If you mean to display live video stream form camera you can use GPUImage.
If you only need to take a still image, use AVFoundation's AVCaptureStillImageOutput. See AVCam - Apple's sample code where you can strip the part of previewing live video (AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer
) and just capture a still image when you need it.
//you'll need to create an AVCaptureSession
_session = [[AVCaptureSession alloc] init];
AVCaptureDevice *device = [AVCaptureDevice defaultDeviceWithMediaType:AVMediaTypeVideo];
//there are steps here where you adjust capture device if needed
NSError *error = nil;
AVCaptureDeviceInput *input = [AVCaptureDeviceInput deviceInputWithDevice:device error:&error];
if ([device supportsAVCaptureSessionPreset: AVCaptureSessionPreset640x480]) {
_session.sessionPreset = AVCaptureSessionPreset640x480;
}
_stillImageOutput = [[AVCaptureStillImageOutput alloc] init];
NSDictionary *outputSettings = [[NSDictionary alloc] initWithObjectsAndKeys: AVVideoCodecJPEG, AVVideoCodecKey, nil];
[_stillImageOutput setOutputSettings:outputSettings];
[outputSettings release];
AVCaptureConnection *videoConnection = nil;
for (AVCaptureConnection *connection in _stillImageOutput.connections) {
for (AVCaptureInputPort *port in [connection inputPorts]) {
if ([[port mediaType] isEqual:AVMediaTypeVideo] ) {
videoConnection = connection;
break;
}
}
if (videoConnection) { break; }
}
[_session addOutput: _stillImageOutput];
[_session startRunning];
This code is used to take photo:
AVCaptureConnection *videoConnection = nil;
for (AVCaptureConnection *connection in _stillImageOutput.connections)
{
for (AVCaptureInputPort *port in [connection inputPorts])
{
if ([[port mediaType] isEqual:AVMediaTypeVideo] )
{
videoConnection = connection;
break;
}
}
if (videoConnection) { break; }
}
[_stillImageOutput captureStillImageAsynchronouslyFromConnection:videoConnection completionHandler: ^(CMSampleBufferRef imageSampleBuffer, NSError *error) {
if (imageSampleBuffer != NULL) {
NSData *imageData = [AVCaptureStillImageOutput jpegStillImageNSDataRepresentation:imageSampleBuffer];
UIImage *image = [UIImage imageWithData: imageData];
//do something with image or data
}
}
Hope it helps.