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Jamie Fenn · YouTube

Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

A working editor sets up DaVinci Resolve's new Claude MCP integration, gives it one real editing task, and races it on the clock.

Posted

September 10th

5 days ago

Duration

08:22

Format

Demo

educational

Views

29.7K

376 likes

Big Idea

The argument in one line.

DaVinci Resolve's new Claude MCP integration can execute a complete, graded edit from one detailed prompt, but on this real test it took 22 minutes to do what an experienced editor finished by hand in under 4.

Who This Is For

Read if. Skip if.

READ IF YOU ARE…

A video editor deciding whether DaVinci Resolve's new AI agent integration is fast enough to fit into a real deadline-driven workflow.
Someone about to set up Claude or another AI assistant inside DaVinci Resolve Studio through the new MCP server and wants to know what to expect.
A creator who wants to understand what an AI editing agent can and can't currently do, including the fact it edits from audio, not from watching the video.

SKIP IF…

You want a step-by-step MCP installation tutorial. This is a single real-world speed test, not a setup walkthrough.
You already assume AI video agents are too slow to use and just want that confirmed without the details.

TL;DR

The full version, fast.

DaVinci Resolve 21.1 added an AI-assistant integration that lets Claude drive the DaVinci Resolve MCP server directly inside a project. The editor writes a full setup prompt (cut repetition, remove dead space, apply the studio power grade, match a specific color space, sync new footage to already-recorded audio), picks a model and effort level, and starts the task. Claude took 22 minutes 13 seconds to deliver a finished edit, most of it spent transcribing audio, since the agent currently edits from what it hears, not what it sees. Doing the identical edit by hand took 3 minutes 31 seconds. The AI's cut was usable, just far slower, and the editor preferred his own version and his own instincts.

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Chapters

Where the time goes.

00:00 – 00:29

01 · The premise: race the AI editor

Blackmagic's DaVinci Resolve 21.1 update adds AI-assistant support. The editor frames the video as a real race: set up the AI agent, give it a real edit, then do the same edit by hand at the same time.

00:29 – 01:32

02 · Enabling the DaVinci Resolve MCP integration

Under File > Setup AI Assistants, he attaches Claude Desktop, then installs and configures the DaVinci Resolve Studio MCP extension, which requires granting it full access to the computer.

01:32 – 02:44

03 · Writing the master prompt

He has Claude help draft its own setup instructions, creates a new 'Claude DaVinci Editor' project, and pastes in a full brief: cut repetition and dead space, make one coherent piece, apply the studio power grade, and set the exact input color space and gamma.

02:44 – 03:12

04 · Model and effort settings, then ten minutes gone

He picks the model ('Fable 5.1' as shown in his Claude Desktop) and sets the effort level to Extra. By the time he's ready to click start, setup alone has taken about 10 minutes.

03:12 – 04:03

05 · Hitting start: Claude loads tools and gets to work

He starts the task and watches Claude load its tools and begin running scripts. It doesn't look like obvious editing yet, just visible tool activity in the chat panel.

04:03 – 04:32

06 · The catch: Claude edits from audio, not video

Claude is shown transcribing the audio and matching it against the externally recorded voiceover. The key limitation: the agent can't see the video, it only works from what it hears.

04:32 – 05:02

07 · Now it's Jamie's turn

With a joking aside about how long the wait felt, he starts his own stopwatch and edits the same raw clip and audio by hand, working from feel rather than a written prompt.

05:02 – 06:22

08 · Claude's cut: 22 minutes 13 seconds

Claude's total time to deliver a finished, graded edit is revealed: 22 minutes 13 seconds. He plays back the AI's finished version, a 5-tips talking-head video.

06:22 – 07:37

09 · Jamie's cut: 3 minutes 31 seconds

He reveals his own edit took 3 minutes 31 seconds and plays it back for comparison against Claude's version of the same source material.

07:37 – 08:22

10 · The verdict and how he'd actually use it

He says he prefers his own edit, calls 22 minutes 'insane' for that result, and lands on a more realistic use case: hand off a rough pass to the AI and review it later rather than waiting on it live.

Atomic Insights

Lines worth screenshotting.

DaVinci Resolve 21.1 added a built-in AI-assistant integration that connects external models like Claude through an MCP server, with full computer access granted during setup.
The AI editing agent currently works from audio only. It transcribes the recording and matches clips to that transcript, it does not analyze the video image.
A workable AI-editing prompt has to spell out everything a human editor would take for granted: color space, power grade, which audio track to sync, and exact cut rules.
Total setup time (writing the prompt, creating the project, picking model and effort) ran about 10 minutes, before the AI touched a single frame.
The agent's total time from 'start task' to finished, graded edit was 22 minutes 13 seconds.
The identical edit done by hand, from feel rather than a written prompt, took 3 minutes 31 seconds, roughly 6 times faster than the AI agent.
Watching the agent work in real time is slower than it looks in a highlight reel: most of the visible time is tool loading and script running, not obvious editing.
The AI's output was functional and usable, not broken. The gap was speed and personal fit, not quality on its own.
An editor who knows the software by muscle memory still beat a fully-configured AI agent on the same task, even after the agent had every instruction spelled out in advance.
The likely better use case for an agent like this isn't racing a human in real time. It's handing off a rough pass and reviewing it later, treating the AI's output as a skeleton cut rather than a finished one.

Takeaway

The AI edit took six times longer

SPEED TEST RESULTS

Setting up DaVinci Resolve's new Claude MCP integration and prompting it to fully edit a clip took 22 minutes end to end, while the same edit done by hand took under 4.

02Enabling the DaVinci Resolve MCP integration

DaVinci Resolve 21.1 added a built-in AI-assistant integration, connecting external models like Claude through an MCP server built into the app.
Turning it on means granting the AI complete access to your computer, not just the project file, so treat the install step as a real permissions decision.

03Writing the master prompt

Before touching the AI, he had Claude help draft the setup instructions and system prompt for the editing project instead of writing them from scratch.
A usable AI-editing prompt has to spell out the technical specifics a human editor would take for granted: which color space, which power grade, which audio track to sync to.

04Model and effort settings, then ten minutes gone

Model and effort settings are exposed as real choices in the workflow, not hidden defaults, and picking them is part of the setup time.
Total setup time before the AI did a single frame of editing ran about 10 minutes, time that doesn't show up in a simple 'AI edited this in 22 minutes' framing.

05Hitting start: Claude loads tools and gets to work

The agent doesn't jump straight into visible editing. It spends real time loading tools and running scripts first, which reads as dead air if you're watching live.
Watching it work live is less satisfying than watching a finished result, because the intermediate steps look like nothing is happening.

06The catch: Claude edits from audio, not video

The single biggest limitation right now: the agent edits by transcribing and matching audio, it cannot see or analyze the video image itself.
That means any edit decision that depends on visual content, framing, expression, action, is invisible to the AI. It only knows what was said and when.

07Now it's Jamie's turn

He timed his own manual edit against the AI's, starting his stopwatch the moment he had the same two assets: the raw clip and the already-recorded audio.
Racing the AI in real time, instead of comparing results after the fact, is what made the speed gap concrete instead of anecdotal.

08Claude's cut: 22 minutes 13 seconds

The AI's total time to deliver a finished, graded, color-corrected edit from the detailed prompt was 22 minutes 13 seconds.
The output itself was functional and usable, just slow, which is a different problem than broken and matters for deciding when it's worth using.

09Jamie's cut: 3 minutes 31 seconds

An experienced editor doing the identical task by feel, with no written prompt, finished in 3 minutes 31 seconds, roughly 6 to 7 times faster than the agent.
Preferring his own cut afterward is a reminder that speed and taste are separate questions. The AI's edit wasn't necessarily worse, just slower and less his.

Glossary

Terms worth knowing.

MCP (Model Context Protocol): A connection standard that lets an AI assistant like Claude directly control an application's tools and functions, in this case letting Claude drive DaVinci Resolve's editing commands instead of just chatting about them.
Power grade: A saved color grade or look, applied across a project's clips as a starting point, that an editor can reuse instead of grading each clip from scratch.
Blackmagic Wide Gamut: A wide color space used by Blackmagic cameras to capture more color and dynamic range than standard formats, meant to be converted to a normal viewing color space during editing and grading.

Resources

Things they pointed at.

00:29toolClaude Desktop

00:52toolDaVinci Resolve Studio MCP extension

02:45toolFable 5.1 (model shown in his Claude Desktop)

Quotables

Lines you could clip.

00:00

“Blackmagic just updated DaVinci Resolve with one of the craziest updates we've had in a long time.”

clean cold-open hook stating the update and the stakes→ TikTok hook↗ Tweet quote

04:05

“Claude can't see the actual video. It's gonna have to go off of audio as of right now.”

the single most important limitation, stated plainly→ newsletter pull-quote↗ Tweet quote

07:11

“I've ran a marathon. I did 100 push-ups. I made a gourmet dinner. No, I'm just messing with you, obviously.”

comedic beat that lands the long wait time→ IG reel cold open↗ Tweet quote

07:11

“Okay, so obviously I like mine better.”

deadpan verdict, short and quotable→ TikTok hook↗ Tweet quote

07:37

“I would never ask my Claude or any AI to edit a video if I knew it was going to take that long.”

strongest stated stance in the video→ IG reel cold open↗ Tweet quote

The Script

Word for word.

Read-along

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Blackmagic just updated DaVinci Resolve with one of the craziest updates we've had in a long time. And a part of this new update is to allow us to use AI agents to do all the mundane tasks within DaVinci. Not only am I going to show you how to set up an AI agent, but I'm going to show you how to prompt it to edit your video.

And I'm actually going to race against it. I'm going to give it a pretty simple task to edit a video like how I would. And simultaneously, I'm going to edit the video the way I'm trying to have it edit.

And we're going to see who wins. So with that said. let us begin now i'm going to be using cloud but you can use chat gpt and other ais but all you have to do is come up here to file and then come down to setup ai assistance it'll show what ai assistants are already attached or that you have downloaded and for right now it shows these i'm just going to use the cloud desktop and click ok i've already done it So it will walk you through an installation process and then you also have to configure it where you basically give DaVinci Resolve Studio complete access to your computer.

And then make sure, yeah, this is enabled and then exit out. So the first thing I'm doing right now is I typed into just the chat portion of Claude. I said, I need to set up the ultimate video editor that will use DaVinci Resolve.

It will use the DaVinci Resolve MCP server. Write me instructions for the new project. so so far to be honest with you guys it's taken a little bit of time just to kind of write me the prompt but it says it's been doing a lot of stuff to kind of set it up it's been three minutes and about 30 seconds hopefully this will you know make the claude editor much faster okay so all i'm going to do is just select copy then i'm going to open up a new project select new project and title it claude DaVinci Editor.

And then I'm just going to paste the entire instructions into this and then click create. I'm going to select co -work and I'm just going to verbally tell it what to do. In my current DaVinci Resolve timeline, 24, please edit the new B -Raw clip that I just dragged into the media pool.

Make sure to cut out all the repetitive phrases, any dead space. and make sure the entire video makes one coherent piece. Then put on my studio power grade and make sure that the input color space and gamma is black magic wide gamut 4 slash 5 and black magic film.

I forgot to include match up the new clip with the audio that has already been recorded. That is... sitting in the editing timeline.

I'm going to click on the fable five extra and make sure it's fable 5 .1. And for the effort, I'm going to leave it on extra. I don't know if I need to do max, but we'll see what happens.

So I guess with all the homework that we've done up until this point, it's been about 10 minutes. I'm going to give Claude the benefit of the doubt. And I'm honestly trying to give as much context to Claude as possible before I click start.

And I really can't think of. Anything else I needed to do. I just wanted just want to see how quickly it'll do this.

So let's go ahead and start task as you can see here's the audio that I recorded and It's thinking and it's doing its thing. So it's loading the tools Let's let's see what happens Okay, so I'll be honest with you guys just from like the first time ever using this I would assume that it would be doing stuff very quickly like I thought it would just like jump straight into editing like if I were to tell someone to do it and as you can see on the left hand side it's just kind of doing its thing and running scripts and so I don't know I don't know maybe it's just doing its thing See, it's transcribing the audio.

And that is something for you guys to understand is Claude can't see the actual video. It's gonna have to go off of audio as of right now. So it's matching up the audio from the B -Raw clip and matching up what I recorded externally in DaVinci Resolve.

And that's how it's gonna have to edit all of your video projects currently.

After all that time, I've ran a marathon. I did 100 push -ups.

I made a gourmet dinner. No, I'm just fucking with you, obviously. I didn't do all those things, but it took a lot longer than I thought.

So now, it's my turn. You guys saw that Claude started off with just the audio waveform and the clip in the media pool, and I am as well. So, with that said, start the clock in 3, 2, 1, go.

Alright. Done. I have no idea how quickly that was.

I feel like it was pretty fast, but it was really easy work. So Claude took 22 minutes and 13 seconds to do its edits, to do everything I asked it to do. Here's Claude's version.

All right, so this is the test video for Claude. So let's see what you got. I'm going to give you five tips that helps you become a better creator.

Tip number one, get enough sleep. It doesn't matter when you go to bed. Just make sure you get about eight hours.

Eat healthy. You are what you eat. If you eat good food, you're going to feel better.

You're going to create better. The art of flow is just going to happen more naturally. Four, coffee.

Coffee in the morning, coffee in the middle of the day, or coffee in the afternoon. Just don't drink too much of it. But it does help.

Trust me. That's why everybody drinks it. And five is take breaks.

Now, some people suggest wait 15 minutes or wait an hour and then go take a break. I personally like to just work, work, work, work, work. And if I get to the point where I feel like I'm starting to slow down or I'm just becoming exhausted, then I'll take a break.

But that could be after an hour. That could be after five hours. Whatever the time frame is, just listen to your body.

You'll know. All right. Those are my five tips.

Let's see what you got, Claude. OK, not bad. Now for my edit, it took me.

Three minutes and 31 seconds. And now this is mine without really looking back at it. I was just trimming the fat.

Let's see what mine looks like. All right. So this is the test video for Claude.

So let's see what you got. I'm going to give you five tips that helps you become a better creator. Tip number one, get enough sleep.

It doesn't matter when you go to bed. Just make sure you get about eight hours. The next tip is to eat healthy.

You are what you eat. If you eat good food, you're gonna feel better. You're gonna create better.

The art of flow is just gonna happen more naturally. Four, coffee. Coffee in the morning, coffee in the middle of the day, or coffee in the afternoon.

Just don't drink too much of it. But it does help. Trust me, that's why everybody drinks it.

And five is take breaks. Some people suggest wait 15 minutes or wait an hour and then go take a break. I personally like to just work, work, work, work, work.

And if I get to the point where I feel like I'm starting to slow down or I'm just becoming exhausted, then I'll take a break. But that could be after an hour. That could be after five hours.

Whatever the time frame is, just listen to your body. You'll know. Okay, so obviously I like mine better.

All right, so here's the takeaway. 22 minutes to edit something like that is insane. I would never ask my...

Claude or any AI to edit a video if I knew it was going to take that long. I maybe set it up weird or maybe I prompted it with something that was too crazy for it to handle. But right now there is proof of concept.

It did pretty well for what I asked it to do. Now, if you want to use it like this, maybe you could set it up and say, hey, edit this and go and do something else and come back and it will kind of give you like the skeleton and you'd have to go back and review it. There's a bunch of other ways that you can use this, like setting up bins or.

you know, renaming footage. It's just probably going to take a little bit of time for it to do so. You guys have any tips or tricks, please comment down below.

Help me make this faster if possible. And yeah, hope you guys enjoyed the little race I did and have a good rest of your day.

The Hook

The bait, then the rug-pull.

DaVinci Resolve just got AI agents that can drive the editing software directly. So the editor set one up, gave it a real editing task, and then raced it doing the same job by hand.

Frameworks

Named ideas worth stealing.

02:15list

The AI-edit prompt checklist

Cut all repetitive phrases and dead space
Make the entire video one coherent piece
Apply the studio power grade
Set the exact input color space and gamma (Blackmagic Wide Gamut 4/5, Blackmagic Film)
Match the new clip to the audio already recorded in the timeline
Choose a model and effort level before starting

The full brief he wrote before letting the AI touch the project. Each line covers something a human editor would normally just know to do.

Steal forany prompt handing a real edit off to an AI agent

CTA Breakdown

How they asked for the click.

FROM THE DESCRIPTION

PRIMARY CTAWhere the creator wants you to go next.

OTHER LINKSAlso linked in the description.

Storyboard

Visual structure at a glance.

open

hookopen00:00

setup

promisesetup01:32

turning point

valueturning point04:32

sign-off

ctasign-off08:06

Frame Gallery

Visual moments.

open

Frame at 00:07 from Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

Frame at 00:15 from Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

Frame at 00:21 from Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

Frame at 00:28 from Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

Frame at 00:33 from Pro Editor vs. DaVinci Resolve's New AI Edit Agent

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