs "were melting" under the load of the requests.

Despite the surge in activity, reactions to the trend have been mixed. Some praised the whimsical and heartwarming aesthetic, while others raised ethical and copyright concerns about using AI to replicate Studio Ghibli’s unique style.

One of the most vocal critics has been Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of Studio Ghibli, who has previously condemned AI-generated art as "an insult to life itself."

Slatton, however, remains mostly positive about his role in sparking the craze, describing the day his post went viral as "the single most net-positive day" he had ever experienced on social media. His unintentional influence has ignited a debate about the boundaries of creativity in the digital age, while also showcasing how a single post can snowball into a global phenomenon.

As the discussion around AI-generated art continues, Slatton’s viral moment serves as a reminder of the rapid and unpredictable nature of trends in the modern internet landscape.