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DaVinci Resolve MCP Server

by guycochran
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Python
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DaVinci Resolve MCP Server

Talk to your timeline. Control DaVinci Resolve with natural language through Claude — browse projects, swap clips, color grade, render for YouTube, and see what's in any frame with AI vision. From your desk or from your phone, anywhere in the world.

You:    "Replace the b-roll at 13:22 with the South Pole takeoff shot"
Claude: Done. Replaced AOA_CLIP_04 with A663C012_SOUTH_POLE_TAKE_OFF on V2.
        Same position, same duration, video only — your interview audio is untouched.

What This Is

An MCP server that connects Claude to a running DaVinci Resolve instance. 53 tools across 11 categories give Claude full read/write access to your projects, timelines, media pool, color page, and render queue — plus AI-powered frame analysis via Moondream.

This isn't a toy. It edits. It replaced a clip on a multi-track documentary timeline, matched the duration, preserved the audio, and exported the result for YouTube. All through conversation.

What You Can Do

Edit by talking

"Open the tutorial project"
"Switch to the Full Documentary timeline"
"What clips are on V2?"
"Replace clip 2 on V2 with the milky way shot"
"Zoom in to 120% on the interview clip"
"Add a blue marker here that says 'Great take'"
"Export this for YouTube"

See through your timeline with AI vision

"What's in this frame?"
→ A wide shot of a beach in St. Maarten with an airplane on final approach,
  turquoise water, and spectators watching from behind a chain-link fence.

"Is there a person at the podium?"
→ Yes, there is a person standing at the podium on the left side of the frame.

"How many people are visible?"
→ 4

Control Resolve from your phone

The server runs over HTTP with a Cloudflare tunnel, so you can edit from your couch, your car, or another continent. Same tools, same capabilities — just talking to Claude on your phone.

The 53 Tools

Category

Count

What they do

Connection

4

Status, page navigation, reconnect

Project

6

List, load, save, create projects, read/write settings

Timeline

8

List/switch timelines, playhead control, track inspection, create new

Media

5

Browse media pool, import clips, create bins, append to timeline

Editing

7

Transform, speed, enable/disable, compound clips, delete clips, replace clips

Color

6

Apply LUTs, create/load color versions, export grades

Markers

3

Add, list, delete timeline markers

Titles

2

Insert Fusion Text+ titles, modify text content

Render

6

Quick export (YouTube/Vimeo/TikTok), custom render jobs, export EDL/FCPXML

Fusion

3

Access Fusion compositions and tools

Vision

3

AI scene description, object detection, visual Q&A

Quick Start

Prerequisites

  • DaVinci Resolve Studio (paid — the scripting API is not available in the free version of Resolve)

  • Python 3.10+ (tested with 3.14)

  • A Moondream API key (free tier available — for AI vision features). Sign up at console.moondream.ai to get your key. Moondream charges per API call, but the free tier is generous for normal editing use.

1. Clone and install

git clone https://github.com/guycochran/resolve-mcp-server.git
cd resolve-mcp-server
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

2. Configure your API key

cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env and add your Moondream API key

3. Add to Claude Desktop

Add to your Claude Desktop MCP config (~/.claude/claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "resolve": {
      "command": "/path/to/resolve-mcp-server/start.sh"
    }
  }
}

4. Open Resolve and start talking

"What project am I working on?"

That's it. Claude can now see and control everything in Resolve.

Remote Access (HTTP Mode)

Control Resolve from anywhere — your phone, a tablet, another computer.

# Start the server in HTTP mode
TRANSPORT=http PORT=3001 .venv/bin/python3 src/server.py

With Cloudflare Tunnel (worldwide access)

# Add to your cloudflared config:
#   hostname: resolve.yourdomain.com
#     service: http://localhost:3001

cloudflared tunnel run

Now point any MCP client at https://resolve.yourdomain.com/mcp and you're editing remotely.

How Clip Replacement Works

The Resolve scripting API has no overwrite edit or three-point edit. We built one.

resolve_replace_clip performs a two-step operation:

  1. Read the old clip's exact timeline position and duration

  2. Delete the old clip (no ripple — preserves the gap)

  3. Insert the new clip at the identical record position with matching duration

# What happens under the hood:
timeline.DeleteClips([old_clip], False)
pool.AppendToTimeline([{
    "mediaPoolItem": new_item,
    "trackIndex": 2,
    "recordFrame": 86734,       # exact same position
    "startFrame": 0,
    "endFrame": 120,            # matches original duration
    "mediaType": 1              # video only — preserves audio
}])

This means Claude can swap b-roll, try alternate takes, and revert — all through conversation.

How AI Vision Works

The server uses Moondream Vision Language Models (VLMs) for AI-powered frame analysis. It grabs the current frame from Resolve, compresses it via Pillow (6MB PNG down to ~250KB JPEG), and sends it to the Moondream cloud API.

Sign up at console.moondream.ai (free tier available) to get your API key.

Three tools:

  • resolve_describe_frame — "What's in this shot?"

  • resolve_detect_in_frame — Find objects with bounding boxes

  • resolve_ask_about_frame — Visual Q&A about the frame

Use cases: automated scene logging, accessibility descriptions, content verification, shot matching.

Architecture

Phone/Tablet ──── HTTPS ────→ Cloudflare Tunnel ────→ localhost:3001
                                                           │
Claude Desktop ── stdio ──────────────────────────────────→│
                                                           │
                                                   Resolve MCP Server
                                                   (Python + FastMCP)
                                                           │
                                              ┌────────────┼────────────┐
                                              ▼            ▼            ▼
                                        DaVinci       Moondream      Cloudflare
                                        Resolve       Vision API      Tunnel
                                        (local)       (cloud)        (cloud)

Project Structure

src/
├── server.py                    # FastMCP entry point (stdio + HTTP)
├── services/
│   ├── resolve_connection.py    # Resolve API connection management
│   └── moondream.py             # Moondream vision API client + image prep
└── tools/
    ├── connection.py            # Status, page navigation
    ├── project.py               # Project management
    ├── timeline.py              # Timeline operations
    ├── media.py                 # Media pool management
    ├── editing.py               # Transform, delete, replace clips
    ├── color.py                 # LUTs, color versions, grade export
    ├── markers.py               # Timeline markers
    ├── titles.py                # Fusion titles
    ├── render.py                # Rendering & export
    ├── fusion.py                # Fusion compositions
    └── vision.py                # AI frame analysis

Requirements

  • DaVinci Resolve Studio — The scripting API requires the paid Studio version

  • mcp[cli] — Model Context Protocol SDK

  • httpx — HTTP client for Moondream API

  • Pillow — Image compression (PNG → JPEG for vision pipeline)

License

MIT

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