Tkinter.PhotoImage doesn't not support png image

Question

I am using Tkinter to write a GUI and want to display a png file in a Tkiner.Label. So I have some code like this:

self.vcode.img = PhotoImage(data=open('test.png').read(), format='png')
self.vcode.config(image=self.vcode.img)

This code runs correctly on my Linux machine. But when I run it on my windows machine, it fails. I also tested on several other machines (include windows and linux), it failed all the time.

The Traceback is:

Exception in Tkinter callback
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 1486, in __call__
    return self.func(*args)
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 150, in showrbox
    SignupBox(self, self.server)
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 197, in __init__
    self.refresh_vcode()
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 203, in refresh_vcode
    self.vcode.img = PhotoImage(data=open('test.png').read(), format='png')
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 3323, in __init__
    Image.__init__(self, 'photo', name, cnf, master, **kw)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 3279, in __init__
   self.tk.call(('image', 'create', imgtype, name,) + options)
TclError: image format "png" is not supported

If I delete format='png' in the source code, the traceback will become:

Exception in Tkinter callback
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 1486, in __call__
    return self.func(*args)
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 150, in showrbox
    SignupBox(self, self.server)
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 197, in __init__
    self.refresh_vcode()
  File "C:\Documents and Settings\St\client\GUI.py", line 203, in refresh_vcode
    self.vcode.img = PhotoImage(data=open('test.png').read())
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 3323, in __init__
    Image.__init__(self, 'photo', name, cnf, master, **kw)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\lib-tk\Tkinter.py", line 3279, in __init__
    self.tk.call(('image', 'create', imgtype, name,) + options)
TclError: couldn't recognize image data

So, what should I do to make it support png files?

Answer 1

PIL is now replaced by Pillow http://pillow.readthedocs.io/en/3.2.x/

solution:

from Tkinter import *
import PIL.Image
import PIL.ImageTk

root = Toplevel()

im = PIL.Image.open("photo.png")
photo = PIL.ImageTk.PhotoImage(im)

label = Label(root, image=photo)
label.image = photo  # keep a reference!
label.pack()

root.mainloop()

---

If PIL could not be found in code, you do need a pillow install:

pip install pillow