Apple iPhone with Quartz Composer a Portable VJ Tool?

Posted January 9, 2007 // Tagged as Hardware, Quartz Composer // 63 Comments ↓

The Apple iPhone is all over the blogs today – one of the most exciting things to me was to see Coverflow working on it. Could it be that we could run low-intensity Quartz Composer apps on this? It’s got a built-in camera and a video-out port, as well as an awesome multi-touch interface. I’m sure the built-in graphics are nothing astounding, but I was able to build some fun and beautiful things on an old iBook G4 in Quartz Composer – here’s hoping that we’ve got a portable video instrument on our hands!

If anyone has info about Quartz Composer running on the iPhone, give a shout in the comments!

63 Responses

MO
February 28th, 2007 at 3:47 am

The production iPhone does not have a video-out port. The unit demoed at MacWorld was not a production unit, and was hacked specifically for that purpose.

Also, Quartz Compositions are really just XML descriptions of Quartz views, so there is no doubt that they are supported.

Given the unknown status of 3rd-party iPhone development, it’s unlikely you’ll be able to run arbitrary Quartz compositions. However, if 3rd-party Dashboard-style widgets are allowed, they support Quartz compositions (cf. Dashcode), so that’s the most probable way for this to happen.

Also consider that whatever the graphics capabilites of the iPhone, it’s extremely unlike that it supports pixel shaders, so Core Image effects are more or less out of the question.
Josh
June 9th, 2007 at 5:57 pm

um… the iphone has an ipod connector, and they make video out (kinda) for that sooo….
Momo the Monster
July 2nd, 2007 at 9:19 am

Recent reports show that it does not output video. Guess we’ll have to wait for the new Touchscreen iPods…
KeynoteKen
July 18th, 2007 at 3:54 am

Nope, no video out and no Quartz Composer… yet. I hope to see one or the other, though, because while not as robust a system as an average mac, it might be able to handle a few layers.
lindsay
August 2nd, 2007 at 10:23 am

This phone is worth the money! yeah it may be pricey but the things it can do are just no words to describe it. my mom thought that the iphone was just some stupid pricey peice of crap but when she bought it for me she tottaly felt like an idiot. the internet, there are no words to descrbie it. you can search anything that comes to mind on it. dont listien to the people who say oh the iphone a peice a crap its not worth it, they probably cant afford it. thanks to the iphone when i go to boring holiday family gatherings i can entertain myself with it. trust me when i say this its worth your money.