How to encode to png a webcam texture?

Question

Setup: Unity 2019

I am trying to get the texture from a plane.

I capture the camera input and map it on a plane. Then i want to read the texture continuously.

I tried something like this. PS: I am new with unity.

using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using UnityEngine;

public class CameraInput : MonoBehaviour
{

static WebCamTexture backCam;

void Start()
{
    if (backCam == null)
        backCam = new WebCamTexture();

    GetComponent<Renderer>().material.mainTexture = backCam;

    if (!backCam.isPlaying)
        backCam.Play();

}

void Update()
{

     byte[] bytes = GetComponent<Renderer>().material.mainTexture.EncodeToPNG();
         System.IO.File.WriteAllBytes(path, bytes);
         Debug.Log(bytes.Length/1024  + "Kb was saved as: " + path);

}

}

Error received:

Unable to retrieve image reference UnityEngine.ImageConversion:EncodeToPNG(Texture2D)

Answer 1

Webcam is a Texture and you can encodetopng Texture2d. So the solution to this is:

Texture2D tex = new Texture2D(backCam.width, backCam.height);
tex.SetPixels(backCam.GetPixels());
tex.Apply();
byte[] bytes =  tex.EncodeToPNG();