MacBook Air 10.8.5 facetime Camera is Problematic in Connect Meetings

Issue: MacBook Air 10.8.5 facetime Camera is Problematic in Connect Meetings

This is an emerging issue and an update will follow very shortly. The issue is isolated to MacBook Air; Apple is aware of the issue; their workaround currently is to restore the camera plugin if a backup is available or restore the OS if not… a bit drastic to say the least.  An update/hotfix is assumed to be in the works but no timetable is known –  perhaps a week but that is speculation.

A possible workaround might be to take a working camera plugin file and overwrite it on someone’s machine where it is NOT working with Connect – maybe install a working version of the applewebcam.plugin file to overwrite the defective one. (The camera plugin files in 10.8.5 are located in:  library/coremediaIO /plugins/DAL and FCP-DAL.) More to follow on this as research continues and the issue develops.

The OSX 10.8.5 update seems to be missing something that facilitates Connect, Skype, etc., from gaining access to the facetime camera on the new MacBook Air clients. At this point, we are not sure how this can be fixed. Connect customers are looking to Apple for more guidance. External webcams should work until Apple pushes out a fix.

I will provide an update as soon as more news is available.

In the meantime. One possible workaround (and I confess to not having tested this as my MBA is not a piece of hardware as is my Lenovo: For MBA users who have upgraded to 10.8.5 it may work to use the free app CamTwist. This shows up as a virtual camera device, and is shown as a selectable camera device under Flash. In CamTwist you can configure it to basically echo the WebCam feed from the built-in FaceTime HD camera. Now I put that out there as a possible workaround, not one that I have tested.