AI assistants are increasingly being used to control creative software and speed up tasks. After Adobe added its own AI assistant in Photoshop earlier in the year, Maxon's now added native support for third-party chatbots in Cinema 4D.

The update means you can now use Claude, ChatGPT or Codex AI assistants to carry out workflows in what is one of our picks as the best 3D modelling software and the best animation software.

Maxon's not introducing its own AI assistant. Instead, it's added a built-in Model Context Protocol (MCP) whose server enables artists to direct Claude, ChatGPT or Codex AI assistants within Cinema 4D workflows.

Artists can then provide natural language instructions to the assistant of their choice to eliminate some of the more procedural, iterative and repetitive manual processes, theoretically without interrupting creative flow.

Maxon cites examples like organising imported objects into a consistent hierarchy, creating object and material variations, preparing multipass renders, organising scenes, and handling basic 3D camera tracking, UV mapping, rigging and animating. The videos below demonstrate processes for motion tracking and for automating repetitive tasks like creating render queue jobs and building scene variations from CSV data.

Maxon says its approach is designed to keep artists in control. Every action happens through Cinema 4D's own tools in the artist's own scene, running locally on their own computer. The results remain native Cinema 4D scene data rather than a flattened generated output, allowing artists to review, refine, undo or iterate on them as they work.

The decision to support third-party AI assistants echoes how Maxon added 3D model generation in Cinema 4D via Tencent’s HY 3D AI engine.

MCP support is available beginning today in Cinema 4D 2026.4 or later on Windows and macOS. A new Cinema 4D iPad app is slated for release before the end of the year.

The MCP connection can be activated without additional installs. You can learn more on the Maxon website.

Joe is a regular freelance journalist and editor at Creative Bloq. He writes news, features and buying guides and keeps track of the best equipment and software for creatives, from video editing programs to monitors and accessories. A veteran news writer and photographer, he now works as a project manager at the London and Buenos Aires-based design, production and branding agency Hermana Creatives. There he manages a team of designers, photographers and video editors who specialise in producing visual content and design assets for the hospitality sector. He also dances Argentine tango.