(Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3)
At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Camera & Photos.
WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab ran for one hour at 6 PM PST on Tuesday June 10th, 2025
Introductory kick-off questions
Question 1
Tell us a little about the new AVFoundation Capture APIs we've made available in the new iOS 26 developer preview?
Cinematic Capture API (strong/weak focus, tracking focus)(scene monitoring)(simulated aperture)(dog/cat heads/groupIDs)
Camera Controls and AirPod Stem Clicks
Spatial Audio and Studio Quality AirPod Mics in Camera
Lens Smudge Detection
Exposure and Focus Rect of Interest
Question 2
I built QR code scanning into my app, but on newer iPhones I have to hold the phone very far away from the QR code, otherwise the image is blurry and it doesn't scan. Why is this happening and how can I fix it?
Every year, the cameras get better and better as we push the state of the art on iPhone photography and videography. This sometimes results in changes to the characteristics of the lenses.
min focus distance
newer phones have multiple lenses
automatic switching behavior
Use virtual device like the builtInDualWide or built in Triple, rather than just the builtInWide
Set the videoZoomFactor to 2. You're done.
Question 3
Last year, we saw some exciting new APIs introduced in AVFoundation in the health space. With Constant Color photography, developers can take pictures that have constant color regardless of ambient lighting. There are some further advancements this year. Davide, could you tell us about them?
constant color photography is mean to remove the "tone mapping" applied to photograph captured with camera app, usually incldsuing artistic intent, and instead try to be a close as possible to the real color of the scene, regardless of the illumination
constant color images could be captured in HEIF anf JPEG laste year. this year we are adding Support for the DICOM medical imaging photo format. It is a fomrat used by the health industry to store images related to medical subjects like MRI, skin problems, xray and so on.
It's writable and also readable format on all OS26, supported through AVCapturePhotoOutput APIs and through the coregraphics api.
for coregrapphics there is a new DICOM entry in the property dictionary which includes all the dicom availbale and defined propertie in a file. finder will also display all those in the info panel
(Address why a developer would want to use it) - not for regualr picture taking apps. for those HEIF and JPEG are the preferred delivery format. use dicom if your app produces output that are health related, that you can also share with health providers or your doctors
Main session developer questions
Question 1
LiDAR vs. Dual Camera depth generation: Which resolution does the LiDAR sensor natively have (iPhone 16 Pro) and when to prefer LiDAR over Dual Camera?
Both report formats with output resolutions (we don't advertise sensor resolution)
Lidar vs Dual, etc:
Lidar: Best for absolute depth, real world scale and computer vision
Dual, etc: relative, disparity-based, less power, photo effects
Also see: 2022 WWDC session "Discovery advancements in iOS camera capture: Depth, focus and multitasking"
Question 2
Can true depth and lidar camera run at 60fps?
Lidar can do 30fps (edited)
Front true depth can do 60fps.
Question 3
What’s the first class way to use PhotoKit to reimplement a high performance photo grid? We’ve been using a LazyVGrid and the photos caching manager, but are never able to hit the holy trinity (60hz, efficient memory footprint, minimal flashes of placeholder/empty cells)
use the PHCachingImageManager to get media content delivered before you need to display it
specify the size you need for grid sized display
set the options PHVideoRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat, PHImageRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat and PHImageRequestOptionsResizeModeFast
Question 4
For rending live preview of video stream, Is there performance overhead from using async and Swift UI for image updates vs UIViewRepresentable + AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer.self?
AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer is the most efficient display path
Use VDO + AVSampleBufferDisplayLayer if you need to modify the image data
Swift UI image is optimized for static image content
Question 5
Is there a way to configure the AVFoundation BuiltInLiDarDepthCamera mode to provide a depth map as accurate as ARKit at close range?
The AVCaptureDepthDataOutput supports filtering that reduces noise and fills in invalid values. Consider using this for smoother depth maps
Question 6
Pyramid-based photo editing in core image (such as adobe camera raw highlights and shadows)?
First off you may want to look a the builtin filter called CIHighlightShadowAdjust
Also the noise reduction in the CIRawFilter uses a pyramid-based algorithm.
You can also write your own pyramid-based algorithms by taking an input image:
down sample it by two multiply times using imageByApplyingAffineTransform
apply additional CIKernels to each downsampled image as needed.
use a custom CIKernel to combine the results.
Question 7
Is the best way to integrate an in-app camera for a “non-camera” app UIImagePickerController?
Yes, UIImagePickerController provides system-provided UI for capturing photos and movies.
Question 8
Hello, my question is on Deferred Photo Processing? Say I have a photo capture app that adds a CIFilter to the capture. How can I take advantage of Deferred Photo Processing? Since I don’t know how to detect when the deferred captured photo is ready
CIFilter can be called on the final at that point
Photo will have to be re-inserted into the Photo library as adjustment
Question 9
For shipping photo style assets in the app that need transparency what is the best format to use? JPEG2000? will moving to this save a lot of space comapred to PNG or other options?
If you want lossless compression PNG is good and supports unpremutiplied alpha
If you want lossy compression HEIF supports premutiplied or unpremutiplied alpha
(Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3)
Photos & Camera
RSS for tagExplore technical aspects of capturing high-quality photos and videos, including exposure control, focus modes, and RAW capture options.
Selecting any option will automatically load the page
Post
Replies
Boosts
Views
Activity
(Note: this is part 2 of a 3 part posting. See Part 1 or Part 3)
At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Camera & Photos.
WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab ran for one hour at 6 PM PST on Tuesday June 10th, 2025
Question 10
Can we directly integrate auto-capture triggers (e.g., when image is steady or text is detected) using Vision and AVFoundation?
Yes apps can use AVCaptureSession's VDO + AVCapturePhotoOutput, run vision on VDO buffers and capture photo when certain scene or text is detected.
Just to be careful to run Vision on VDO buffers async so it doesn't cause frame drops.
Question 11
What Camera or Photos framework features support working with images from external media, like connected cameras or SD cards? Any best practices?
The ImageCaptureCore framework supports camera devices, memory cards, scanners
read and write, where supported
check out the docs to see how to browse connected devices, folders, files, etc.
Question 12
Hi Brad, to follow up on your SwiftUI cautionary note: using AVCaptureVideoPreview inside a UIViewRepresentable, is okay, right? Thanks all for the great info!
Yes, this is totally fine.
AppKit or UIKit views inside appropriate SwiftUI representables should be equivalent performance
Question 13
What’s the “right” way to transition media in my photos app between HDR modes? When I’m in a one-up view, we use HDR, but in other contexts (like thumbnail) we don’t want HDR. Is there a nice way to tone map?
There’s a suite of new System Tone Mapper APIs in this years’ OSes
CoreImage ImageKit CoreAnimation, CoreGraphics
For example:
CoreImage: new CISystemToneMap filter.
CoreAnimation: layer.preferredDynamicRange = CADynamicRangeConstrainedHigh
Using image views (NSImageView/UIImageView/SwiftUI Image/CALayer) support animations on preferredDynamicRange
Can go from high to constrained to standard
Tone mapping is provided by the system (CISystemToneMap for controllable example)
Question 14
What is your recommendation to preprocess and upscale your depth map in order to render a realistic portrait mode image?
One way to do this: the CIEdgePreserveUpsample CIFilter can be use to upsample a lower resolution depth map by using a higher resolution RGB image as a guide.
Question 15
For buffering frames for later processing from real-time camera output should we prefer a AVSampleBufferDisplayLayer centered approach or AVCaptureVideoDataOutputSampleBufferDelegate centered approach? When would we use each?
AVSampleBufferDisplayLayer and AVCaptureVideoDataOutputSampleBufferDelegate are used hand in hand for custom camera preview.
For buffering for later processing, ensure you make copies of VDO buffers to not drop frames from the output
Question 16
Hello, my question is on Deferred Photo Processing? Say I have a photo capture app that adds a CIFilter to the capture. How can I take advantage of Deferred Photo Processing? Since I don’t know how to detect when the deferred captured photo is ready
CIFilter can be called on the final at that point
Photo will have to be re-inserted into the Photo library as adjustment
Question 17
Is digital zoom (e.g., 1.5x) before taking a photo the same as cropping the photo afterward?
digital zoom upscales the image to output dimensions and cropping will yield a smaller output image
while digital zoom will crop, it also upscales
Question 18
How do you design camera interfaces that work for both casual users and photography enthusiasts?
Progressive disclosure: Put the most common controls up front, and make it easy for pros to drill down.
Sensible Defaults: Choose defaults that work well for casual users, but allow those defaults to be modified for photography enthusiasts
A good philosophy is: Keep the simple things easy, make the hard things possible
Question 19
Recent iPhone models introduced macro mode which automatically switch between lenses to take into account of the focal distance difference. Is there official API to implement this, or should I implement them myself using LiDAR values.
Using builtInTripleCamera and builtInDualWideCamera will automatically switch to macro when available
Question 20
a couple of years ago at WWDC, the option of replacing a camera with a virtual camera was mentioned. How does one do that - make the “physical” camera effectively disappear, so only the virtual camera is accessible to the user?
You can't prevent the built-in camera from being available to the user
Question 21
Can developers now integrate custom Core ML models with Vision for on-device photo analysis more seamlessly?
Yes they can, use CoreMLRequest , provide their model container
Been supported for a while (iOS 18/macOS 15)
For more details go to Machine Learning & AI group lab Thursday
use smaller images for better performance
Question 22
What would you recommend for capture of the new immersive and spatial formats?
To capture Spatial Video use AVCaptureMovieFileOutput’s spatialVideoCaptureEnabled property
Not all device formats support spatial capture, check AVCaptureDevice.activeFormat.spatialVideoCaptureSupported
See WWDC 2024 talk “Build compelling spatial photo and video experiences” for more details
Question 23
You mentioned JPEG-XL. What is the current status of support on iOS and macOS for encoding and decoding?
For decoding, we support JPEG-XL files in all our OSes, regular SDR files, as well as ISO HDR files.
For encoding, we only support JPEG-XL for ProRAW DNG capture in the Camera app or via third-party AVFoundation APIs.
If you have any requests for improvement or new features related to JPEG-XL, please file a Feedback request using the Feedback Assistant.
(Note: this is part 2 of a 3 part posting. See Part 1 or Part 3)
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Tags:
Image I/O
Photos and Imaging
PhotoKit
Core Image
(Note: this is part 3 of a 3 part posting. See Part 1 or Part 2)
At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Camera & Photos.
WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab ran for one hour at 6 PM PST on Tuesday June 10th, 2025
Question 24
What’s the best approach for optimizing barcode scanning using AVFoundation or Vision in low-light or angled scenarios
Turn on flash in low-light scenarios
Lower framerate to improve exposure and reduce noise
Wait until the capture is in focus/notify your user that they need to get closer
Question 25
Recent iPhone models introduced macro mode which automatically switch between lenses to take into account of the focal distance difference. Is there official API to implement this, or should I implement them myself using LiDAR values.
Using builtInTripleCamera and builtInDualWideCamera will automatically switch to macro when available
Question 26
Is there a way to quickly create a thumbnail after the user selects an image with PhotosPicker?
File provider API
Additional questions from the WWDC25 in-person labs that occurred later in the WWDC week
Question 1
When should I build my custom photo picker instead of using the system one?
Always start with the system picker -> try embeddable customization APIs -> fallback to custom picker for very special needs
Question 2
I'm building a new camera app for pros and I want to give my users the most un-processed image possible, and the most control over the capture as possible. How can I do that with AVCapture?
If stills, Brief Bayer RAW capture overview, or Pro RAW if you want Apple's processing and dynamic range
If video, talk about prores LOG.
Custom exposure settings are available throguh the apis
maybe global/local tonemapping discussion?
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Tags:
Image I/O
Photos and Imaging
PhotoKit
Core Image
Hello,
Does anyone have a recipe on how to raycast VNFaceLandmarkRegion2D points obtained from a frame's capturedImage?
More specifically, how to construct the "from" parameter of the frame's raycastQuery from a VNFaceLandmarkRegion2D point?
Do the points need to be flipped vertically? Is there any other transformation that needs to be performed on the points prior to passing them to raycastQuery?
What options do I have if I don't want to use Blackmagic's Camera ProDock as the external Sync Hardware, but instead I want to create my own USB-C hardware accessory which would show up as an AVExternalSyncDevice on the iPhone 17 Pro?
Which protocol does my USB-C device have to implement to show up as an eligible clock device in AVExternalSyncDevice.DiscoverySession?
Where can I find the documentation of the Genlock feature of the iPhone 17 Pro? How does it work and how can I use it in my app?
Hi everyone,
I’m running into an issue with PHPickerFilter when using PHPickerViewController.
When I configure the picker with a .videos and .livePhotos filter, it seems to work correctly in the Photos tab. However, when I switch to the Collections tab, the filter doesn’t always apply — users can still see and select static image assets in certain collections (e.g. from one of the People & Pets sections).
Here’s a simplified snippet of my setup:
var configuration = PHPickerConfiguration(photoLibrary: .shared())
configuration.selectionLimit = 1
var filters = [PHPickerFilter]()
filters.append(.videos)
filters.append(.livePhotos)
configuration.filter = PHPickerFilter.any(of: filters)
configuration.preferredAssetRepresentationMode = .current
let picker = PHPickerViewController(configuration: configuration)
picker.delegate = self
present(picker, animated: true)
Expected behavior:
The picker should consistently respect the filter across both Photos and Collections tabs, only showing assets that match the filter.
Actual behavior:
The filter seems to apply correctly in the Photos tab, but in the Collections tab, other asset types are still visible/selectable.
Has anyone else encountered this behavior? Is this expected or a known issue, or am I missing something in the configuration?
Thanks in advance!
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Tags:
Files and Storage
Media Library
Photos and Imaging
PhotoKit
When changing a camera's exposure, AVFoundation provides a callback which offers the timestamp of the first frame captured with the new exposure duration: AVCaptureDevice.setExposureModeCustom(duration:, iso:, completionHandler:).
I want to get a similar callback when changing frame duration.
After setting AVCaptureDevice.activeVideoMinFrameDuration or AVCaptureDevice.activeVideoMinFrameDuration to a new value, how can I compute the index or the timestamp of the first camera frame which was captured using the newly set frame duration?
I'm working on a photo app and I want to allow the user to display, edit and delete photos. I can fetch all photos using PHAsset.fetchAssets(with: options). This works as intended.
However, I can't seem to find a way to prevent the user from seeing photos from a Shared Library. The PHAssetSourceType only contains typeCloudShared to only show items from a specific album; not library.
How can I filter by iCloud Shared Library?
I have a feature requirement: to switch the writer for file writing every 5 minutes, and then quickly merge the last two files. How can I ensure that the merged file is seamlessly combined and that the audio and video information remains synchronized? Currently, the merged video has glitches, and the audio is also out of sync. If there are experts who can provide solutions in this area, I would be extremely grateful.
In iOS 26 (Developer Beta), the AVCaptureMetadataOutputObjectsDelegate no longer receives callbacks when metadataOutput.metadataObjectTypes = [.face] is set. On earlier iOS versions the issue does not occur. Interestingly, face detection works if I set the sessionPreset to .medium, but not with .high — except on the iPhone 16 Pro Max, where it works regardless.
I'm creating Live Photos programmatically in my app using the Photos and AVFoundation frameworks. While the Live Photos work perfectly in the Photos app (long press shows motion), users cannot set them as motion wallpapers. The system shows "Motion not available" message.
Here's my approach for creating Live Photos:
// 1. Create video with required metadata
let writer = try AVAssetWriter(outputURL: videoURL, fileType: .mov)
let contentIdentifier = AVMutableMetadataItem()
contentIdentifier.identifier = .quickTimeMetadataContentIdentifier
contentIdentifier.value = assetIdentifier as NSString
writer.metadata = [contentIdentifier]
// Video settings: 882x1920, H.264, 30fps, 2 seconds
// Added still-image-time metadata at middle frame
// 2. Create HEIC image with asset identifier
var makerAppleDict: [String: Any] = [:]
makerAppleDict["17"] = assetIdentifier // Required key for Live Photo
metadata[kCGImagePropertyMakerAppleDictionary as String] = makerAppleDict
// 3. Generate Live Photo
PHLivePhoto.request(
withResourceFileURLs: [photoURL, videoURL],
placeholderImage: nil,
targetSize: .zero,
contentMode: .aspectFit
) { livePhoto, info in
// Success - Live Photo created
}
// 4. Save to Photos library
PHAssetCreationRequest.forAsset().addResource(with: .photo, fileURL: photoURL, options: nil)
PHAssetCreationRequest.forAsset().addResource(with: .pairedVideo, fileURL: videoURL, options: nil)
What I've Tried
Matching exact video specifications from Camera app (882x1920, H.264, 30fps)
Adding all documented metadata (content identifier, still-image-time)
Testing various video durations (1.5s, 2s, 3s)
Different image formats (HEIC, JPEG)
Comparing with exiftool against working Live Photos
Expected Behavior
Live Photos created programmatically should be eligible for motion wallpapers, just like those from the Camera app.
Actual Behavior
System shows "Motion not available" and only allows setting as static wallpaper.
Any insights or workarounds would be greatly appreciated. This is affecting our users who want to use their created content as wallpapers.
Questions
Are there additional undocumented requirements for Live Photos to be wallpaper-eligible?
Is this a deliberate restriction for third-party apps, or a bug?
Has anyone successfully created Live Photos that work as motion wallpapers?
Environment
iOS 17.0 - 18.1
Xcode 16.0
Tested on iPhone 16 Pro
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Tags:
LivePhotosKit JS
PhotoKit
Core Image
AVFoundation
Some users reported that their images are not loading correctly in our app. After a lot of debugging we identified the following:
This only happens when the app is build for Mac Catalyst. Not on iOS, iPadOS, or “real” macOS (AppKit).
The images in question have unusual color spaces. We observed the issue for uRGB and eciRGB v2.
Those images are rendered correctly in Photos and Preview on all platforms.
When displaying the image inside of a UIImageView or in a SwiftUI Image, they render correctly.
The issue only occurs when loading the image via Core Image.
When comparing the different Core Image render graphs between AppKit (working) and Catalyst (faulty) builds, they look identical—except for the result.
Mac (AppKit):
Catalyst:
Something seems to be off when Core Image tries to load an image with foreign color space in Catalyst.
We identified a workaround: By using a CGImageDestination to transcode the image using the kCGImageDestinationOptimizeColorForSharing option, Image I/O will convert the image to sRGB (or similar) and Core Image is able to load the image correctly. However, one potentially loses fidelity this way.
Or might there be a better workaround?
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Tags:
Image I/O
Photos and Imaging
Core Image
Core Graphics
Hello,
I'm developing an app that displays a photo library using UICollectionView and PHCachingImageManager. I'd like to achieve a user experience similar to the native iOS Photos app, where low-quality images are shown quickly while scrolling, and higher-quality images are loaded for visible cells once scrolling stops.
I'm currently using the following approach:
While Scrolling: I'm using the UICollectionViewDataSourcePrefetching protocol. In the prefetchItemsAt method, I call startCachingImages with low-quality options to cache images in advance.
After Scrolling Stops: In the scrollViewDidEndDecelerating method, I intend to load high-quality images for the currently visible cells.
I have a few questions regarding this approach:
What is the best practice for managing both low-quality and high-quality images efficiently with PHCachingImageManager? Is it correct to call startCachingImages with fastFormat options and then call it again with highQualityFormat in scrollViewDidEndDecelerating?
How can I minimize the delay when a low-quality image is replaced by a high-quality one? Are there any additional strategies to help pre-load high-quality images more effectively?
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
After Picture-in-Picture is opened on the camera interface, the custom UI cannot be displayed. Is there any way to make the custom UI visible? If custom UI cannot be displayed, how do teleprompter-type apps in the store manage to show custom teleprompter text within the camera?
I'm using Picture-in-Picture (PiP) mode in my native iOS application, which is similar to Google Meet, using the VideoSDK.live Native iOS SDK. The SDK has built-in support for PiP and it's working fine for the most part.
However, I'm running into a problem:
When the app enters PiP mode, the local camera (self-video) of the participant freezes or stops. I want to fix this and achieve the same smooth behavior seen in apps like Google Meet and WhatsApp, where the local camera keeps working even in PiP mode.
I've been trying to find documentation or examples on how to achieve this but haven't had much luck. I came across a few mentions that using the camera in the background may require special entitlements from Apple (like in the entitlements file). Most of the official documentation says background camera access is restricted due to Apple’s privacy policies.
So my questions are:
Has anyone here successfully implemented background camera access in PiP mode on iOS?
If yes, what permissions or entitlements are required?
How do apps like WhatsApp and Google Meet achieve this functionality on iPhones?
Any help, advice, or pointers would be really appreciated!
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
I'm developing a photo backup app.
To detect newly added or edited photos since the app launched, I keep a local dictionary in the format [localIdentifier: modification_date].
However, PHAsset.modificationDate is not reliable.
It often changes unexpectedly, possibly due to system operations like iCloud metadata updates.
Is there a more reliable way to detect whether a photo has been modified by user since the last app launch?
I'm thinking about using content hash instead, but I'm not sure how heavy this operation is in terms of performance.
Hi all,
I'm working on a custom Metal-based video pipeline using AVCaptureVideoDataOutput, and I've run into an unexpected issue related to exposure.
Setup:
I'm capturing video frames using kCVPixelFormatType_420YpCbCr8BiPlanarFullRange.
In my Metal shader, I:
Convert YCbCr (full range Rec.709) to linear Rec.709 RGB.
Apply Rec.709 → sRGB gamma encoding.
Output to .bgra8Unorm_srgb via MTKView.
Everything renders correctly in terms of colorspace math, but the image appears significantly brighter (~+3 stops EV) compared to AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer and the native iOS Camera app under the same camera exposure settings.
What I’ve verified:
The color transforms are correct: YCbCr709 to RGB, then linear to sRGB.
I'm not applying any tone mapping or aggressive look LUTs yet.
Camera exposure is locked using:
device.setExposureModeCustom(duration: ..., iso: ...)
The same EV (e.g., ISO 50, 1/125s, f/5.6) on my iPhone appears visually 3 stops brighter than on my digital cameras (Sony/Canon etc).
To match the look of the preview layer or camera app, I have to simulate a ~–3 EV shift in my custom pipeline.
Questions:
Is AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer applying extra tone mapping, digital gain, or contrast shaping (like OOTF etc)?
Does the camera ISP expose "hotter" (i.e., with more light) internally for the preview layer than what we get in video frame buffers?
Is there a standard way to compensate for this ISP behavior in custom pipelines using AVCaptureVideoDataOutput?
Can this be accounted for using metadata (e.g., exposure bias, gain, gamma curve)?
Topic:
Media Technologies
SubTopic:
Photos & Camera
Hey,
Quick question. I noticed that Adobe's new app, Project Indigo, allows you to open the app using the Camera Control button. However, when your device is locked it just shows this screen:
Would this normally be approved by the Appstore approval process? I ask because I would like to do something similar with my camera app.
I know that this is not the best user experience, but my apps UI is not built in Swift and I don't have the resources to build the UI again. At least this way the user experience would be improved from what it is now, where users cannot even launch the app. I get many requests per week about this feature and would love to improve the UX for my users, even if it's not the best possible.
Thanks, Alex
Hello everyone,
I'm working on a feature where I need to capture the highest possible quality photo (e.g., 24MP on supported devices) and upload it to our server. I don't need the photos to appear in user's main Photos app so I thought I could store the photos in app's private directory using FileManager until they are uploaded. This wouldn't require requesting Photo Library permission, maximizing user privacy.
The documentation on AVCapturePhotoOutput states that "the 24MP setting (5712, 4284) is only serviced as 24MP when opted-in to autoDeferredPhotoDeliveryEnabled"
/**
@property maxPhotoDimensions
@abstract
Indicates the maximum resolution of the requested photo.
@discussion
Set this property to enable requesting of images up to as large as the specified dimensions. Images returned by AVCapturePhotoOutput may be smaller than these dimensions but will never be larger. Once set, images can be requested with any valid maximum photo dimensions by setting AVCapturePhotoSettings.maxPhotoDimensions on a per photo basis. The dimensions set must match one of the dimensions returned by AVCaptureDeviceFormat.supportedMaxPhotoDimensions for the current active format. Changing this property may trigger a lengthy reconfiguration of the capture render pipeline so it is recommended that this is set before calling -[AVCaptureSession startRunning].
Note: When supported, the 24MP setting (5712, 4284) is only serviced as 24MP when opted-in to autoDeferredPhotoDeliveryEnabled.
*/
@available(iOS 16.0, *)
open var maxPhotoDimensions: CMVideoDimensions
(btw. this note is not present in the docs https://developer.apple.com/documentation/avfoundation/avcapturephotooutput/maxphotodimensions)
Enabling autoDeferredPhotoDeliveryEnabled means that for a 24MP capture, the system will call the photoOutput(_:didFinishCapturingDeferredPhotoProxy:error:) delegate method, providing a proxy object instead of the final image data.
According to the WWDC23 session "Create a more responsive camera experience," this AVCaptureDeferredPhotoProxy must be saved to the PHPhotoLibrary using a PHAssetCreationRequest with the resource type .photoProxy. The system then handles the final processing in the background within the library.
To use deferred photo processing, you'll need to have write permission to the photo library to store the proxy photo, and read permission if your app needs to show the final photo or wants to modify it in any way.
https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10105/?time=799
This seems to create a hard dependency on the Photo Library for accessing 24MP images.
My question is:
Is there any way to receive the final, processed 24MP image data directly in the app after a deferred capture, without using PHPhotoLibrary as the processing intermediary?
For example, is there a delegate callback or a mechanism I'm missing that provides the final data for a deferred photo, allowing an app to handle it in-memory or in its own private sandbox, completely bypassing the user's Photo Library?
Our goal is to follow Apple's privacy-first principles by avoiding requesting a PHPhotoLibrary authorization when our app's core function doesn't require access to the user's photo collection.
Thank you for your time and any clarification you can provide.
it will use about 300MB memory, it cause a memory peak
Hi guys,
Can I use CMIO to achieve the following feature on macOS when a USB device (Camera/Mic/Speaker) is connected:
When a third-party video conferencing app is not in a meeting, ensure the app defaults to using the USB device (Camera/Mic/Speaker).
When a third-party conferencing app is in a meeting, ensure the app automatically switches to the USB device (Camera/Mic/Speaker).
AVCaptureSession's startRunning method is thread blocking and seems to be slow. What is this method doing behind the scenes?
For context: I'm working on Simulator Camera support and I have a 'fake' AVCaptureDevice that might be causing this. My hypothesis is that AVCaptureSession tries to connect to the device and waits for a notification to be posted back.
I'd love to find a way to let my fake device message AVCaptureSession that it's connected.