Search code examples
djangopython-imaging-libraryimagefield

how to go from django image field to PIL image and back?


Given a django image field, how do I create a PIL image and vice-versa?

Simple question, but hard to google :(

(I'm going to use django-imagekit 's processor to rotate an image already stored as model attribute.)

edit

In [41]: m.image_1.__class__
Out[41]: django.db.models.fields.files.ImageFieldFile

In [42]: f = StringIO(m.image_1.read())

In [43]: Image.open(f)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
IOError                                   Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-43-39949b3b74b3> in <module>()
----> 1 Image.open(f)

/home/eugenekim/virtualenvs/zibann/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/PIL/Image.pyc in open(fp, mode)
   2023                 pass
   2024
-> 2025     raise IOError("cannot identify image file")
   2026
   2027 #

IOError: cannot identify image file

In [44]:

Solution

  • The first question:

    import Image
    
    pil_image_obj = Image.open(model_instance.image_field)
    

    The second question:

    from cStringIO import StringIO
    from django.core.files.base import ContentFile
    
    f = StringIO()
    try:
        pil_image_obj.save(f, format='png')
        s = f.getvalue()
        model_instance.image_field.save(model_instance.image_field.name,
                                        ContentFile(s))
        #model_instance.save()
    finally:
        f.close()
    

    UPDATE

    According to OP's comment, replacing import Image with from PIL import Image solved his problem.