Mach.Art Bridge transfers your shapes, paths, text and color from Illustrator directly into After Effects as native, animatable shape layers. One button. Zero friction. No recreating, no copy-paste, no color drift.
Illustrator and After Effects talking to each other. Design your vectors. Press Send. Your artwork appears in AE — positioned exactly where you placed it, correct colors, fonts and layer structure.
Create your artwork as you normally would — logos, icons, UI screens, typography, illustrations. Mach.Art Bridge works with any Illustrator document.
One button. Bridge reads your Illustrator document and streams all shape data to After Effects. Your artwork arrives as native shape layers, ready to animate.
Paths become AE shape layers. Rectangles become parametric AE rectangles. Compound paths transfer as multi-path shapes. Everything editable from frame one.
Open the panel in After Effects once — the watcher starts automatically. Every time you press Send in Illustrator, AE imports instantly. No manual steps in AE, ever.
After transferring your artwork, the built-in motion tools let you set pivot points, align layers, apply expression behaviors, create infinite scrolls, rotations and loops — directly inside the same Mach.Art Bridge panel.
Set the anchor point of any layer to one of 9 positions — corners, edges or center — without the layer jumping. Works on shapes, text and any layer type.
Center, left, right, top or bottom — align layers to the comp bounds. Calculated from the actual layer bounding box, not just the anchor point.
One-click expression behaviors — Shake, Pulse, Swing, Pendulum, Spin Z, Spin Y (green axis), Spin 3D, Orbit. Amp and Freq controlled by sliders.
Seamless infinite scroll — left, right, up or down. Uses AE's Offset effect for pixel-perfect looping. Speed adjustable, works on any layer.
Continuous rotation on Z, X or Y axis. CW or CCW. Speed slider, start offset. X and Y axes automatically enable 3D on the layer.
Apply loopOut() to selected timeline properties — Cycle, Ping Pong, Offset, Continue. Select the properties in the AE timeline first, then apply.
Press Send to AE in Illustrator. That's it. After Effects receives your artwork instantly and opens the comp. The live watcher in AE starts automatically — you never have to touch the AE panel after the first time.
Open the panel in After Effects once. The watcher starts automatically and listens for new exports. Every time you press Send in Illustrator, AE imports instantly — no manual steps required in AE, ever.
Whatever size your Illustrator artboard is — 1920×1080, 1080×1920, 4096×2160 or anything in between — After Effects creates a comp that matches exactly. Every object lands at the exact XY position it had in Illustrator.
Export the entire document or only the objects you have selected in Illustrator. Iterate on individual elements without resending everything. Two modes: Replace (fresh comp) or Update (add layers).
Stop recreating in AE
what you already built in Illustrator.
That time is gone.
Mach.Art Bridge started as an internal tool at Jacober Design because we needed it ourselves. It became a product. It keeps getting better. No subscription. Ever.
This is not a recurring charge. Pay once, use forever. Mach.Art Bridge will never become a subscription. That's not a marketing line — it's a commitment.
Every update — bug fixes, new features, new tools — is free for existing customers. You buy it once and it keeps getting better.
This is not a finished product sitting on a shelf. New features are planned and in development. The roadmap is long and we're moving fast.
Every sale goes directly into building more features. By buying Mach.Art Bridge you're supporting a motion designer who builds tools for motion designers.
Purchase on Gumroad or aescripts. You receive the ZXP file and full instructions immediately.
One-timeOpen the free ZXP/UXP Installer (aescripts.com) or Anastasiy Extension Manager. Drag the ZXP file in — done. No terminal, no regedit, no admin required.
One-time · Free installerRestart Illustrator and After Effects. Open the panel via Window → Extensions → Mach.Art Bridge in both applications.
One-timeDesign in Illustrator. Press Send. Your artwork appears in After Effects instantly, as native shape layers. The watcher handles everything automatically.
Every timeThe free ZXP/UXP Installer by aescripts handles everything. No terminal, no regedit, no admin rights needed.
Also free, also works without system changes. Good alternative if ZXP/UXP Installer doesn't work for you.
There is no native way to bring Illustrator shapes into After Effects as editable shape layers. The standard workaround loses positioning, colors and text editability. Mach.Art Bridge solves this completely.
Motion designers, animators, UI designers and brand studios who work across Illustrator and After Effects daily. If you've ever recreated an Illustrator design in After Effects by hand, this is for you.
Adobe Illustrator 2020–2026 · After Effects 2020–2026 · Windows 10/11 · macOS · Logos, icons, UI screens, typography, illustrations, infographics, brand assets.
Illustrator to After Effects · AI to AE plugin · import Illustrator shapes as shape layers · send paths from AI to AE · Illustrator After Effects bridge · CEP extension motion design · transfer vector to motion.
Importing an AI file as a composition and converting to shapes loses colors, text editability and exact positions. Recreating shapes by hand takes hours. Mach.Art Bridge does it in seconds, correctly.
Jacober Design · mach.art · A studio that builds tools for motion designers because we needed them ourselves. Mach.Art Bridge started as an internal workflow tool and became a product.
Bridge + Motion Tools. One-time purchase. Works with Illustrator & After Effects 2020–2026.