Assets Catalog
One searchable library across local files, AI-generated outputs, cloud drives, self-hosted media, and stock catalogs — with lazy materialization and attribution.
The Assets Catalog is one searchable library for every piece of media you work with in the desktop app. Local uploads, AI-generated outputs, your cloud drives, your self-hosted photo server, and licensed stock catalogs all show up in the same place. You can search, filter, preview, attach to a task, or drag into Video Mode or Design Mode without downloading anything by hand. Remote items stay remote until they are needed.
What's in the Catalog
| Source | Examples | What It's For |
|---|---|---|
| Local files | Files you upload or generate in your workspace | Anything stored directly on your machine |
| AI generated | Outputs from Image, Video, Audio modes | Generated media tracked back to the prompt that produced it |
| Self-hosted media | Immich, PhotoPrism | Personal photo and video libraries running on your own server |
| Cloud drives and object storage | Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, S3-compatible storage | Files and media stored in business cloud drives or buckets |
| Stock catalogs | Openverse, Unsplash, Pexels, Pixabay, Coverr, Videvo | Licensed images and videos with attribution attached for reuse |
Connect cloud drives, self-hosted media, and stock catalogs from Settings > Connectors > Cloud storage. See Cloud Storage for the full setup steps. Once connected, the items appear alongside your local files in the catalog.
Browse the Catalog
- Open Library
- Select the Assets tab
- Type into Search assets... for a keyword search
- Toggle Semantic for natural-language search ("a sunset over water")
- Use the filter row for Type, Source, Tags, and a date range
- Click any tile to open the preview
- Use Clear filters to reset the view
The grid shows a count of matching assets at the top and a count of selected assets when you tick checkboxes. The preview dialog shows metadata, extracted text, transcripts, dimensions, capture date, and a View raw or Download action.
If the catalog takes longer than expected to load, the picker shows Retry. The first view uses the indexed catalog while remote sources are checked in the background, so slow cloud providers should not block browsing.
Attach Assets to a Task
- Start a task from Home or open an existing task thread
- Open the attachment menu in the chat input
- Click Catalog
- Search, filter, and select one or more assets
- Click Attach selected
Attached assets are passed to the agent with their metadata. Stock catalog credits are added to the prompt so the agent always has the required attribution text.
Use Assets in Video Mode
In a Video Mode project, open the project's Assets panel and click Browse catalog. Select one or more catalog items and click Attach selected — or drag them straight from the catalog into the panel.
To bring in a whole local folder, choose Add assets > Add folder from the Video Mode Assets panel. The app opens your operating system's folder picker, then links the chosen folder as a project source without copying every file into the project.
Remote items show a small badge while they are being prepared:
- Preparing asset... when a download is being set up
- Downloading asset {percent}% while bytes are pulled in
- Asset ready when the file or its editor proxy is available
- Asset failed with a reason if something went wrong
Each in-flight asset has Cancel download and Retry download controls on its tile, so a long pull can be stopped or restarted without leaving the editor. Video items get an editor proxy generated automatically once they cross the configured pixel, duration, and size thresholds, so the timeline stays responsive.
Use Assets in Design Mode
In Design Mode, open the assets browser dialog and pick items from the same catalog. References stay lightweight by default — the full file is only pulled down when the design step actually needs the pixels. Stock items keep their license and credit information attached to the design output, and any required attribution text is added automatically.
Lazy Materialization
Remote catalog items are not downloaded until something asks for them. The first time you attach an item to a project, drop it on a timeline, or hand it to a tool that needs the bytes, the app "materializes" it — pulling the file (or a smaller editor proxy) into a local cache.
Materialization is bounded by two budgets:
- Downloads this conversation — how much can be pulled in during a single chat session
- Downloads stored in a project — how much total materialized data a single Video or Design project can hold
If a budget is about to be exceeded, the app asks you to approve a higher limit before continuing. Old, unreferenced cache files are evicted automatically when the shared cache fills up.
Settings > Data > Assets Materialization
Open Settings > Data and find Asset materialization to control on-demand downloads, project storage, and cache eviction for Video and Design assets.
| Setting | What It Controls |
|---|---|
| Downloads this conversation | Session cap before agents or drops ask for a larger download budget. 0 disables |
| Downloads stored in a project | Project cap across materialized Video or Design assets. 0 disables |
| Shared cache size | Unreferenced cache files are evicted when this limit is exceeded |
| Unused cache retention | Unreferenced cache rows older than this are eligible for cleanup |
| Range download threshold | Large files at or above this size download in resumable chunks |
| Proxy pixel threshold | Video above this megapixel count gets an editor proxy after attach |
| Proxy duration threshold | Video at or above this duration gets an editor proxy after attach |
| Proxy size threshold | Files at or above this size get an editor proxy when the preset supports it |
Click Save limits to apply changes.
Underneath the settings, Current storage breaks down how much disk the catalog is using right now:
- Managed total — everything the catalog is responsible for
- Shared cache — the on-demand cache that gets evicted automatically
- Project copies — files materialized into specific Video, Design, or Task projects
- Proxies and previews — generated proxies, thumbnails, and preview artifacts
Project copies by scope lists which Video projects, Design projects, Tasks, and other scopes are holding the largest copies, so you can clean up the right place first.
Attribution
Stock catalog items track their license and author. Whenever you attach a stock item to a task or use it in a Video or Design project, the credit text is added to the agent prompt and carried through to the project's export. You do not need to copy attribution by hand — it travels with the asset.
For Agents (MCP)
Agents in this app can search, attach, sync, and request budget increases against the catalog using these built-in tools.
| Tool | What It Does |
|---|---|
assets_search | Hybrid keyword and semantic search across the catalog |
assets_get | Fetch the full record for one asset |
assets_similar | Find assets similar to a known one using its text and embeddings |
assets_ingest | Register a workspace file in the catalog |
assets_attach | Attach an asset to a task, message, chat, video project, or design project |
assets_tag | Add tags to an asset |
assets_sync | Pull new items from a connected source such as Immich, Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, S3-compatible storage, or stock catalogs |
assets_recent | List recent workspace and project assets with preview links |
assets_materialize_status | Check download, proxy, and preview status for an asset |
assets_attribution | Render the credits block for all materialized assets in a scope |
assets_request_budget_increase | Ask the user to approve a larger session or project download quota |
When an agent is blocked by a download budget, it can call assets_request_budget_increase with a reason and the byte limit it needs. You approve the new limit and the agent retries.
Privacy and Storage
- Cataloged items live on your machine
- Remote sources are only fetched on demand, never bulk-downloaded in the background
- The shared cache reclaims space automatically when it crosses the configured size or retention window
- Items you delete from the catalog are removed from local storage too — references in old projects are cleaned up by garbage collection
- Stock attribution is preserved end-to-end so exports always include the required credits
Learn More
- Cloud Storage — Connect self-hosted media, cloud drives, and stock catalogs
- Video Mode — Drag catalog assets into a video project
- Design Mode — Use catalog assets in design outputs
- MCP and Skills — How agent tools and built-in servers work
- Workspace Security — Workspace isolation and safety