How do you create a custom camera view, instead of UIImagePickerViewController?

Question

I created a simple application using UIImagePickerViewController for capturing from the camera, but I'd like to customize the interface for grabbing from the camera, such as adding some buttons.

UIImagePickerViewController doesn't allow this directly, so how would you create a custom view that allows for displaying the live camera feed and capturing from it?

Answer 1

The easy way is to continue to use UIImagePickerViewController but set showsCameraControls to NO and provide your own user interface using cameraOverlayView.

The more difficult (but more flexible) way is to use the AVFoundation classes (particularly AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer and AVCaptureStillImageOutput) to construct your own camera.