Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator via MCP

Note that this is an early draft of a skill. You should not rely on it alone; expect to dig deep into the MCP tool docs and code to learn how to solve problems. Feel free to suggest improvements to the skill (additions, subtractions, organization) as you use it.

The intention of these tools is to structure interactions with Adobe Illustrator, and is oriented towards scientific figure production.

How the MCP works (ie3jp/illustrator-mcp-server)

The MCP provides ~30 tools that talk to Illustrator via osascript. Tools fall into four groups:

• Read — get_document_info, get_document_structure, get_layers, list_text_frames, get_colors, get_path_items, find_objects, get_selection, etc. Read tools tag every object with a string ID (stored in the object's note field) and return it. Use these IDs to reference objects in modify/export calls.
• Create — create_rectangle, create_ellipse, create_line, create_text_frame, create_path, place_image, create_document, close_document. Each returns an ID for the new object.
• Modify — modify_object takes an object ID and a properties bag (position, size, fill, stroke, opacity, rotation, contents, font_name, font_size). convert_to_outlines and apply_color_profile operate on the whole document.
• Export — export (SVG/PNG/JPG by artboard, selection, or object ID) and export_pdf (print-ready with optional marks and bleed).

Gotchas

• Coordinate system: Default artboard-web = origin at artboard top-left, Y-down (like CSS). Use coordinate_system: "document" for Illustrator-native Y-up.
• Colors are always {"type": "rgb", "r": 0, "g": 0, "b": 255}, {"type": "cmyk", ...}, or {"type": "none"}.
• Font names must be PostScript names (e.g., "ArialMT" not "Arial"). If wrong, the tool returns candidate matches.
• Limitations: No undo, no delete, no boolean ops, no gradients, no grouping, no effects, no layer reordering. Illustrator steals window focus on every modify/export call.

osascript fallback

For anything the MCP can't do, you can try running ExtendScript directly:

# Inline
osascript -e 'tell application "Adobe Illustrator" to do javascript "app.activeDocument.name"'

# From file (preferred for multi-line)
osascript -e 'tell application "Adobe Illustrator" to do javascript file "/tmp/script.jsx"'

ExtendScript is ES3 — var only, no arrow functions, no template literals, no native JSON. Return values come back on stdout. This gives full access to Illustrator's DOM for anything the MCP tools don't cover (delete objects, boolean ops, gradients, effects, grouping, etc.).

Opening files

osascript -e 'tell application "Adobe Illustrator" to open POSIX file "/path/to/file.ai"'

Works for .ai, .svg, .pdf, .eps.

Exporting PDFs for LaTeX embedding

Preferred: use the MCP export_pdf tool. It clips to the artboard, doesn't change the active document path, and produces XeLaTeX-safe output with default settings:

export_pdf(output_path="/path/to/figure.pdf", options={trim_marks: false, registration_marks: false, color_bars: false, page_information: false, bleed: false})

After export, trim whitespace and verify XeLaTeX safety:

# 1. Trim to content bounds (2bp margin)
pdfcrop --margins 2 figure.pdf figure.pdf

# 2. Verify XeLaTeX-safe (no ICC stream reference)
python3 -c "
import pikepdf
pdf = pikepdf.open('figure.pdf')
for page in pdf.pages:
    if '/Group' in page and '/CS' in page['/Group']:
        cs = page['/Group']['/CS']
        assert not isinstance(cs, pikepdf.Array), f'ICC ref found — run latex-pdf-preprocess skill'
print('OK')
"

Fallback: JSX script via osascript. Use this if you need finer control over PDF settings. Note that saveAs changes the active document path as a side effect.

var opts = new PDFSaveOptions();
opts.compatibility = PDFCompatibility.ACROBAT7;
opts.preserveEditability = false;
opts.fontSubsetPercentage = 100.0;
opts.artboardRange = "1";
opts.trimMarks = false;
opts.registrationMarks = false;
opts.colorBars = false;
opts.pageInformation = false;
opts.bleedOffsetRect = [0, 0, 0, 0];

The key settings are ACROBAT7 + preserveEditability = false — this writes /DeviceRGB in the page transparency group instead of an ICC stream reference, avoiding the xdvipdfmx crash. Do not use named presets like [PDF/X-4:2008] or [Smallest File Size] — those embed ICC profiles that break xdvipdfmx. If a PDF was exported with a preset, use the latex-pdf-preprocess skill to fix it after the fact.

Setup

See install.md for installation instructions.