In the previous post, Getting MPMoviePlayerController to Cooperate with iOS4 and Earlier Versions of iPhone SDK, I demonstrated how to work with the most recent changes in iPhone OS 3.2 and 4.0 MPMoviePlayerController to enable one application to play movies regardless of the OS version on the device.

In this post I want to show you a few minor changes you can make to the previous app to display a movie in portrait mode, something that was not possible in earlier (pre 3.2) OS versions. With that said, back in January of 2010 I did cover a means to create the illusion that a movie was in portrait mode, if this piques your interest, have a look here: Play iPhone Movies in Portrait Mode with MPMoviePlayerController using Public API’s

The figure below shows the same movie as played back in landscape and portrait:

Play Movies in Portrait Mode

The code below is from the previous post and shows how to configure the movie player view to display in landscape:

MPMoviePlayerController *mp =  [[MPMoviePlayerController alloc]
     initWithContentURL:movieURL];
 
...
 
- (void) moviePlayerLoadStateChanged:(NSNotification*)notification 
{
  ...
  // Rotate the view for landscape playback
  [[self view] setBounds:CGRectMake(0, 0, 480, 320)];
  [[self view] setCenter:CGPointMake(160, 240)];
  [[self view] setTransform:CGAffineTransformMakeRotation(M_PI / 2)]; 
 
  // Set frame of movieplayer
  [[mp view] setFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 480, 320)];
 
  ...
}

To playback a movie in portrait mode is as easy as removing the code for the rotation and changing the frame of the movieplayer. I’ve also added a call to scale the movie so it fills the screen, this will maintain the aspect ratio.

- (void) moviePlayerLoadStateChanged:(NSNotification*)notification 
{
  ...
  // Rotate the view for landscape playback
  //	  [[self view] setBounds:CGRectMake(0, 0, 480, 320)];
  //		[[self view] setCenter:CGPointMake(160, 240)];
  //		[[self view] setTransform:CGAffineTransformMakeRotation(M_PI / 2)]; 
 
  // Set frame of movieplayer
  // [[mp view] setFrame:CGRectMake(0, 0, 480, 320)];
  [[mp view] setFrame:CGRectMake(0, 160, 320, 160)];
 
  // Scale uniformly, maintaining aspect ratio
  [mp setScalingMode:MPMovieScalingModeAspectFill];
 
  ...
}

This approach works on 3.2 (iPad) as well as 4.0 and greater. Needless to say, given the large display on the iPad this is a nice alternative as the user can watch videos without rotating the device.

Source Code

Download the source code to build an iPhone app that displays movies in portrait mode.