DocsThe chat and its modes
The chat and its modes
Angelo's chat sits beside your 3D view. Describe a change and the agent makes it with Blender's own tools. Two modes decide how much of Blender you see around it.
Director and Manual#
Angelo opens in Director mode: one 3D view on the left and the chat on the right. Everything else is out of the way: the other editors, the status bar, the 3D view's header, toolbar and sidebar, the floor grid and the menus at the top. You still orbit, select and move things in the 3D view as usual, and your keyboard shortcuts still work. Messages that would go to the status bar appear in the top bar instead.
Manual mode is all of Blender: Properties, Outliner, Timeline, toolbars and menus, with the chat docked on the right of the 3D view. Director works on a copy of your workspace, so switching back to Manual gives you your own layout exactly as it was.
Angelo remembers the mode you chose and opens in it next time.
Switching
| Way | How |
|---|---|
| Mode button | The button on the right of the top bar, labelled Director or Manual. Choose Director Mode or Manual Mode. |
| Shortcut | ⌃ ⌥ M on a Mac (Control, Option, M), Ctrl Alt M on Windows, from any editor. The Director / Manual menu shows it beside the other mode. |
| Welcome screen | Try the standard editor switches to Manual. Open the welcome screen again from Help ▸ Welcome to Angelo, or from the mode button. |
| Window menu | Window ▸ Director Mode, in Manual mode. |
| Ask | “Switch to Manual mode” in the chat works too, after you approve it. |
Director hides the Help menu, so the mode button also has Welcome to Angelo, Check for Updates… and What's New.
Show and hide the chat#
In Manual mode you can give the chat's room back to your scene, and bring the chat back when you need it. Hiding closes the chat's area, so the editors beside it take the space. Your conversation and the message you were typing are kept.
| To | Do this |
|---|---|
| Hide or show | Click Chat on the right of the top bar, just left of the Director / Manual button. It looks pressed while the chat is shown, and its tooltip says what a click does. |
| With the keyboard | ⌃ ⌥ N on a Mac (Control, Option, N), Ctrl Alt N on Windows, from anywhere in the window. |
| From the menu | Window ▸ Angelo Chat opens the chat again. |
The chat comes back on the side it was docked on. A chat you popped out into its own window closes the same way and comes back docked.
Director always shows the chat, so the button isn't there in Director, and the shortcut says to switch to Manual mode first.
The first time you are in Manual mode, a small card right under the Chat button, with an arrow pointing at it, shows where it is and names the shortcut; its own Hide chat button does it for you. The first time the chat is hidden, the card says how to bring it back. Each shows once.
The message box#
Type in the box that says Do anything and press Return to send. Shift Return starts a new line. While Angelo works, the send button turns into a square Stop button.
The row under the text holds, from left to right:
- +: attach a picture or file, or start from a base mesh (Start from a base mesh).
- Approvals, with a shield: what the agent may do without asking. It reads Approve for me by default (Stay in control).
- The model, with its reasoning effort, for example “Opus 5.5 Low”. Click it to change the effort, turn on Fast, or pick another model (Models and AI Providers).
- Send, or Stop while Angelo works.
A choice you make while Angelo is working applies to your next message. Before you connect a model, the chat shows ways to connect instead of the message box.
Objects you name exactly in your message, with the same capitals, are pointed out to the agent, so “make Pillar.003 taller” finds the right one.
Pictures and files#
Show the agent a reference: press + and choose Image or file…, or drag files onto the chat. A file dropped on the chat is attached to your next message, never opened or imported, and that includes a .blend file.
| Kind | Accepted |
|---|---|
| Pictures | PNG, JPEG, WebP, up to 5 MB each |
| Text and code | .txt, .md, .rst, .py, .json, .csv, .yaml, .yml, .svg, .gltf, .obj, .mtl |
| Documents | PDF (its text is read when pdftotext is installed) |
| 3D files | .blend, .glb, .fbx, .stl, as references the agent can look at, not imported |
| Limits | Up to four files per message; files other than pictures up to 20 MB |
More than one chat#
The chat's title at the top of the chat is a menu: New Chat starts another conversation, and every chat you had is listed below it, marked when one is working or waiting for your approval. The + button beside the title also starts a new chat. Each chat keeps its own history, model, approval setting and unsent message.
Chats are kept in Angelo's own folder on your computer, not in your .blend file, so sharing a .blend never shares a conversation. A message you haven't sent yet is not kept when you quit Angelo.
In Manual mode the chat's View menu docks it on the left or right, or pops it out into its own window you can move and resize (Pop Out Chat, and Return Chat to Dock to put it back). The gear at the right end of the chat's header opens AI Providers.
Where your keys go#
The chat holds the keyboard like a text field: once you click into it, letters go into the message even with the pointer over the 3D view. Navigation keys (the numpad, Home, the view pie) always go to the editor under the pointer. Click elsewhere, or use the middle or right mouse button outside the chat, to give the keyboard back to Blender.