Motion Video Director

A Claude Code skill for motion graphics and video editing.

Plan, animate, edit, voice and sound-design complete videos with Claude Code, Codex or Cursor. Everything renders locally, with no After Effects or Premiere.

Laptop reveal animation rendered entirely in code by Claude Code

_{Every frame above was written and rendered by Claude Code using this skill.}

Overview

Motion Video Director turns a coding agent into a video production team. It handles the work a motion designer, editor and sound designer would normally do:

Motion graphics and animated explainers, drawn in code (Canvas, SVG, Three.js, GSAP)
Editing raw footage and talking-head clips: cuts, punch zooms, captions, B-roll, text behind the subject
Voiceover scripts for ElevenLabs, with word-level timing for every shot
Sound design synced to the frame and mixed to platform loudness (-14 LUFS)
Final MP4 renders in 9:16, 16:9 or 1:1

The skill is a production playbook (SKILL.md) plus a set of helper scripts. The agent follows a fixed process with approval gates, so you review the script, the plan and a preview before anything is fully rendered.

Examples

All of these were made with this skill.

AI Creates Motion Graphic	Motion keyboard	Brud Code launch

Watch on Instagram	Watch on Instagram	Watch on Instagram

The launch ad for this skill was also produced with it: a 56-second, 1080p SaaS ad with voiceover, 2D/3D animation and a full sound mix.

Installation

Quick install (recommended)

Run this in your project folder. It works with Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and other agents that support skills:

npx skills add Miftahul-Islam-Efaz/Motion-graphics-skill

You need Node.js installed. The installer asks which agent you use and copies the skill to the right folder.

Claude Code plugin

Inside Claude Code, run:

/plugin marketplace add Miftahul-Islam-Efaz/Motion-graphics-skill
/plugin install motion-video-director@motion-graphics-skill

Restart Claude Code afterwards.

Manual install

Click Code → Download ZIP at the top of this page and unzip it.
Copy the skills/motion-video-director folder into one of these locations:
- ~/.claude/skills/ to use it in every project (on Windows: C:\Users\<you>\.claude\skills\)
- .claude/skills/ inside a project to use it only there
Restart Claude Code.

For Codex, Cursor or other agents, copy the folder into your project and tell the agent:

Read skills/motion-video-director/SKILL.md and follow it for this video project.

Usage

Describe the video you want and attach references if you have them.

Make a 30-second 9:16 launch reel for my SaaS. References attached.

Edit my raw talking-head clip into a reel with captions, punch zooms and B-roll.

Create a 45-second product explainer of our dashboard. Clean UI animation, subtle sound design.

The agent then works through these steps:

Brief. Collects references, story, audience, format and length.
Voiceover script. Writes a script ready to paste into ElevenLabs. You generate the MP3 and send it back.
Storyboard. Times every shot to the words in the voiceover.
Build. Animates the scenes in code and edits any footage you provided.
Preview. Renders contact sheets of each scene and fixes problems before the full render.
Render and mix. Exports the final video with sound design and loudness normalization, then runs a QA checklist.

You approve the script, the plan and the preview before the final render. Progress is logged in PROGRESS.md, so a new session can continue where the last one stopped.

What the skill covers

Area	Details
Directing	Hooks in the first 3 seconds, pacing, shot types, J/L cuts, match cuts, CTA structure
Editing intensity	Five levels, from fast-paced reels to restrained corporate video
Motion graphics	Kinetic typography, 3D text, UI mockups, cursor animation, stickers, particles, Lottie
Footage editing	Punch zooms, subject cutouts (RVM, SAM2), captions behind the subject, speed ramps
3D	Three.js product shots, floating cards, camera fly-throughs, extruded logos
Animation	The 12 principles of animation, easing, staggering, overshoot
Color and layout	60-30-10 color, WCAG contrast, safe zones for 9:16 platforms
Sound	Risers, impacts and whooshes synced to the frame, ducking under voice, -14 LUFS / -1.5 dBTP
Voiceover	ElevenLabs scripting, audio QA, word timestamps with faster-whisper
Assets	Fonts, sound effects and stock footage via Firecrawl, Freesound, Pexels, Pixabay and LottieFiles. The agent can also browse sites like Pinterest and Behance with Playwright

Repository structure

.claude-plugin/
  plugin.json            Plugin manifest
  marketplace.json       Marketplace entry for one-command install
skills/motion-video-director/
  SKILL.md               The production playbook
  scripts/
    preflight.sh         Checks Node, ffmpeg, Playwright, Python tools and API keys
    preview.mjs          Renders a time range to a contact sheet for quick review
    analyze_ref.sh       Breaks a reference video into frames, cuts and audio
    create_env.sh        Creates a .env file with empty API key slots
    normalize_env.py     Converts an existing key file into a clean .env

Requirements

Required: Node.js 18+, ffmpeg and ffprobe, and Playwright with headless Chrome.

Optional: Python 3.10+ with faster-whisper, rembg and demucs for transcription, cutouts and stem separation. You can also add API keys or MCP servers for ElevenLabs, Firecrawl, Freesound, Pexels, Pixabay and LottieFiles.

To see what is installed and what is missing, run:

bash skills/motion-video-director/scripts/preflight.sh

API keys are stored in a local .env file, which is excluded from git.

FAQ

Do I need After Effects or Premiere Pro?
No. Animation is written in code and rendered with headless Chrome and ffmpeg.

Can it edit existing footage, or only create animation?
Both. It can cut, caption, grade and sound-design raw clips, and combine them with motion graphics.

What does it cost to run?
Rendering is free and local. ElevenLabs and some stock-media APIs have their own pricing; their free tiers cover most projects.

Does it work outside Claude Code?
Yes. It works with any agent that can run terminal commands and edit files, including Codex and Cursor.

Author

Made by Miftahul Islam Efaz. If you make something with it, tag me on Instagram.