After Effects MCP Server

Add a composition marker at a time, with a comment, duration, chapter and web link

Add controls to a composition's Essential Graphics panel (Animation > Add Property to Essential Graphics): properties such as Source Text, colours, sliders, checkboxes, angles, 2D points and scale, Dropdown Menu Controls (optionally setting their menu items) and 3D shadow colour, or footage and precomposition layers as media replacement. A nested composition then shows them as Essential Properties

Add a layer (Layer > New): solid, null, adjustment, text, shape, camera or light, or a project item (footage or composition) as a layer, at the top of the composition

Add a mask to layers: a rectangle or ellipse from bounds, or a path from points, all in the layer's own pixel coordinates; with its mode, feather, opacity, expansion and inversion

Protect part of a composition's timing so it keeps its length when the composition is nested or the template is stretched (Composition > Responsive Design - Time > Create Intro, Create Outro or Create Protected Region from Work Area), or protect a custom span: a composition marker with Protected Region on

Add shapes to shape layers (the Timeline panel's Add menu), or to a new shape layer: groups (which can hold items of their own), rectangle, ellipse, polystar and free paths, fill, stroke, gradient fill and gradient stroke, and the path operations Merge Paths, Offset Paths, Pucker & Bloat, Repeater, Round Corners, Trim Paths, Twist, Wiggle Paths, Wiggle Transform and Zig Zag, each with its settings. Items are added in order at the end of the group. Gradient colours are set in the Gradient Editor

Add a text layer (Layer > New > Text, or the Horizontal and Vertical Type tools): point text, or paragraph text in a box, horizontal or vertical, optionally named and placed

Check that After Effects is reachable: platform, how the server addresses After Effects, whether it is running, its version and project. Use this first when a call fails to connect

Align Video to Data (Layer > Time): offset video layers in time by the frame counts their names have in a data layer's mgJSON videoSyncTimeList. Selects the data layer and the video layers and makes the composition active

Track the camera of footage layers (Animation > Track Camera): apply the 3D Camera Tracker effect, or change the one already applied, and set Solve Method, Detailed Analysis, Auto-delete Points Across Time and Hide Warning Banner. After Effects analyses the layer in the background; creating a camera or content from the solved points is done in the Composition panel

Apply a colour effect (Effect > Color Correction or Utility) to layers, or to a new adjustment layer at the top of the composition so it affects everything below and final renders: Lumetri Color, Curves, Levels, Hue/Saturation, Exposure and other grading effects; Broadcast Colors to keep output broadcast-safe; Color Profile Converter to simulate an output type in renders. Set controls by display name with properties

Apply an effect to layers (Effect menu) by match name (e.g. "ADBE Gaussian Blur 2") or display name, optionally setting its properties by name, e.g. { "Blurriness": 20 }

Apply an animation preset (.ffx) to layers (Animation > Apply Animation Preset)

Apply Warp Stabilizer VFX to layers (Animation > Warp Stabilizer VFX), or change the one already applied, and set its controls: Result, Smoothness, Method, Preserve Scale, Framing, Auto-scale, Additional Scale, Detailed Analysis, Rolling Shutter Ripple, Crop Less <-> Smooth More, synthesis options, Objective, Target Layer, Track Point Size, Auto-delete Points and Hide Warning Banner. After Effects analyses the layer in the background after the effect is added or its analysis settings change

Change the stacking order: move layers to the top, to the bottom, or before or after another layer

Rearrange shape items in a group: delete, duplicate, move to a position, Group Shapes (wrap the items in a new group), Ungroup Shapes (dissolve groups) or Convert To Bezier Path (turn a rectangle, ellipse or polystar into a free path). Grouping, ungrouping and converting open the composition and run the Layer > Mask and Shape Path command on the items

Choose a layer tool in the Tools panel: Rotation, Pan Behind (Anchor Point) or Selection, for the user's next drag in the Composition panel. To rotate or move an anchor point from here, use set_transform

Turn Multi-Frame Rendering on or off with a CPU limit for the next render, start, pause, continue or end Watch Folder mode (File > Watch Folder: After Effects then renders projects saved into the folder and stops taking other work), and report whether this After Effects is a render-only engine

Show or hide the Render Queue panel (Window > Render Queue), pause, continue or stop a render in progress, turn the whole-queue completion notification on or off, and read progress: each item's status, start time and elapsed time

Bake a property's expression into a keyframe on every frame and switch the expression off, keeping its text (Animation > Keyframe Assistant > Convert Expression to Keyframes). Keyframes already in the span are replaced

Convert layers with a Layer menu command: Create Shapes from Text (new shape layers with the outlines), Create Masks from Text (a solid with a mask per character), or Convert to Editable Text (Photoshop text layers to After Effects text). Selects the layers and runs the command in their composition

Copy from one layer's property to properties on other layers: its keyframes (Edit > Copy and Paste, or Paste Reverse Keyframes with reverse), its expression only (Edit > Copy Expression Only), or a link: an expression on each target that follows the source, as Edit > Copy With Property Links then Paste, or dragging the expression pick whip, would write

Create a composition (Composition > New Composition) with a size, pixel aspect, duration, frame rate and background colour, optionally in a folder, and open it

Make compositions from footage or compositions in the Project panel (File > New Comp from Selection): one per item, or one holding them all, sized and timed from an item, optionally with the layers in sequence and added to the Render Queue

Add a folder to the Project panel, optionally inside another folder, and move items into it

Add a footage item without adding a layer: a colour-bar placeholder for footage that is not available yet (File > Import > Placeholder) or a solid (File > Import > Solid), optionally into a folder

Queue a composition to render as its own proxy (File > Create Proxy > Still or Movie): adds a Render Queue item whose post-render action is Set Proxy. Render it with render_queue

Convert Illustrator, PDF or SVG footage layers to shape layers (Layer > Create > Create Shapes from Vector Layer). Each new shape layer is placed above its source, which is turned off

Delete layers from a composition

Find the cuts in video footage layers (Layer > Scene Edit Detection) and add a marker at each, split the layer at each cut, or split and pre-compose each scene; none only returns the cut times

Duplicate a composition (Edit > Duplicate), optionally renaming the copy

Duplicate layers (Edit > Duplicate), or copy them into another composition

Add, move, remove or clear a composition's ruler guides (View > Add Guide, Edit Guide, Clear Guides). Positions are pixels from the left (vertical guides) or top (horizontal guides); guides are numbered from 1 in the order they were added

Change existing keyframes of a property (Animation > Keyframe Interpolation, Keyframe Velocity, Keyframe Assistant, the Graph Editor buttons and the keyframe context menu): interpolation presets such as Easy Ease, Easy Ease In/Out, Auto Bezier, Continuous Bezier, Linear and Toggle Hold Keyframe; incoming and outgoing interpolation and ease (speed and influence of the Bezier handles); Rove Across Time; motion path tangents; keyframe colour label; the value of every chosen keyframe (Edit Value); and Time-Reverse Keyframes. keys.times adds a keyframe where none exists, holding the value there, as the keyframe navigator or the Pen tool on a motion path does

Composition and layer markers (Layer > Add Marker, the Marker dialog): list, add (or set a numbered composition marker 0-9), edit comment, duration, chapter, web link, cue point, label and protected region, remove one or all, move the current time to a marker, or Update Markers From Source. Give layers for layer markers; omit them for composition markers

Read or replace the project's XMP metadata (shown in the Metadata panel and in Adobe Bridge). showPanel toggles Window > Metadata

Run your own ExtendScript in After Effects and return its last expression. It runs unrestricted: it can change or delete anything, read or write files, and run system commands (system.callSystem, which needs Allow Scripts to Write Files and Access Network). Prefer the specific tools

Export a composition as a Motion Graphics template (.mogrt) (File > Export > Export As Motion Graphics Template) to the Local Templates Folder or a folder on a local drive. The file is named after the template name

Browse the effects on the Effect menu by category (Blur & Sharpen, Distort, Generate, Expression Controls, ...) or by name, from the built-in effect catalog: display name, match name, category, the controls After Effects documents for each, and whether this After Effects has it installed (Effect menu; Effects & Presets panel)

Search the fonts After Effects can use (Character panel font menu, app.fonts) by name, or list only variable fonts or missing and substituted fonts. Returns PostScript names for set_text, families and styles, variable font axes, and the favourite and recent font lists

Find missing footage, effects or fonts (File > Dependencies > Find Missing Footage, Find Missing Effects, Find Missing Fonts). Footage and fonts are listed; reveal also runs the menu command, which shows them in the Project or Timeline panel. Missing effects can only be revealed

Search the project like the Project panel search field (File > Find): items whose name or comment contains text, and items that are missing, unused or used, optionally of one type

Describe the running After Effects and the computer: version, build, language, memory in use, render-engine and watch-folder modes, operating system, the project's GPU acceleration (File > Project Settings) and the types available, whether viewer updates are paused, and the values of preference keys you name

Read the project's colour settings (File > Project Settings > Color): bit depth, working colour space, working gamma, Linearize Working Color Space, Blend Colors Using 1.0 Gamma and Compensate for Scene-referred Profiles, and optionally the ICC colour profiles that can be the working space

Read the controls of effects on layers (Effect Controls panel): each control's name, match name, type (number, menu, point, point3d, color, layer, mask, topic, group or custom; checkboxes are numbers 0 or 1), current value, menu choices, range, units, keyframe count and expression

Describe footage items (Project panel, Interpret Footage): source kind (file, solid, placeholder), file and missing path, alpha, frame rates, fields and pulldown, pixel aspect, loop, proxy and the compositions that use each item

Describe the open project: file, unsaved changes, bit depth, working colour space, expression engine, item counts by type, the active item and the render queue

Read a layer property: its value, keyframes (time, value, interpolation) and expression. Properties are named by a shortcut or a path of match names or names; this includes the Data group of a data-driven layer

Read Render Queue items in full (Render Queue panel): status, start and elapsed render time, log level, notification, time span, every render setting and every output module's format, file, file name template, post-render action and settings, by the names set_render_settings and set_output_module accept

Read text layers' Source Text: text, font (with its PostScript name, family, style and variable axes), character and paragraph formatting, point or paragraph text and box size, and where each paragraph and composed line starts and ends