How can I reduce the file size of a video created with UIImagePickerController?

Question

I have an app that allows a user to record a video with UIImagePickerController and then upload it to YouTube. The problem is that the video file that UIImagePickerController creates is HUGE, even when the video is only 5 seconds long. For example, a 5 second long video is 16-20 megabytes. I want to keep the video in 540 or 720 quality, but I want to reduce the file size.

I've been experimenting with AVFoundation and AVAssetExportSession to try to get a smaller file size. I've tried the following code:

AVAsset *video = [AVAsset assetWithURL:videoURL];
AVAssetExportSession *exportSession = [AVAssetExportSession exportSessionWithAsset:video presetName:AVAssetExportPresetPassthrough];
exportSession.shouldOptimizeForNetworkUse = YES;
exportSession.outputFileType = AVFileTypeMPEG4;
exportSession.outputURL = [pathToSavedVideosDirectory URLByAppendingPathComponent:@"vid1.mp4"];
[exportSession exportAsynchronouslyWithCompletionHandler:^{
    NSLog(@"done processing video!");
}];

But this hasn't reduced the file size at all. I know what I'm doing is possible because in Apple's Photos app, when you select "share on YouTube", will automatically process the video file so its small enough to upload. I want to do the same thing in my app.

How can I accomplish this?

Answer 1

With AVCaptureSession and AVAssetWriter you can set the compression settings as such:

NSDictionary *settings = @{AVVideoCodecKey:AVVideoCodecH264,
                           AVVideoWidthKey:@(video_width),
                           AVVideoHeightKey:@(video_height),
                           AVVideoCompressionPropertiesKey:
                               @{AVVideoAverageBitRateKey:@(desired_bitrate),
                                 AVVideoProfileLevelKey:AVVideoProfileLevelH264Main31, /* Or whatever profile & level you wish to use */
                                 AVVideoMaxKeyFrameIntervalKey:@(desired_keyframe_interval)}};

AVAssetWriterInput* writer_input = [AVAssetWriterInput assetWriterInputWithMediaType:AVMediaTypeVideo outputSettings:settings];

Edit: I guess if you insist on using the UIImagePicker to create the movie in the first place, you'll have to use AVAssetReader's copyNextSampleBuffer and AVAssetWriter's appendSampleBuffer methods to do the transcode.