RhinoAIBridge — AI Control of Rhino 8 via MCP

The most powerful Rhino MCP server. Give Claude, ChatGPT, or Ollama full control of Rhino 8 — create geometry, manipulate layers, capture viewports, run any Rhino command, and more. No .NET SDK required on the target machine.

What is this?

RhinoAIBridge is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that bridges any MCP-compatible AI — Claude Desktop, ChatGPT, or local Ollama models — directly into Rhino 3D (version 8). The AI can read your scene, create and modify geometry, manage layers, run scripts, capture viewport images, and execute any Rhino command — all from a natural language conversation.

This is the fastest, most feature-complete Rhino AI integration available:

• ⚡ Sub-millisecond ping with in-process scene cache (no full scene walks)
• 🗜️ Gzip wire compression — 5–8× smaller payloads on large scenes
• 📸 Auto-thumbnails — every mutation returns a viewport JPEG so the AI sees what it built
• ⚛️ Atomic batches — multi-step operations roll back as one unit on failure
• 🔌 No .NET SDK required on target machines — plugin is pre-built

Quick Install (2 minutes)

Requirements: Rhino 8 · Python (auto-installed via uv) · Claude Desktop / ChatGPT API key / Ollama

Windows

1. Download the latest release zip and unzip anywhere
2. Double-click INSTALL.bat — copies the plugin, installs dependencies, patches Claude Desktop config automatically
3. Open Rhino 8 → type PluginManager → Install → browse to: %APPDATA%\McNeel\Rhinoceros\8.0\Plug-ins\RhinoAIBridge\RhinoAIBridge.rhp (First time only — auto-loads on future starts)
4. In Rhino command line, type: AIBridge
5. Restart Claude Desktop → ask: "ping Rhino"

That is it. No Visual Studio. No .NET SDK. No manual config editing.

For a detailed walkthrough see INSTALL_GUIDE.txt.

32 MCP Tools

Scene & Context

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | ping | Liveness check — returns doc name, unit system, object count, scene version | | query_scene | Smart scene query: filter by type, layer, name, bbox, visibility | | get_object_details | Full metadata for specific objects | | get_rhino_commands | Discover all available Rhino commands with substring filter |

Geometry Creation

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | create_object | Universal create: Box, Cylinder, Sphere, Wall, Slab, Column, Roof, Curve, Point... | | create_massing | Parametric building mass from footprint + height | | derive_floors_from_mass | Auto-generate floor slabs by intersecting a massing solid | | create_core | Structural core punched through a massing solid | | place_openings_on_facade | Parametric window/door placement on any brep face | | get_cross_section | Cut a section curve at any Z height |

Modify & Transform

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | modify_object | Change name, layer, colour, visibility, material | | transform_objects | Move, rotate, scale, mirror, array | | boolean_operation | Union, difference, intersection | | delete_objects | Delete by ID list |

Layers & Materials

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | create_layer | Create layer with colour | | setup_arch_layers | One-call layer stack: Site, Structure, Facade, Slab, Core, Roof... | | batch_layer_visibility | Show/hide multiple layers at once | | set_layer_material | PBR material: color, roughness, metallic, opacity, emission |

Viewport & Capture

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | capture_viewport | JPEG/PNG viewport image with auto-downscale + state restore | | set_view | Switch to Top/Front/Right/Perspective/named view | | set_display_mode | Wireframe, Shaded, Rendered, Ghosted, Arctic... | | set_camera | Position camera by location+target or zoom to bounding box | | select_objects | Highlight objects in the Rhino viewport |

Analysis

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | measure_object | Area, volume, bounding box, centroid | | measure_distance | Distance between two points | | check_intersection | Detect clashes between objects | | validate_objects | Check for bad geometry / open edges | | report_areas | Area schedule grouped by layer or type |

Scripting & Workflow

| Tool | What it does | |------|-------------| | run_command | Execute any Rhino command string; returns new object IDs | | execute_script | Run RhinoScript or Python code | | batch | Send multiple operations as one atomic transaction | | undo | Undo last operation | | get_log | Inspect bridge command log with timestamps and timing |

Connecting Different AI Providers

Claude Desktop (recommended)

The installer patches claude_desktop_config.json automatically. Just restart Claude Desktop after install.

ChatGPT

cd server
set OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...
uv run python chat.py --provider openai --model gpt-4o

Ollama (fully local, free)

ollama pull qwen2.5-coder:7b
cd server
uv run python chat.py --provider ollama --model qwen2.5-coder:7b

Best local models: qwen2.5-coder:32b, deepseek-r1:32b, llama3.1:70b

Anthropic API directly

cd server
set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-...
uv run python chat.py --provider anthropic --model claude-opus-4-6

Architecture

Claude Desktop / ChatGPT / Ollama
         |  MCP (stdio)
         v
  server/src/rhino_architect/server.py   <- FastMCP Python server (32 tools)
         |  TCP 127.0.0.1:9544
         |  [1-byte flag][4-byte len][gzip payload]
         v
  plugin/RhinoAIBridge.rhp              <- C# Rhino 8 plugin
         |  UI thread dispatch + deferred redraw
         v
  Rhino 8 Document

Wire protocol: Responses over 10 KB are gzip-compressed. Large floor-stack responses see 5-8x reduction. The scene snapshot cache means repeated query_scene calls are O(1) regardless of object count.

Atomic batches: Send batch(commands=[...], atomic=true) and the entire sequence runs inside one Rhino undo record. Any failure triggers Doc.Undo() — the scene is left exactly as it was.

Auto-thumbnails: Every mutating tool captures a 240x180 JPEG after the viewport redraws and embeds it in the response. Claude sees the result immediately without a separate capture_viewport call.

Building from Source

Only needed if you want to modify the C# plugin. Target machines do NOT need the .NET SDK.

Requirements: .NET 8 SDK, Rhino 8 (for RhinoCommon)

cd plugin
dotnet build --configuration Release

Output: plugin/bin/Release/net8.0/. Copy .rhp + DLLs to the Rhino plugin folder.

Troubleshooting

"Cannot connect to Rhino" — Make sure Rhino is open and you have run the AIBridge command in Rhino's command line.

Plugin does not appear in Claude — Restart Claude Desktop after install. Check %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json contains the rhino-architect server entry.

uv not found — Open a new terminal after install (PATH change does not apply to the current session).

Ollama connection refused — Run ollama serve in a separate terminal before starting chat.py.

Large scenes slow — Use query_scene with filters rather than fetching everything at once. The cache handles 5000+ objects at interactive speed.

Changelog

v4.5 (current)

• Pre-built plugin — no .NET SDK required on target machines
• set_camera with explicit location/target or bounding-box framing
• get_rhino_commands — live Rhino command discoverability
• set_layer_material — PBR properties (roughness, metallic, opacity, emission)
• run_command — execute any Rhino command string, returns new object IDs
• Auto-thumbnails on every mutation response
• Gzip wire compression (5-8x on large responses)
• capture_viewport restore_state — AI inspection never disrupts your view
• Atomic batch rollback with Doc.Undo() on failure

v4.0

• Scene snapshot cache — O(1) reads regardless of object count
• Deferred redraw — batches fire one Redraw() instead of one per op
• Atomic batches with reference resolution ($1.object_ids[0])
• Architect intelligence: massing, floors, core, facade, schedules

License

MIT — see LICENSE. Free for personal and commercial use.

Built by tanishqb — https://github.com/tanishqb