MotionPilot is an After Effects panel that puts a motion spec where the animation is actually made. A spec is a versioned JSON file holding a studio's easing curves and duration tiers, and MotionPilot treats a curve and a duration as one token — in a motion system, a curve without a duration is only half a rule. Select keyframes, pick a token, and it writes the easing and retimes the segment in one step.
It's built for design leads who keep a house motion spec, and the artists who follow it.
What it does
- Apply Spec — set easing and retime selected keyframes from one token. Works offline, with no account and no API key.
- One spec, many artists — the spec loads from a URL, so publishing it once updates every artist's panel. One file can carry several targets, such as phone UI and head-mounted display profiles with different timing budgets.
- Build from a prompt (optional) — describe what you want and MotionPilot creates native, editable layers and animation. The model never writes easing values: it names a curve from your spec, and the panel compiles that name into real bezier handles.
- Bring your own AI — sign in with the OpenAI Codex CLI, use your own OpenAI or Google Gemini API key, or point it at a local endpoint such as Ollama. There is no hosted AI service.
- Everything stays editable — native layers and keyframes; undo works, and nothing is baked frame by frame.
MotionPilot is the "build" step of MotionRules: MotionSpec defines the tokens, MotionPilot builds with them, and MotionSheet hands off and audits the result. It's free on Adobe Exchange, developed and tested on Windows; macOS is not verified yet.