Outputting video over hdmi on boot is a easy thing, it is optimizing it to launch very quickly and running it stable is where its going to require some time, but ive using the pi as camera module in the past like a lot of times, (built a fpv googles with pan tilt where i had the pi zero handling the pantilt along with the camera, with video streaming over tcp, security cameras and loads of other times), feel free to check my profile for the above mentioned projects or text me to discuss further.