Flex Examples

The following example shows how you can get the array of available cameras in ActionScript by using the static Camera.names property, which returns an array of camera names. You’ll also see how you can get a specific camera instance (in case users have multiple cameras installed, which may be the case if they have a laptop with a built in webcam as well as an external USB/Firewire webcam) by passing a parameter to the static Camera.getCamera() method.

Full code after the jump.

This example won’t be very interesting unless you actually have a webcam installed.

View MXML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<!-- http://blog.flexexamples.com/2008/01/25/getting-specific-camera-instances-using-the-static-cameragetcamera-method/ -->
<mx:Application xmlns:mx="http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml"
        layout="horizontal"
        verticalAlign="top"
        backgroundColor="white"
        creationComplete="init();">

    <mx:Script>
        <![CDATA[
            import flash.media.Camera;
            import mx.controls.Alert;
            import mx.events.ListEvent;
            import mx.utils.ObjectUtil;

            private var camera:Camera;

            private function init():void {
                if (Camera.names.length == 0) {
                    Alert.show("You do not have any cameras attached.");
                    list.enabled = false;
                    textArea.enabled = false;
                }
            }

            private function list_change(evt:ListEvent):void {
                var tList:List = evt.currentTarget as List;
                var cameraName:String = tList.selectedIndex.toString();
                camera = Camera.getCamera(cameraName);
                textArea.text = ObjectUtil.toString(camera);
            }
        ]]>
    </mx:Script>

    <mx:Panel id="panel"
            title="Installed cameras:"
            status="{list.dataProvider.length} camera(s)">
        <mx:List id="list"
                dataProvider="{Camera.names}"
                width="200"
                change="list_change(event);" />
    </mx:Panel>

    <mx:TextArea id="textArea"
            editable="false"
            width="100%"
            height="100%" />

</mx:Application>

View source is enabled in the following example.

Note that since we aren’t actually accessing the camera’s video, we don’t get the Adobe Flash Player Settings dialog box asking is if we want to allow/deny access to the current Flex application, but we can still get basic camera information such as available camera names, and various properties of each camera.