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QuickTime Kit Framework Reference

Framework
QTKit.framework
Header file directories
QTKit/QTKit.h
Companion guide
QuickTime Kit Programming Guide
Declared in
QTCaptureAudioPreviewOutput.h
QTCaptureConnection.h
QTCaptureDecompressedAudioOutput.h
QTCaptureDecompressedVideoOutput.h
QTCaptureDevice.h
QTCaptureDeviceInput.h
QTCaptureFileOutput.h
QTCaptureInput.h
QTCaptureLayer.h
QTCaptureOutput.h
QTCaptureSession.h
QTCaptureVideoPreviewOutput.h
QTCaptureView.h
QTCompressionOptions.h
QTDataReference.h
QTError.h
QTFormatDescription.h
QTMedia.h
QTMovie.h
QTMovieLayer.h
QTMovieView.h
QTSampleBuffer.h
QTTime.h
QTTimeRange.h
QTTrack.h
QTUtilities.h

Introduction

The QuickTime Kit is a Objective-C framework (QTKit.framework) with a robust and evolving API for manipulating time-based media. Introduced in Mac OS X v10.4, the QuickTime Kit provides a set of Objective-C classes and methods designed for the basic manipulation of media, including movie playback, editing, import and export to standard media formats, among other capabilities. With the release of Mac OS X v10.5 and the latest iteration of QuickTime 7, the reach and capability of the framework have been extended. The QuickTime Kit framework now includes the addition of 15 new classes, all designed to support professional-level video and audio capture, as well as pro-grade recording of media. Two additional classes, which support Core Animation layers for capture and movies, are also provided in the API.

Developers who work with the Cocoa Application Kit classes NSMovie and NSMovieView should move their applications to the QuickTime Kit framework in order to take advantage of the power and enhanced functionality of this API.

Note: The QuickTime Kit framework supports applications running in Mac OS X v10.3. Applications running in Mac OS X v10.3 require QuickTime 7 or later, however.

Important: The issue of thread-safety has been addressed for developers in the release of the QuickTime Kit framework available in Mac OS X v10.5. Five new methods belonging to the QTMovie class have been added. These include the following class and instance methods that deal specifically with handling and managing thread-safety operations of movie objects: enterQTKitOnThread, enterQTKitOnThreadDisablingThreadSafetyProtection, exitQTKitOnThread, attachToCurrentThread, and detachFromCurrentThread. For more information, refer to the QTMovie Class Reference.

The new QTKit capture classes introduced in Mac OS X v10.5 generally have good thread-safety characteristics. In particular, these classes can be used from any thread, except for QTCaptureView, which inherits from NSView. Note, however, that although capture sessions and their inputs and outputs can be created, run, and monitored from any thread, any method calls that mutate these objects or access mutable information should be serialized, using locks or other synchronization mechanisms.

See Also

The following documents provide additional information about the QuickTime Kit framework:


Last updated: 2009-02-26

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