DaVinci Resolve 21.1 Released – AI Assistant Integration via MCP, Individual HDR Trims, and Python Scripting Moves to Studio

Software Update

by Nino LeitnerSeptember 9^th, 2026

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So here it is, DaVinci Resolve 21.1, and it is a much bigger release than the point number suggests. Blackmagic Design has built a native MCP server into the Studio edition so that Claude, Claude Code, and ChatGPT Codex can organize media, cut highlight reels, and batch render on your behalf, added individual trim passes for Dolby Vision, HDR10+ and HDR Vivid, and wired FUJIFILM, Leica, and Sony cameras into the Photo page. It has also quietly moved Python scripting out of the free version, and the reason Blackmagic gives for that is the most interesting paragraph in the whole release notes.

Blackmagic counts more than 100 new tools and controls in this update, and having gone through both the free and the Studio release notes line by line, that number is not marketing rounding. The headline items are the AI assistant integration, the expanded Photo page camera support, a reworked multicam and trim workflow on the Edit page, per-format HDR trims on the Color page, more than 25 new Krokodove shape and 3D tools in Fusion, 20 new scripting API calls with built-in console support, and updated Blackmagic Cloud Presentations with subtitles, shared annotations and comment replies. The update is free and runs on macOS 15 Sequoia or later on Apple Silicon, Windows 10 Creators Update, Windows 11 for ARM on Snapdragon X Elite systems, and Rocky Linux 8.6. If you are new to version 21, we covered the full Resolve 21 feature set when it shipped in June and went hands-on with the Photo page at NAB 2026.

Talking to Resolve in plain language

The feature everyone will be arguing about is the native MCP server, and it is Studio only. MCP (Model Context Protocol) is the open standard that lets an AI assistant call functions inside another application rather than just talking about them, and Resolve Studio 21.1 exposes one natively. Blackmagic names Claude, Claude Code, and ChatGPT Codex as supported assistants and says you can analyze projects, organize media, adjust settings, and batch render using conversational language. The examples the company gives are telling: creating highlight edits from long-form video, removing unwanted clips, and rendering deliverables.

I find this more interesting than the chat panels Adobe has been bolting onto its apps, and not because of the AI model behind it. The difference is architectural. Adobe’s assistants live inside the application and see what Adobe lets them see. Blackmagic is doing the opposite: it is opening a door so that whatever assistant you already use on your desktop can reach into Resolve. It means the assistant you already use for emails and scripts can now also tidy your media pool.

The practical scope is defined by the scripting API underneath, which is why the 20 new API calls matter more than they look. Resolve 21.1 adds calls for creating and flattening multicam clips, triggering multicam SmartSwitch, auto-aligning timeline clips, adding transitions, normalizing audio, setting fades and speed changes, getting media pool clip transcriptions with speaker and timing data, managing render presets and project setting presets, cloning media files, setting source audio mapping, querying and setting output blanking, and validating and encrypting DCTL files. Read that list again with an AI assistant in mind. Transcriptions with speaker data plus multicam creation plus auto-align plus render presets is exactly the toolkit you need to say “build me a rough cut of the interview and render a review copy” and have it happen. Whether it happens well is a different question, and anyone tempted should run it on a throwaway project before trusting it with anything a client will see. Blackmagic also added a Media page preference for AI tools to use proxy media if originals are offline, which suggests the company expects these analyses to run on laptops away from the RAID.

Python scripting leaves the free version

Here is the part that will sting some people. Advanced scripting now requires DaVinci Resolve Studio, and Python 2 support is gone entirely. The free 21.1 release notes are unusually candid about why: “The Python API was being used to hack studio features into the free version. DaVinci Resolve relies on studio license sales to pay for the engineering team.” The same note goes on to say that Blackmagic wants to offer a differentiation from monthly license fees, which, in its words, lock people’s work up unless you pay.

“The Python API was being used to hack studio features into the free version. DaVinci Resolve relies on studio license sales to pay for the engineering team.”

I have a lot of sympathy for that argument. A perpetual $295 Studio license that has not gone up in years, funded partly by people who could have used the free version, is a better deal for the industry than any subscription model out there, and Blackmagic is right that it cannot keep giving away the engineering that makes the free version worth having. The uncomfortable side is that plenty of free-version users wrote perfectly legitimate Python scripts for batch tasks, and those scripts now stop working unless they pay up. If you are one of them, the upgrade cost is the price of one decent day rate, and you get the MCP server thrown in. If you were using the API for what Blackmagic describes, well, you knew what you were doing. (I hope Blackmagic is reading this: a cheap scripting-only tier would make this a lot easier to swallow, but I am almost 100% certain that will not happen, and that is just my guess.)

Tethered FUJIFILM, Leica, and Sony on the Photo page

The Photo page that arrived with Resolve 21 was clearly built with a longer roadmap in mind, and 21.1 fills in a big chunk of it. Camera control now covers FUJIFILM GFX and X Series bodies, Leica SL-System cameras, and the Sony Alpha 7R VI, which joins the ARW RAW support that came in 21.0.1. DNG files gain lens distortion, aberration, and shading correction, RAW images get improved post-decode sharpening, and every RAW parameter has its own inspector reset control. Resolve FX Sky Replacement now works on album photos too.

The part I like most is panel support. Image settings on the Photo page can now be adjusted from Blackmagic’s color panels, including the Micro Color Panel we looked at when it launched. For anyone shooting stills and motion on the same job, that means the same hands-on tool grades both, and the case for keeping Lightroom around gets weaker with each release. The sidebar has also been reworked with flexible height and stacked panels.

Multicam, trim, and the Edit page

Multicam editing is now a timeline viewer property with its own mode button rather than a global switch, multicams can be split at gaps when syncing by timecode, and switching grid size keeps the page containing your selected angle. Keyboard shortcuts now cover switching or cutting up to 25 angles, decomposing multicams, and source and auto select for up to 32 tracks, and the multicam shortcuts work whether the timeline or the source viewer has focus. Anyone cutting talk shows or multi-camera events will feel that immediately.

The trim editor on the Edit page now supports direct mouse drag in the viewer for frame-level adjustments, plus nudging, and switching to dynamic trim enables trim mode by default with loop playback continuing while you edit. Two small things I have wanted for years also landed: you can cut, copy, and paste gaps on the timeline, and a timeline view option now shows clip durations next to clip names. There are inspector presets, a new compare timeline workflow, and Fusion property editing across multiple selected clips, and the Studio edition’s AI music editor retains more content and avoids repetition, according to Blackmagic.

Colorists get individual HDR trims and four new log formats

The Color page change that matters for anyone delivering to multiple HDR formats is individual MultiMaster trims for Dolby Vision, HDR10+ and HDR Vivid. Until now the three shared a common trim pass; from 21.1 each format can be graded independently, with an option to override output sizing per trim and a per-trim color output cache and timeline cache. That is Studio only, and it is the kind of feature that quietly saves a day of compromise on every multi-deliverable job.

Camera support widens with DJI D-Gamut2 and D-Log2, GoPro Log, a Leica L-Log IDT and LUT, and Vivo Wide Gamut and Vivo Log, all available in both editions. The LUT Manager can now relink missing LUTs and DCTLs, and missing DCTLs show as a viewer overlay rather than failing silently. Studio users also get Resolve FX Panomap, natural-effect and high-precision options for CineFocus, and softness controls for Beauty, CineFocus, and Film Grain.

Fusion, Cloud Presentations, and the housekeeping

Fusion gains more than 25 new Krokodove-based shape and 3D tools, building on the Krokodove integration that arrived with Resolve 21, plus OpenPBR material shaders, a Macro Editor that loads and saves multi-template DRFX files, and the ability to import externally tracked results into the Camera Tracker. Studio users can calibrate lens distortion from user-drawn lines in the viewer, and the deep compositing toolset gets flipbook previews, matte objects and deep motion blur for Renderer3D, and what Blackmagic calls up to 8x faster hardware-accelerated deep renders. That last figure is a manufacturer claim and will depend heavily on the GPU.

Blackmagic Cloud Presentations now supports subtitle export, shared annotations, and comment replies, which turns it into a more credible client review tool than it was. In the general list, there is native support for NVIDIA RTX Spark systems on Windows, hardware-accelerated HEIC decode on Apple Silicon, EXR rendering with HTJ2K compression, embedded Canon PL lens metadata, and multiple embedded captions in QuickTime and MXF renders. Studio adds GPU-accelerated JPEG 2000 and HTJ2K decodes on NVIDIA hardware and an offline install package via the Extras download manager. Project Server now bundles PostgreSQL 18, though libraries on PostgreSQL 13 and above still work.

Before you install

The usual warning applies, and this time it has teeth. Project libraries stay compatible with DaVinci Resolve 20.3.2, but any project created or opened in 21.1 will no longer open in 20.3.2. If you share libraries with a facility or freelancers still on 20, back up the full project library and the individual projects first. Minimum requirements are unchanged for the basics, but Studio users running the AI tools now need at least 16 GB of GPU memory on Windows and Linux or 16 GB of system memory on a Mac, and background rendering and analysis wants 32 GB of RAM plus 12 GB of VRAM. NVIDIA users need Studio driver 581.57 or newer on Windows and 580.119.02 on Linux.

DaVinci Resolve 21.1 is available now as a free download from the Blackmagic Design support page. The free version continues to master and output at Ultra HD or lower with a single GPU, while DaVinci Resolve Studio remains a one-time $295 license, which is now also the ticket to the MCP server and to scripting in general.

Is an AI assistant that can reach into your project something you actually want, or is the Python change the bigger story for you? Don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments below!