An After Effects MCP is a connector that lets an AI app work inside your real After Effects comp. With Filmit MCP connected, Claude or ChatGPT can build shape and text layers, set keyframes and easing, write expressions and add effects, then render a frame and look at it to check its own work.
This guide covers what it can do in After Effects, the lower third from the video built one request at a time, how you would build the same thing by hand, and where it stops.
What can it do in After Effects?
There are 35 After Effects actions. Grouped by job:
The comp’s size, frame rate, length and every layer, one layer in detail, and any property’s keyframes and expression.
Comps, solids, nulls, adjustment layers, shape layers, text layers, images, rectangular masks and gradients.
Text styling, per-character text animation, transforms, keyframes with easing and interpolation, motion blur, expressions (including ready-made wiggle, loop, bounce, inertia and overshoot), expression controls and parenting.
Any effect by its name, with settings, keyframes or an expression. Reorder, duplicate, trim, precompose, blending modes and track mattes.
Render a frame of the comp so the AI can see the result and fix what looks off.
The full list, with the names you see in your AI app’s settings, is in What Claude can do.
A real job: a lower third, one request at a time
The video builds a lower third the way you would brief a motion designer: start simple, then add one thing at a time and check it.
"I need a lower third"
Describe it, and Claude builds the shape and text layers in your comp.
"Slide it in"
Claude sets the keyframes and the easing, right on the layer.
"A little bounce when it lands"
Claude writes the expression and adds it for you.
"Make the title type on"
Claude adds a text animator, so the title appears letter by letter.
"Swap the flat yellow for a gradient"
It changes the fill, then looks at the frame to check the name still reads.
"Finish it"
A drop shadow and motion blur go on, and the lower third is ready to render.
Every one of those is an ordinary layer, keyframe or expression. Open the layer afterwards and you can tweak it like anything you built yourself.
How would you build it by hand?
All of it is native After Effects, and worth knowing. Draw the bar with the Rectangle tool and type the name with the Type tool. Set two Position keyframes for the slide, select them and press F9 for Easy Ease, then shape the curve in the Graph Editor. For the bounce, Alt-click (Option-click) the Position stopwatch and paste a bounce expression. For the type-on, add Animate, Opacity to the text layer, set the animator’s Opacity to 0, and keyframe the Range Selector’s Start from 0 to 100 percent. Add Effect, Generate, Gradient Ramp for the gradient and Effect, Perspective, Drop Shadow for the shadow, then turn on the motion blur switch for the layers and the comp.
That is a few minutes for someone who does it every day, and longer for everyone else. Asking is quicker for the first pass, and you keep full control of the result. Our guides to After Effects expressions and text animation presets cover the native pieces in more depth.
How do you connect it?
Install the free Filmit Studio app, which adds the Filmit Studio panel to After Effects. Open Window, Extensions, Filmit Studio, go to the MCP tab and flip the switch. For Claude, click Connect next to Claude and sign in with your Filmit account. For ChatGPT, add Filmit in ChatGPT using the connector address https://mcp.filmit.io/mcp and sign in with Filmit (ChatGPT setup steps). The setup guide has every step, and our walkthrough of using Claude in After Effects shows a full prompt-to-animation test.
Where it falls short
For other shapes, it builds a shape layer and uses it as a track matte instead.
It builds what you describe. A reference image in the chat helps it match a style, but deciding what looks right is your job.
A lower third with text, styling and animation takes a handful of actions, because it reads before and after it edits. On a free account, that leaves plenty of the 50 a day for small jobs.
The same connector edits timelines in Premiere Pro: see our Premiere Pro MCP guide and how to use ChatGPT in Premiere Pro. New to the panel? Start with our guide to getting started with Filmit Studio.
