custom camera preview on the iPhone?

Question

I have two of my apps rejected by Apple and sitting on the "shelves of approval" for 2 months, because both apps were using UIImagePickerController and I dared to add a rectangle on top of the UIImagePickerController, using something as

[picker.view addSubView:rectangle];

On the other hand, applications like CameraZoom and others, ditch the UIImagePickerController regular appearance completely and has its own interface, with custom graphics and sliders on top of the camera preview and even with the ability to zoom the preview image in real-time.

My question is: how can one do that and not be crucified by Apple?

thanks for any insight!

Answer 1

As far as I know, it's been hit and miss. Some apps get through, some don't, and it's really quite annoying (as is app approval in general).

In SDK 3.1, there is a new Camera Overlay concept, where you can overlay your own view on top of the camera view. You can find more documentation on the iPhone Developer website (since it is 3.1, it is under NDA).