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Install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on OSX

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face_detection_opencv3

As I mentioned last week, OpenCV 3.0 is finally here!

And if you’ve been paying attention to my Twitter stream, you may have noticed a bunch of tweets regarding installing OpenCV on OSX and Ubuntu (yep, I’ve been tweeting a lot lately, but that’s just because I’m so excited about the 3.0 release!)

To celebrate OpenCV 3.0, I have decided to perform a series of blog posts that detail how to install OpenCV 3.0 on both Python 2.7+ and Python 3+.

We’ll also be performing these Python 2.7 and Python 3+ installations on a variety of platforms including OSX, Ubuntu, and yes, the Raspberry Pi.

As I’m sure you already know, OpenCV has never been an effortless library to install. It’s not like you can let pip or easy_install to the heavy-lifting for you. In most cases you’ll be pulling down the repo, installing prerequisites, compiling by hand, and hoping that your installation goes smoothly.

With OpenCV 3.0 it doesn’t get any easier — and there are definitely some caveats and gotchas that you need to look out for (such as the opencv_contrib repository — without it, you’ll be missing out on some important features, such as SIFT, SURF, etc.)

But don’t worry, I’ve got you covered! Just keep following along with the PyImageSearch blog and I promise these tutorials will get you up and running with OpenCV 3.0 in no time.

We’ll go ahead and kick-off our OpenCV 3.0 install fest by installing v3.0 with Python 2.7+ bindings on the OSX platform.

If you’re an Ubuntu or Raspberry Pi user, be sure to keep an eye on PyImageSearch as I’ll be posting OpenCV 3.0 install instructions for Ubuntu and the Raspberry Pi as well.

A quick note before we get started: While OpenCV 3.0 is indeed compatible with Python 3+, most computer vision developers are still using Python 2.7 (since OpenCV 2.4.X is only compatible with Python 2.7). If you’re a Python 3 user and excited to give the bindings a try — don’t worry! I’ll be covering OpenCV 3.0 and Python 3+ installation in a future tutorial. But for now, let’s stick with what we know and use Python 2.7.

UPDATE: The tutorial you are reading now covers how to install OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7 bindings on OSX Yosemite and below. This tutorial still works perfectly if you are using OSX Yosemite or prior, but if you want to install OpenCV on the newer El Capitan and macOS Sierra please use this freshly updated tutorial.

How to Install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on OSX

This is our first tutorial in our OpenCV 3.0 install-fest series. In this tutorial I’ll be detailing how to install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on the OSX operating system — I’ll be covering Python 3+ in a future post.

Let’s go ahead and dive into the OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ install instructions.

Step 1:

The first step we need to do is install Xcode, which is a combination of IDE and software development tools for developing applications on the OSX and iOS platforms — most of us already have Xcode installed.

But if you don’t, you’ll want to open up the App Store application and search for Xcode. From there, just click Get and Install App (and when prompted, you’ll need to enter your Apple ID username and password):

Figure 1: Installing Xcode on your OSX system.
Figure 1: Installing Xcode on your OSX system.

Step 2:

Now that Xcode is installed, we need to install Homebrew, which is labeled as “The missing package manager for OSX” (and they really are not joking about that one). Think of Homebrew as an (almost) equivalent of apt-get for Ubuntu.

To install Homebrew, simply head to the Homebrew website and simply copy and paste the command underneath the “Install Homebrew” section into your terminal:

$ cd ~
$ $ ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

Now that Homebrew is installed, you’ll need to update it and grab the latest package (i.e. “formula”) definitions. These formula are simply instructions on how to install a given package or library.

To update Homebrew, simply execute:

$ brew update

Step 3:

It’s bad form to use the system Python as your main interpreter. And this is especially true if you intend on using virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper (which we will be).

Let’s go ahead and use Homebrew to install our user-specific version of Python 2.7:

$ brew install python

Note: This tutorial will be covering how to install and setup OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7. I will be covering how to install OpenCV 3.0 with Python 3+ later this month.

However, before we proceed, we need to update our PATH in our ~/.bash_profile file to indicate that we want to use Homebrew packages before any system libraries or packages. This is an absolutely critical step, so be sure not to skip it!

Open up your ~/.bash_profile file in your favorite editor (if it does not exist, create it), and append the following lines to the file:

# Homebrew
export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH

From there, reload your ~./bash_profile file to ensure the changes have been made:

$ source ~/.bash_profile

As a sanity check, let’s confirm that we are using the Homebrew version of Python rather than the system one:

$ which python
/usr/local/bin/python

If your output of which python is /usr/local/bin/python , then you are indeed using the Homebrew version of Python. And if your output is /usr/bin/python , then you are still using the system version of Python — and you need to go back and ensure that your ~/.bash_profile file is updated and reloaded correctly.

Again, this is a very important step, so be sure not to skip it!

Step 4:

Alright, time to get virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper installed and configured correctly. These packages allow us to create separate Python environments for each project we are working on. This is especially useful if you have projects that require different (or conflicting) versions of a given library.

It’s important to note that virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper are by no means required to install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on OSX. However, you really should be using these packages when doing Python development. It’s cleaner. Easier to maintain. And well worth the upfront effort.

Anyway, to install virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper , just execute the following command:

$ pip install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper

Again, we need to update our ~/.bash_profile file by appending the following two lines:

# Virtualenv/VirtualenvWrapper
source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh

After updating the ~/.bash_profile file, we need to reload it:

$ source ~/.bash_profile

At this point, both virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper are installed correctly, so we can create our cv virtual environment:

$ mkvirtualenv cv

This command will create a new Python environment that is entirely sequestered from our system and Homebrew Python installations. The cv virtual environment is where we’ll be doing all of our computer vision development (and not to mention, compiling OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7+ support).

Step 5:

Now we can start installing some Python packages. We need to install NumPy since the OpenCV Python bindings represent images as multi-dimensional NumPy arrays:

$ pip install numpy

Step 6:

Up until this point we have been mainly focusing on actually setting up and configuring our development environment to compile and install OpenCV — here is where the real work starts.

First, we’ll use brew to install the required developers tools, such as the wonderful CMake utility:

$ brew install cmake pkg-config

And here we are going to install the necessary image I/O packages. These packages allow you to load various image file formats such as JPEG, PNG, TIFF, etc.

$ brew install jpeg libpng libtiff openexr

And finally, let’s install libraries that are used to optimize various operations within OpenCV (if we so choose):

$ brew install eigen tbb

Step 7:

Alright, our system is all setup — time to compile and install OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7+ support.

The first thing we’ll do is change directory to our home directory, followed by pulling down OpenCV from GitHub, and checking out the 3.0.0 version:

$ cd ~
$ git clone https://github.com/Itseez/opencv.git
$ cd opencv
$ git checkout 3.0.0

Update (3 January 2016): You can replace the 3.0.0 version with whatever the current release is (as of right now, it’s 3.1.0 ). Be sure to check OpenCV.org for information on the latest release.

Unlike previous versions of OpenCV that were (essentially) self-contained, we need to pull down the extra opencv_contrib repo from GitHub as well. The opencv_contrib repo which contains extra modules for OpenCV, such as feature detection, local invariant descriptors (SIFT, SURF, etc.), text detection in natural images, line descriptors, and more.

$ cd ~
$ git clone https://github.com/Itseez/opencv_contrib
$ cd opencv_contrib
$ git checkout 3.0.0

Again, make sure that you checkout the same version for opencv_contrib that you did for opencv above, otherwise you could run into compilation errors.

Note: We don’t have to pull down the opencv_contrib repo if we don’t want to. OpenCV will compile and install just fine without it. But if you compile OpenCV without opencv_contrib , be warned that you’ll be missing out on some pretty important features, which will become very obvious, very fast, especially if you’re used to working with the 2.4.X version of OpenCV.

Step 8:

Let’s setup our OpenCV build by creating the build directory:

$ cd ~/opencv
$ mkdir build
$ cd build

Where we’ll use CMake to configure our build:

$ cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local \
	-D PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH=~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages \
	-D PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin \
	-D PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/Frameworks/Python.framework/Headers \
	-D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON -D INSTALL_PYTHON_EXAMPLES=ON \
	-D BUILD_EXAMPLES=ON \
	-D OPENCV_EXTRA_MODULES_PATH=~/opencv_contrib/modules ..

There are some very important options we are supplying to CMake here, so let’s break them down:

  • CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE : This option indicates that we are building a release binary of OpenCV.
  • CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX : The base directory where OpenCV will be installed.
  • PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH : The explicit path to where our site-packages directory lives in our cv virtual environment.
  • PYTHON2_LIBRARY : Path to our Hombrew installation of Python.
  • PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR : The path to our Python header files for compilation.
  • INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES : Indicate that we want to install the C/C++ examples after compilation.
  • INSTALL_PYTHON_EXAMPLES : Indicate that we want to install the Python examples after complication.
  • BUILD_EXAMPLES : A flag that determines whether or not the included OpenCV examples will be compiled or not.
  • OPENCV_EXTRA_MODULES_PATH : This option is extremely important — here we supply the path to the opencv_contrib repo that we pulled down earlier, indicating that OpenCV should compile the extra modules as well.

Update (3 January 2016): In order to build OpenCV 3.1.0 , you need to set -D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=OFF (rather than ON ) in the cmake command. There is a bug in the OpenCV v3.1.0 CMake build script that can cause errors if you leave this switch on. Once you set this switch to off, CMake should run without a problem.

Whew, that was a lot of options.

Trust me, it’s a lot easier installing OpenCV 3.0 on Ubuntu where these options are automatically determined via CMake for us.

But when using OSX you’ll need to explicitly define the PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH , PYTHON2_LIBRARY , and PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR yourself. It’s a real pain, but if you don’t, your compile will fail.

Here’s an example of what my CMake output looks like:

Figure 2: Before compiling OpenCV 3.0 on your OSX system, make sure that cmake has picked up the correct Python interpreter, library, numpy version, and packages path.
Figure 2: Before compiling OpenCV 3.0 on your OSX system, make sure that cmake has picked up the correct Python interpreter, library, numpy version, and packages path.

Notice how the Python 2 Interpreter, Libraries, numpy version, and packages path have been correctly picked up.

You’ll also want to make sure that python2 is in the list of modules To be built, like this:

Figure 2: Ensuring the "python2" module is in our list of modules "To be built".
Figure 2: Ensuring the “python2” module is in our list of modules “To be built”.

If it python2 is not in this list, and is in the Unavailable list, then you need to go back to the CMake step and ensure that you have correctly supplied your PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH , PYTHON2_LIBRARY , and PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR .

Now that CMake has properly configured the build, we can compile OpenCV:

$ make -j4

Where the 4 can be replaced with however many cores you have available on your processor. Here’s an example of OpenCV compiling on my system:

Figure 3: OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7+ support compiling on my system.
Figure 3: OpenCV 3.0 with Python 2.7+ support compiling on my system.

And assuming that OpenCV compiled without error, you can now install it on your OSX system:

$ make install

If you get an error message related to permissions (although that really shouldn’t happen), you’ll need to run the install command as sudo :

$ sudo make install

Step 9:

Assuming you’ve made it this far, let’s perform a sanity check and ensure OpenCV is installed:

$ cd ~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages/
$ ls -l cv2.so 
-rwxr-xr-x  1 adrian  staff  2013052 Jun  5 15:20 cv2.so

Sure enough, we can see that OpenCV has been installed in our cv virtual environment’s site-packages directory!

As a quick note, you’ll be able to find the cv2.so file (which is your OpenCV bindings) in your build/lib directory as well.

Let’s verify our install by firing up a shell and importing OpenCV:

(cv)annalee:~ adrianrosebrock$ python
Python 2.7.8 (default, Jul 31 2014, 15:41:09) 
[GCC 4.2.1 Compatible Apple LLVM 5.1 (clang-503.0.40)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import cv2
>>> cv2.__version__
'3.0.0'

Doesn’t that 3.0.0 look nice?

Congrats, you have now installed OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on your OSX system!

Step 10:

After all this work, let’s give our OpenCV 3.0 install a test drive!

Most of my work in computer vision involves image search engines, or more formally, Content-based Image Retrieval. A critical step of CBIR is extracting features to quantify and abstractly represent the contents of an image.

OpenCV 3.0 has numerous updates and changes, but perhaps my personal favorite is an implementation of AKAZE features — Fast Explicit Diffusion for Accelerated Features in Nonlinear Scale Spaces by Alcantarilla et al.

Since Jurassic World was just released (and Jurassic Park is my favorite movie of all time), let’s explore how we can compute and extract AKAZE features from the following image:

Figure 4: Our Jurassic World test image that we are going to detect keypoints and extract features using AKAZE.
Figure 4: Our Jurassic World test image that we are going to detect keypoints and extract features in using AKAZE.

Open up a new file, name it test_akaze.py , and insert the following code:

# import the necessary packages
from __future__ import print_function
import cv2

# load the image and convert it to grayscale
image = cv2.imread("jurassic_world.jpg")
gray = cv2.cvtColor(image, cv2.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)
cv2.imshow("Original", image)

# initialize the AKAZE descriptor, then detect keypoints and extract
# local invariant descriptors from the image
detector = cv2.AKAZE_create()
(kps, descs) = detector.detectAndCompute(gray, None)
print("keypoints: {}, descriptors: {}".format(len(kps), descs.shape))

# draw the keypoints and show the output image
cv2.drawKeypoints(image, kps, image, (0, 255, 0))
cv2.imshow("Output", image)
cv2.waitKey(0)

And then execute it via:

$ python test_akaze.py
keypoints: 762, descriptors: (762, 61)

Assuming you have download the jurassic_world.jpg  image and placed it in the same directory as your test_akaze.py  script, you should see the following output:

Figure 5: We have successfully been able to detect keypoints, extract AKAZE features, and then draw the keypoints on our image using OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+!
Figure 5: We have successfully been able to detect keypoints, extract AKAZE features, and then draw the keypoints on our image using OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+!

Notice how we have been able to detect keypoints and extract AKAZE features in our image!

Obviously we need to do a lot more work than this to build a useful project using AKAZE features — but this example demonstrates that (1) our OpenCV 3.0 install is working, and (2) we are able to use a unique OpenCV 3.0 feature using Python 2.7.

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Summary

OpenCV 3.0 is finally here! And to celebrate the OpenCV 3.0 release, we are going to performing an OpenCV 3.0 install-fest for both Python 2.7+ and Python 3+ on a variety of operating systems including OSX, Ubuntu, and the Raspberry Pi!

This article kicked-off the install fest by detailing how to setup and install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on the OSX operating system.

Next week, we’ll be moving over to Ubuntu and detailing the instructions to get OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7 installed on Ubuntu 14.04+ (hint: it’s much easier than OSX).

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this post and found it useful!

Please consider subscribing to the PyImageSearch Newsletter by entering your email address in the form below — I’ll be sending out updates as new OpenCV 3.0 + Python install instructions are released!

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About the Author

Hi there, I’m Adrian Rosebrock, PhD. All too often I see developers, students, and researchers wasting their time, studying the wrong things, and generally struggling to get started with Computer Vision, Deep Learning, and OpenCV. I created this website to show you what I believe is the best possible way to get your start.

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323 responses to: Install OpenCV 3.0 and Python 2.7+ on OSX

  1. Jason

    This is a great tutorial. This helps much more than the homebrew formula built for opencv 3.0 did.

    Only comments are, Line 6 of the cmake command is missing a “\” at the end of it so it executes prematurely when copied and pasted.

    Also, a question. I am trying to follow the tutorial on this page.

    http://docs.opencv.org/master/db/d5c/tutorial_py_bg_subtraction.html

    createBackgroundSelectorMOG and createBackgroundSelectorGMG do not seem to be working in OpenCV 3.0 as installed here. I would really like to try GMG on an existing project, and that existing project fails now because MOG seems to be removed. Is this on purpose or am I missing a step to connect these and other OpenCV functions?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Jason, thanks for the comment. I fixed the command and added in the trailing slash, so that shouldn’t be a problem anymore.

      As for your question, try using cv2.createBackgroundSubtractorMOG2. I’m not sure where cv2.createBackgroundSubtractorMOG (notice the lack of the trailing “2”) went, but it’s definitely not in the 3.0 release with Python bindings. I know both are part of the 2.4.11 release though, just with slightly different function names.

      The GMG based method is not part of the Python bindings for the 3.0 release (again, I’m not sure why). I think it’s available in one of the RC or beta releases (not positive though).

      Also, which version of Python are you using? I’ve noticed that not all of the bindings are compiled and installed when using 2.7 vs. 3.

      • Jason

        Thank you for getting back to me. I never upgraded to Python 3, Python 2.7.10 is what I am using and has always satisfied my needs. I’m looking forward to more Python bindings from OpenCV in the future.

  2. Patrick

    I’ve always used brew install opencv to get v2. Is it just a matter of time before v3 is that easy, or has something changed to prevent an easy install? Or have I been doing it wrong.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      There is a brew formula that has been released about 4 days ago for OpenCV 3.0, you can find it here. The biggest issue is the customizability of the opencv_contrib package which now contains important features such as SIFT, SURF, etc. which were part of 2.4.X, but have been marked as optional in 3.0, mainly related to patent reasons.

      Furthermore, by compiling from source you can install to a custom location and run multiple versions of Python and OpenCV at the same time! This is especially important since OpenCV 3.0 was just released and we’re still finding bugs and backwards compatibility issues. With brew, you won’t be able to do this.

  3. Casey

    First, thanks for the helpful guide. I was able to get OpenCV 3.0 running in my virtual environment (running OSX by the way) after some tweaking of the Cmake options. Specifically, I had to turn off build_opencv_videoio for an error free compilation. I would still like to get the video I/O capabilities. Do you know what other dependancies I need? Perhaps you could post your entire Cmake output.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hi Casey, OpenCV has a lot of video I/O capabilities, is there a specific one that you are looking for or just the general ability to read video files? In my case, I did not have to install any extra dependencies related to video I/O and I can access the webcam and read frames from video without an error. However, that all said, look into the (optional) ffmpeg dependency which should bring in many, many packages related to video I/O.

  4. Yong Yuan

    Is it possible to install the OpenCV 3.0 with Homebrew by “brew install opencv3”? I want to using the OpenCV with python or with C plus plus in Xcode.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Indeed it is! I’ll be doing another set of followup posts regarding installing OpenCV 3.0 with Homebrew within the next few weeks. These posts are simply to help readers who are interested in compiling and installing OpenCV 3.0 from source.

  5. Joseph

    What are your views on using Anaconda? I was able to download the required packages through ‘conda install’ but the only opencv that’s available for download is version 2.4.8. Have you used Anaconda before and if so, is there any way to upgrade it to version 3.0.0?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Continuum’s Anaconda is a really great tool — but you really won’t see me post about it here on PyImageSearch. The Continuum team and myself had a falling out about a year ago, and because of that, I don’t use their products.

      • Joseph

        Thank you for the reply! I also apologize for any negative sentiments I brought with the comment. I was just debating whether I should just go with virtualenv and homebrew python to work with opencv 3.0.0.

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          No worries Joseph, there were no negative sentiments 🙂 I’ll be doing a blog post within the next 3-4 weeks on Homebrew + Python + OpenCV 3 as well.

          • Daniel Revier

            Hi Adrian,

            Any progress on the Homebrew method of OpenCV3 installation? I can’t seem to find it on the website.

            Thanks for everything!

        • Hank

          If anyone is interested, you can easily set the location of a conda virtual environment as your pyton library source, instead of using virtualenv.

  6. mehul

    hi this is the great guide , i have followed all the steps but finally when i run the code it hits me this error

    OpenCV Error: Assertion failed (scn == 3 || scn == 4) in cvtColor, file /Users/mehulmistry/opencv/modules/imgproc/src/color.cpp, line 7564
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “test.py”, line 6, in
    gray = cv2.cvtColor(image, cv2.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)
    cv2.error: /Users/mehulmistry/opencv/modules/imgproc/src/color.cpp:7564: error: (-215) scn == 3 || scn == 4 in function cvtColor

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Make sure you have downloaded the jurassic_world.jpg image and placed it in the same directory as your test.py. You are getting this error because the jurassic_world.jpg image is not in the same directory as your Python script.

  7. isaac vidas

    Great tutorial! Thank you very much!

    I had a few issues during the cmake step and the “make -j4” step. I don’t know if it’s because of changes in the installation or a different reason specific to my environment.
    When I ran cmake I couldn’t get python2 to be in the list of modules to be built.
    After taking a look in “opencv\CMakeLists.txt” I found out that some of the parameters were changed:
    1) PYTHON2_LIBRARY – changed to PYTHON2_LIBRARIES. The value stayed the same.
    2) PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR – was removed and not being used.
    3) PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS – was added and should be pointed to the include dir of numpy.
    4) BUILD_opencv_python2 – In the CMakeLists.txt this parameter is used in the condition of building opencv for python2 so I used this as well.

    I ended up with the following command:
    cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local \
    -D PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH=~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages \
    -D PYTHON2_LIBRARIES=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin \
    -D PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS=~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages/numpy/core/include \
    -D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON -D INSTALL_PYTHON_EXAMPLES=ON \
    -D BUILD_EXAMPLES=ON BUILD_opencv_python2=ON \
    -D OPENCV_EXTRA_MODULES_PATH=~/opencv_contrib/modules ..

    You also need to make sure that PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS is correct. In my case, I didn’t set the PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS value at first, so it used the default value “/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages”. While the cmake step finished successfully, the “make -j4” failed with the following error: “fatal error: ‘numpy/ndarrayobject.h’ file not found”.
    I fixed this error by pointing the PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS parameter to the include library of numpy in the virtualenv. You can find “ndarrayobject.h” in this folder.

    I’ve installed this on OS X Yosemite 10.10.4.

    Hope this helps.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Thanks so much for the tips Issac! Very interesting that the CMake options have already changed though.

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Welcome to the world of OpenCV! But that’s too be expected. OpenCV 3 is barely a month old, whereas OpenCV 2.4 was the major version for years. It’s going to take awhile for good documentation on it to appear. I just hope that PyImageSearch can be one of those “good documentation” websites.

          • isaac vidas

            I think PyImageSearch is already one of those websites.

            I’ve been returning to this site for a while now and I really like what you’re doing with it.
            I have some ideas that I wanted to try with OpenCV and when I wanted to get started, this was the first place I went to.
            Thank you for all the great tutorials and examples!

    • Jay Ludher

      Hi! Sorry to bring back to life an old topic. I’m doing this new change as i also looked at the CMakeLists.txt file and saw the new headings. However, when i change to the new format and run cmake, i’m still having python 2 in my list of unavailable and my interpreter is pointing to /usr/local/bin/python2.7 (ver 2.7.11) instead of pointing to Users/Ludhercris/.virtualenvs/cv/bin/python2.7 …… any help?

    • Trozdol

      OMG! Thank you so much for posting this. I kept running cmake over and over thinking I had some typo. Driving me Crazy!

    • Pat1234

      Thanks so much Isaac!

      I have a problem regarding the “make -j4” step. I ran cmake and python2 is in the list of modules to be built.

      When I run “make -j4” i get the reply “make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop.”

      I am very new to this so its probably a beginners mistake.
      Can anyone help me out?

      Thanks!!

      • Adrian Rosebrock

        If you’re getting an issue related to “No targets specified”, then it’s likely that your CMake command exited with errors. Double-check your output from CMake and you’ll likely see errors that need to be resolved.

    • Nic

      What a lifesaver. Thanks for the clear example.
      However, though it almost worked for me, I still had to set INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=OFF

  8. bhagyeshm

    Oops!! I realised that I am asking for “which python” instead of asking “which python3”..Thanks anyways Adrian for the lovely book ‘Practical Python and OpenCV’! Everything is simply there at one place.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Glad it’s working for you! And that’s awesome that you are enjoying the book! 😀

  9. Alex

    Thank you very much; this was well-needed!

    Also thanks to Isaac Vidas, as I was having the same issue.

    What would we do without these practical, yet passionate, tech blogs? When will proper documentation development receive the attention it deserves!? (not just for OpenCV)

    Cheers,
    Alex

  10. Xi Wang

    Great tutorial! I followed exactly the same steps and got exactly the same results on my MacBook Air. Thank you so much for the accuracy!

      • Reza Kalantar

        Thanks for sharing, I keep getting the error: make: *** [all] Error 2 at around 38% and have followed exactly the same steps. I would appreciate if you can help me with this. Many thanks

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          What is the exact error message you are getting? Without knowing the error I cannot provide any suggestions on how to resolve it.

  11. Mike

    I ran into a problem where, after running make -j4, I got an error saying Python.h was not found.

    The problem was that when I ran cmake, I used this option:
    -D PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/Frameworks/Python.framework/Headers

    That file was an alias to a folder that didn’t exist, for some reason. I just changed it to:
    -D PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework/Headers
    and it worked.

      • Dan

        Hi Mike/Adrian, sorry to bring up an old topic, but I have tried both of those paths that you have suggested and I still keep getting a fatal error around 78% because Python.h cannot be found.

        My Python.h file exists in System/Library/Frameworks/Python.frameworks/Headers.

        Any suggestions on why this might not be working? I’ve run the Cmake command again a few times trying those paths out but nothing seems to be working. Thanks for your help!

  12. Kusuma Ramesh

    Hi

    I am trying to install openCV3.0 and Python2.7 on OSX. After installing python from the brew, making necessary changes for .~bash_profile file and type $ which python on the terminal.It is showing the system version of python and not the python installed from brew.Please help

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      After updating your .bash_profile file did you reload it using:

      $ source ~/.bash_profile

      Alternatively, you could launch a new shell and try which python

      If it is still showing the system version of Python, then it’s likely that your .bash_profile file was not updated correctly.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      That sounds like an issue unrelated to OpenCV, but with git and your OSX install. I’m not quite sure why you would be getting that error (other than OSX 10.7 is pretty dated at this point). You can read more about it here, but again, the issue is most certainly with your git install, not OpenCV.

  14. Chris

    Hi Adrian, I just want to install OpenCV 3.0 on Mac to use with C++. I followed your instruction, but from Step 6 I exited the cv virtual environment and installed the rest globally, because I was afraid that it won’t work with XCode (or any other C++ IDE) if I keep installing under the virtual environment. In the end I coudn’t find the cv2.so anywhere (either in site-packages or build/lib). I haven’t tested with C++ (Xcode) yet but just wanted to ask you if what I did could lead to any potential problem? Overall, how do I get it to work with both Python and C++? Thanks

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Chris, I’ll be honest — I don’t do much C++ development, and when I do, it’s on Ubuntu, not OSX so I’m not sure I’m the best person to answer this question. But to answer your question, you should still follow the the same install instructions I have provided. The sudo make install command will install OpenCV globally on your machine. The only extra step is to sym-link the cv2.so file into your virtual environment. Other than that, you should be able to run Python scripts and compile C++ programs.

      • Chris

        Cool so this time I followed the exact instruction and I was able to build OpenCV 3.0 for both Python and C++ (Xcode). Thanks a ton. Even though I don’t use Python, I’ll follow your blog to learn more about features in OpenCV (rather than looking into OpenCV documentation).

        Two quick questions though as I’m pretty new to python: (1) How to reactivate the cv virtualenv once I close the current terminal and start a new one? ; (2) Once your test_akaze.py is running from terminal, how do I close it? I tried a couple options (ESC, q, exit(), etc) but the only one that stops it is Ctrl + z, but then the python session is still running and in order to close the image window I have to force close it. Is there a better way? Thanks

  15. bill

    After wiping an old home-brew install and resetting all the foobared permissions, I am getting the following error wen attempting to make opencv:


    [ 79%] Linking CXX executable ../../bin/cpp-tutorial-pnp_registration
    [ 79%] Built target cpp-tutorial-pnp_registration
    [ 79%] Linking CXX executable ../../bin/opencv_perf_stitching
    [ 79%] Built target opencv_perf_stitching
    make: *** [all] Error 2

    What is going on and how to fix it?

    cmake complains about PythonLibs2.7, but doesn’t see the libpython1.7.10 in the Cellar.
    make notes that “libopencv_hal.a” has no symbols.

    Thanks

    oops: that is lib python2.7.10 in the cellar

    Thanks Hackeron,

    I also had the Python.h problem. Fixed it as suggested above and everything compiled and installed.

    never mind. It was the Python.h problem. fixed that and everything worked.

  16. Scott Squires

    Tried to install twice now.
    Same issues each time.

    -D PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin \

    I had to change to python/2.7.10_2 since that was the folder created for some reason.

    Any of the make files on cv fail errors in the video codecs. Complains about x86, etc.

    In the end import cv2 doesn’t work since it can’t find cv2

    Suggestions?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      If you are getting compile errors, then yes, OpenCV will not be able to finish compiling and install. The library must be compiled correctly and installed correctly before it can be imported.

      Try changing your PYTHON_LIBRARY to point to the .dylib file so it can be linked against. The path on your machine will likely be different, but for me it's:

      -D PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.8/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/libpython2.7.dylib

      • kota

        Thanks Adrian. Previously I used the following but didn’t work (everything worked but import cv2)
        PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin

        Then I changed it to .dylib and it worked now.

        Since I couldn’t find satisfying answer about what .dylib does, can you shed some light about why it works now?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          A dylib file is a dynamic library that’s loaded at runtime rather than compile time (hence why your error only happened during the import). If you’ve ever done any Windows or DOS programming, dylibs are essentially parallel to DLL files.

  18. Bernd Meyer

    Despite Adrian’s generous help I couldn’t quite get this to work in my environment, but based on this and another blog I finally found the solution. If you, like me, are tortured by the “‘unsupported/Eigen/MatrixFunctions’ file not found” bug, this solution may also work for you: http://wp.me/P3ALAE-82

  19. Nick

    Hi Adrian, I followed your instruction twice and checked every step, but I still could not get the modules from opencv_contrib. I tried with SIFT by running sift = cv2.SIFT() and I got this error: AttributeError: ‘module’ object has no attribute ‘SIFT’ (import cv2 works fine btw). I check in /usr/local/include/opencv2 and there’s no folder nonfree which suppose to include the header for SIFT and SURF etc. Can you help? Is there any screen output in the process that we can check if opencv_contrib is added. I did have the line “-D OPENCV_EXTRA_MODULES_PATH=~/opencv_contrib/modules ..” in the cmake command. Thanks

  20. SPQR

    brew doctor now complains with :
    Unexpected dylibs:
    /usr/local/lib/libopencv_adas.3.0.0.dylib
    /usr/local/lib/libopencv_bgsegm.3.0.0.dylib
    …
    /usr/local/lib/libopencv_xobjdetect.3.0.0.dylib
    /usr/local/lib/libopencv_xphoto.3.0.0.dylib

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Did you install OpenCV via brew or from the source like detailed in this post? I haven’t ran into a problem with brew doctor when compiling from source.

  21. Ashwin

    I wanted know if I will be able to change the number of dedicated cores for OpenCV.
    Say, I’ve already complied OpenCV and mentioned “make -j4”. But now, I want to change it to 2 cores. How do I do it?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Ashwin — I think there might be a bit of confusion. The -j option controls the number of cores that is used compile OpenCV, not the number of cores that OpenCV will use once compiled, installed, and performing various operations. OpenCV determines that automatically and can be further improved by compiling with TBB support.

  22. Sarath

    Hi,
    I tried to install opencv for python2.7. i end up with the error Python.h not found.
    i checked my PYTHON_INCLUDE_ DIR path, for me it is /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Headers . I checked the directory, i have Python.h file is present inside it.
    i also have Header directory in /Library/Frameworks/Python.frameworks/Versions/2.7/Headers. which one should i choose.
    Is there any way to find the correct path?

    I did not install python using brew. does it matters? if, How could i remove preexisting python and install using brew.

    Please help me..

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Yes, it does matter if you did not install Python via brew. If you do not install Python via brew, you will end up compiling against the OSX version of Python. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but you’ll need to change your paths accordingly. You do not need to uninstall the system version of Python to install another version — just let brew take care of it for you like I have outlined in this blog post.

  23. Me

    I followed all the steps and Igor it to work. The next time I restarted the computer I used ‘workon cv’ to switch to the virtual env, but the example code stopped working. A little digging in with ‘pip list’ showed that I lost the packages…

    Any idea how to get the packages to persist between restarts?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      It sounds like you need to re-access your virtual environment:

      $ workon cv
$ python test.py

      Make sure you are always in the cv virtual environment before executing your Python script.

      • justin ng

        Hi Adrian,

        I have installed OpenCV 3.0.0 on Ubuntu but somehow when using python and check “cv2.__version__”, it still returns “2.4.8”.
        Thus, I can not use some xfeature2d functions.
        Could you suggest any ideas to get my python work with OpenCV 3.0.0

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          That’s quite strange. Have you previously installed OpenCV 2.4.8 on your system? If so, make sure you are in the cv virtual environment so you are seeing the OpenCV 3.0.0 bindings.

  24. Vic

    I attempted to create the virtual environment by:
    mkvirtualenv cv,

    but i got:
    -bash: mkvirtualenv: command not found

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      I would go back to Step 3 and make sure your ~/.bash_profile file is properly edited. Then, make sure to reload it via source ~/.bash_profile

      • Felicia Amy

        Hi,
        I also have problem with this. Somehow the virtualenvwrapper.sh is stored here “/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/” instead of “/usr/local/bin/”. Do you have any idea what went wrong in my case? Thank you.

      • hendrick

        same problem with me. I already make sure my ~/.bash_profile. but when I run which python the result is usr/bin/python

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Which version of Python and pip did you use to install virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper?

    • Pawan Ajagond

      Use this line of code :
      source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh

      and then this line of code:workon cv

  25. Peter

    Hey Adrian,
    first I have to thank you for this amazing manual. Everything works fine right now and it was fun to get some background information as well.
    After the install process there are two folders in the home directory: ~/opencv and ~/opencv_contrib.

    Are they necessary after installing? Can I delete them or what should I do with them?
    Thanks and all the best from Germany
    Peter

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Nice, I’m glad the tutorial worked for you Peter! 😀

      After you run make install you can safely delete opencv and opencv_contrib.

  26. Peter

    Hey Adrain,
    after the install process there are two folders in the home directory. opencv and opencv_contrib.

    Are they necessary or can I delete them?
    Best and thanks for the helpful manual.
    Peter

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Yep! After you’ve ran make install you can safely delete the opencv and opencv_contrib directories.

  28. Mike Mehr

    Hi Adrian,
    I got this all working after I realized that my initial error (C compiler cannot create executables) in Cmake had to do with not having the Xcode Command Line tools (I had to look that one up on Google/StackOverflow). Everything else proceeded just fine, including the final test run. Except for not knowing how to quit out from the running Python script (lots to learn about Python!).
    Can I now run the install for Python3 as well? Should I? I’ll see if there are comments on that page about that issue.
    Anyway, thanks for setting all this up and I’m looking forward to learning more with you.
    — Mike

    Hi Adrian,
    I did do this page after doing the 2.7 install page; the brew install python3 got me v3.5.0, so I modified the CMAKE command accordingly, but after the make build, I could not find the cv2.so file anywhere, not in the path specified by Rick, nor the 3.5 path as you suggested. The old 2.7 package in the cv virtualenv is still there and still works under 2.7. I assume if it had put the 3.5-compiled .so file there, it would NOT run under 2.7, so I’m at a loss to explain where it might have gone. Any suggestions? I noted some differences in the output of CMAKE around the Python stuff, but the 3.5 stuff was called out properly.
    Best,
    Mike M

    Further update (fixed the problem). I am not sure what step(s) below exactly fixed the problem above, but among the things I did were:

    1. Made sure there was only one set of virtualwrapper.sh calls in my .bash_profile
    2. Renamed /usr/local/bin/python2.7 temporarily so the old interpreter couldn’t be found by CMAKE
    3. Reran the CMAKE line, which then only found the 3.5 interpreter.
    4. Reran make -j4 so that it was built with Python 3.5
    5. Put the /usr/local/bin/python2.7 link back
    6. Found the .so file at ~/opencv/build/lib/python3/cv2.cpython-35m-darwin.so and copied it to ~/.virtualenvs/cv3/lib/python3.5/site-packages
    7. Opened python3 and verified that import cv2 worked.

    My clue was noticing that when it wasn’t working, the make didn’t actually link the .so file in the final step, only building the video-write tutorial. I became suspicious of the line of CMAKE output “– Python (for build): /usr/local/bin/python2.7” and thus my steps #2-4. Only took 2 hours extra! Is this a bug in the build script?

    Regards,
    Mike

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Mike — congrats on getting OpenCV installed! And thanks for following up with all the added details (I’ve consolidated all your comments into a single one just for ease of readability). I’m sure other PyImageSearch readers will find your comment helpful.

      As you noted, there should only be one set of virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper calls in your .bash_profile. Both of these packages are compatible with Python 2.7 and Python 3. It’s also strange that you needed to manually move python2.7. Provided the library and interpreter flags were set to point to Python 3.5, this should not have happened. But then again, each OSX system is a bit different.

      As far the strange cv2.so, there must be a bug in the build script. It only happens for Python 3, not Python 2.7 which is quite odd.

  30. James

    Hi Adrian

    Thanks for the great tutorial!

    I’m currently doing step 10 and restarted the terminal (for no particular reason), however I get this error:

    Jamess-MBP:~ james$ cd documents
Jamess-MBP:documents james$ cd PythonProjects
Jamess-MBP:PythonProjects james$ python test_akaze.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "test_akaze.py", line 3, in 
    import cv2
ImportError: No module named cv2

    What’s the best way around this?

    Best wishes

    James

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey James, if you ever open up a new terminal you need to use the workon command to re-access your cv virtual environment:

      $ workon cv

      This will drop you back down into the Python virtual environment and you’ll be able to successfully import the OpenCV library.

  31. Daniele

    Hi Adrian, thanks for the great guide! I installed it without virtualenv by skipping the virtualenv part and using PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH=/usr/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages

    It worked without any problem on El Capitan 10.11.1, Really thanks for all your work!

  32. David Kadouch

    As always this is wonderful tutorial for your winning series of tutorials. One comment is that in the cmake command the PYTHON2_LIBRARY and PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR paths for python2 in cmake didn’t work for me, leading to errors during the build process (make -j4). I have python2.11 and not 2.10 as in your example. I found that you can modify the command by pointing everything to the virtual env. This way it’s less dependent on how your physical env is configured in reality. Here’s the modified command:

    $ cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local \
	-D PYTHON2_PACKAGES_PATH=~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages \
	-D PYTHON2_LIBRARY=~/.virtualenvs/cv/bin \
	-D PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=~/.virtualenvs/cv/include/python2.7 \
	-D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON -D INSTALL_PYTHON_EXAMPLES=ON \
	-D BUILD_EXAMPLES=ON \
	-D OPENCV_EXTRA_MODULES_PATH=~/opencv_contrib/modules ..

    HTH
    David

  33. Hilman

    Hey, great tutorial. Just want to ask something. Sorry if it sounds fool because I am a beginner (with spirit to master image processing!).

    1. I am using El Capitan and follow all of your instructions. Is it ok?
    2. Why need to install python when in fact the os x come with installed python?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Yes, you can certainly use El Capitan. And the reason you install a separate Python version is so you don’t break the systme install one if anything goes wrong.

  35. Hilman

    Hey Adrian, I have another question.
    Every time I want to use the opencv 3 with the python for my work, through the terminal, I must run the “mkvirtualenv cv” command first?

      • Hilman

        I’ve read it. Great article by the way :).
        Just to make sure:

        1. If I corectly follow the above steps during installing python 2.7+ And opencv 3, I just need to type in “workon cv” and no need to type other command like “source virt1/bin/activate” etc.

        2. Before this I’ve already entered “mkvirtualenv cv” like many times to enter the cv environment as I didn’t know the method above. Will it affects anything?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          1. Correct, once you’ve already gone through the installation steps you just need to use the workon cv command — that’s all that is required to drop you down into the cv virtual environment.

          2. This shouldn’t affect anything. The mkvirtualenv command is “smart” enough to know that the virtual environment already exists and won’t overwrite anything.

  36. Adolfo

    Hi. Thanks very much for the tutorial!

    I did everything and it’s working but it seems that the SVM module is not included. Anyone else has that problem?

  37. Robert Joseph

    Adrian, thank you so much for your walkthrough! I need libopencv_contrib.dylib to be built but when I follow your steps (for both opencv and opencv_contrib) I see cmake output reports that contrib is not being built. gist: https://goo.gl/ENWUNA

    Does this make any sense to you? Am I missing something obvious? Any help would be MUCH appreciated!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Robert, thanks for using a gist, that really helps improve the readability of the output (and ensure the comment isn’t accidentally marked as spam).

      Your output of CMake is actually correct. Modules such as xfeatures2d, ximgproc, etc. are part of the opencv-contrib package. You can safely go ahead and compile OpenCV and the additional contrib package will be installed.

      The world and contrib_world are the old (unneeded) OpenCV bindings.

  38. Bangor

    Thanks for the article, I’d have taken years to figure this out on my own!

    Random question from a complete amateur who decided to get ambitious: Any idea why CMake would fail with:

    CMake Error at samples/gpu/CMakeLists.txt:100 (list):
    list sub-command REMOVE_ITEM requires list to be present.

    When checking out the just released OpenCV 3.1.0?

    Following the instructions and checking out 3.0.0 instead works perfectly, so I’ll be using that!

    🙂

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      I personally have not tried to compile OpenCV 3.1 yet, so I’m not sure about this error message. I will look into it.

  39. shomz

    Hi, Adrian! I was wondering what steps should be skipped and what should be changed to install without the virtual environment. I tried to install with it, but I am a beginner and probably made a mistake along the way, because it did not work in the end. I plan to use PyCharm, is that ok? Thank you!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      You can certainly use PyCharm with OpenCV. Please see this post for more information, although it does assume you are using a Python virtual environment.

      As for the steps required to not use the virtual environment, simply skip the installation of virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper along with the mkvirtualenv and workon commands.

  40. Sanjay

    After struggling through old documentation on OpenCV this is a breather with new and updated versions. Thank you!!

  41. Jackson Isaac

    Hi,

    Nice tutorial. With 3.1.0 version there is an issue in samples/gpu/CMakeLists.txt line 100.

    Hence while building 3.1.0 version I had to drop -D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON. Didn’t try any other workaround though.

  42. Rohan

    I couldn’t install it the first time around.

    After removing all of the brew and pip installations from their respective directories, I removed python 2.7.

    I re-installed with brew and made sure ‘brew doctor’ didn’t show any errors.

    Then, the installation worked properly.

  43. Moe

    Hey Adrian, thank you so much for this great tutorial.

    Two questions:

    First, in step 9, how do I get the (cv) before your computer name in the terminal? Is it necessary to always run “mkvirtualenv cv”? Also, am I understanding correctly that the (cv) is called the virtual environment?

    Second, in the very last step while testing. How do I terminate/exit the process after running “test_akaze.py” properly? Pressing ctrl-C does not work as it simply prints “^C” in the terminal, also the Python output has no exit button. Should I simply quit the Python window with cmd+Q?

    Thank you once again for what you do!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Moe, to answer your questions:

      1. The mkvirtualenv command only needs to be run once. After that, you just need to run workon cv to drop into the cv virtual environment.

      2. Click on the window and press any key. This will exit the Python script.

      • Moe

        Thanks for the reply, Adrian.

        If I ran “mkvirtualenv cv” multiple times, what are the consequences? Does it just rebuild or does it create multiple environments? I’m asking because I ran it a second time before your reply.

        Thanks :)!

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Running mkvirtualenv cv multiple times won’t hurt anything — it’s smart enough to realize that the virtual environment already exists and will not overwrite it. It just drops you down into the environment.

    • mandysmoak

      I am having the same issue. Unfortunately, I found no solutions on the suggested Troubleshooting section.

      Any other suggestions??

      • Adrian Rosebrock

        As mentioned in the “Troubleshooting” section, it’s really hard to diagnose why OpenCV may fail to import. The best suggestions are to (1) ensure you are in the cv virtual environment prior to trying to import OpenCV and (2) ensure that OpenCV compiled without any errors.

        • mandysmoak

          Found my problem! I didn’t notice that python2 was in the Unavailable section, rather than the Opencv after the cmake command. I used the one provided by isaac above and everything works!

          Thank you so much for this tutorial!

  45. aaz15

    Hello Adrian,
    I just crossed your blog and its packed with excellent resources. Thank you for your guide.
    While testing, I came accross this error

    AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'AKAZE_create'

    any ideas why?

    • versionHell

      Hi. I also had this error. I was able to successfully run the sample after doing the following:

      1. I had originally built 3.1.0, so I then built 3.0.0
      1a. I have python 2.7.11, so I had to change this line:

      PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.11/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin

      2. It still wasn’t working, but I determined it was because I was running python outside of the virtual environment (my desktop), which is linked to openCV 2.4 instead of 3

      3. copying the sample code and image to the .virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7 folder, then running it from there worked as expected

      • Adrian Rosebrock

        Once you have successfully created the virtual environment, you do not need to put code directly in the .virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7 folder. Instead, just use the workon command to access the virtual environment and then execute your Python script:

        $ workon cv
$ python your_script.py

  49. Gani Siva Kumar

    Thank you,I had successfully installed opencv. How can I add scipy now to virtualenv to work in opencv?

    I installed scipy through “pip install scipy”.But it showing import error while working in virtualenv.

  50. Niko

    I just installed a fresh copy of the newest el capitan version.
    Im using python version 2.7.11 and OpenCV Version 3.1.0. And yes i set “INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=OFF -D” so CMake was able to compile without any errors.
    I followed the tutorial till step 9 i had no issues. But i can´t find the “cv2.so” file, the openCV bindings in my “~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages/” directory. I´ve been using “workon cv” . Of course i cant sym-link cv2.so and python error : “ImportError: No module named cv2”. The troubleshooting post from https://pyimagesearch.com/2015/10/26/how-to-install-opencv-3-on-raspbian-jessie/ doesn´t solve the problem.
    Which is the best workaround for now ?
    I don´t know why cv2.so was not created.
    Greeds Niko

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Can you confirm that the make command successfully compiled OpenCV? If so, check your build/lib directory after the compile. The cv2.so file should be in there. Once you find it, you can move it/sym-link it into the virtual environment.

  51. at0mb0y

    Hi, as some other I have trouble to install openCV. I’ll not bug the comment with my bash output but can you be clearer at the step 6. Should we brew install while we are in the virtualenv cv ? or outside ? it’s not clearly explain we we are in or out.
    Thanks for your post

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      The brew package should have been installed way back in Step 2, long before you install virtualenv. Once you’ve installed brew, you then proceed with the tutorial.

      • at0mb0y

        Sorry that’s not what I mean.
        At the step 6 we are in the virtual env or out ?
        should we type at sometimes “deactivate” to get out of virtualenv before step 6 ?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          No, do not leave the virtual environment. It is important that you stay inside the virtual environment so that the CMake commands picks up the correct Python version.

  52. Lirone

    Thank you !
    So just to be sure, If I already have in my laptop OpenCV 2.4, It won’t be overwritted right ? I can use both on my computer without problem (meaning without create any conflict ?)

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Technically yes, but sometimes there are gremlins in the system. I normally only run sudo make install for one of the installations, from there I run a compile for each OpenCV + Python version and then delete everything but the code/build directory. I then create a virtual environment that points to each respective version.

      • Lirone

        Thank you Adrian for your answer.

        I made a silly mistake. In the step 8 PYTHON2_LIBRARY=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10/Frameworks/Python.framework

        I didn’t notice that I have python 2.7.11 installed, therefore it didn’t work when I wanted to import cv2.

        I replaced 2.7.10 with 2.7.11, re make, and it worked. 🙂

  53. Zakai

    I’m not sure if my first question is going to post or not, but I have resolved it. Now I am having another problem where after the build has compiled and I go to install it the cv2.so file isnt located in my site-packages directory. It shows up in my opencv/build directory, so I believe the install goes correctly but is not linking with the cv virtualenv and python.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Zakai — I’ll look into the spam filter to see if your first comment got caught there. In any case, you should check the dist-packages directory as well. Finally, if it’s still not there, then manually copy the cv2.so file from build into the site-packages directory of your virtual environment.

  54. Akhila

    Hello!

    Thank you for the great tutorial! I am interested in using openCV 3.1.0, specifically the DNN module that is in opencv_contrib. I followed your tutorial and was able to install 3.1.0. I know the contributions were installed because “cv2.xfeatures2d.SIFT_create()” works. However, the module “cv2.dnn” does not exist. Do you have any thoughts on how I can use it?

    Thanks!
    Akhila

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      I personally haven’t used the DNN sub-module of OpenCV yet. My understanding is that the DNN module is a placeholder to load and run pre-trained Caffe or Torch networks. It’s not actually used to currently train a network. I also don’t think this module is exposed to the Python bindings (yet).

  55. Vijay Kamarshi

    Hi Adrian,

    Not sure what I did, but I deleted the terminal instance, launched a new instance, did “workon cv” and reran cmake (with python includes and libraries pointing to the virtualenvs environment as suggested by some helpful person above). And cmake was able to configure correctly this time. Not sure why it failed first time around. By the way, for people not so familiar with cmake, I fount it best to delete the build directory and create a fresh one everytime you make a new cmake attempt. Just my 2c to add to the “folklore”.

    Regards,

    Vijay

  56. Jose Sotelo

    Hello. Im following your tutorial and everything was perfect until Step 10. Im pretty new into phyton, OpenCv and programming at all, so I cant create a new file…. It must to be inside Xcode, the terminal or in a text file? Im lost :(((

    Thank you for any help

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      You can create the sample Python script in whatever text editor you would like. That could be XCode, Sublime Text, nano, vim, emacs, TextEdit, etc. Once you have created the Python script, open up your Terminal and execute the script.

  57. Rob

    Thank you for this tutorial!

    In case it helps anyone:

    In my case “make -j2” (I have a dual core MBP) failed with “fatal error: ‘hdf5.h’ file not found”. In cmake, I noticed that it was searching /Users/rob/anaconda/… (my previous Python installation used Anaconda) for HDF5.

    Even though my .bash_profile had the right path and I ran source, I noticed that cmake was still finding an old version of HDF in the anaconda directory.

    I did two things at once so I’m not sure which fixed it:

    First, I updated Anaconda by running “conda update conda” and it turns out my Anaconda installation (and probably HDF) were a year out of date. Then, even though “which python” was returning the Homebrew installation, I completely removed the anaconda path in .bash_profile, rand source again, and created a new virtual environment.

    I recompiled and there were no errors.

    • Ernie

      Interesting — I’m having the same issue, yet I don’t have Anaconda installed 🙁

      No idea how to fix it.

      • Sujit Pal

        Six months too late for Ernie, but maybe someone else has this problem and stumbles upon this comment…

        I was trying to install OpenCV 3.1.0 with Anaconda Python 2.7.12 using Adrian’s guide. For the cmake, I skipped setting the PYTHO2_* variables hoping they will get set to the Anaconda defaults. During “make -j4”, I had the same problem with the missing hdf5.h that is mentioned in the thread above.

        I was ultimately able to fix it with the hack proposed by @avtomatons in OpenCV Issues #6016 (and replicated in #6050), ie, adding the following lines to the OPENCV_HOME/modules/python/common.cmake.

        find_package(HDF5)
        include_directories(${HDF5_INCLUDE_DIRS})

        Also, many thanks to Adrian for writing this awesome how-to for installing OpenCV 3.x on Python (with SURF and SIFT). Just verified that I can create a SURF object in my REPL like so:

        >>> import cv2
        >>> surf = cv2.xfeatures2d.SIFT_create()
        >>> surf

  58. Anton

    Hi Adrian,

    Thanks so much for this – this was tremendously helpful. I was able to successfully carry out the OpenCV 3.1.0 installation on my Mac, but I’m having a problem as I now need to find cv2 equivalents to certain (older) cv functions and I’m struggling mightily to figure out what they might be. In particular, I’m looking for cv2 equivalents for:

    cv.FindStereoCorrespondenceGC()
    cv.GetReal2D()
    cv.CreateStereoGCState()

    I’m looking for these too, but they’re less important:

    cv.Set2D()
    cv.LoadImage() (here I can probably use imread())
    cv.CreateMat()
    cv.ConvertScale()

    More concretely, what I’m trying to do is create a disparity map using the Graph Cuts (GC) implementation. Has this functionality been stripped from OpenCV 3? If so, is there any way to access the older functions?

    I’m willing to try the C++ route (as opposed to Python), if need be.

    Thanks very much for your help!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Anton, thank sfor the comment. To be honest with you, I do very little work with stereo vision, so I’m not sure about your first set of functions, but I’m pretty sure this is a resource that would help out.

      As for cv.Set2D, images are represented as NumPy arrays in OpenCV 2.4 and OpenCV 3. This means that we simply using NumPy indexing to access and set a pixel value: image[y, x] = (255, 255, 255)

      The cv.CreateMat function is also not needed since we can use NumPy to allocate memory for an image: image = np.zeros((height, width), dtype="uint8")

      Finally, the cv.ConvertScale function is not known as cv2.convertScaleAbs.

      I hope that helps! And if you decide you want to learn more about the basics of OpenCV 2.4/3+ along with Python, be sure to take a look at Practical Python and OpenCV , which will help get you up to speed quickly.

      • Anton

        Hi Adrian,

        Thanks a bunch for your reply and tips. I was actually able to find and compile a pure C++ implementation of Graph Cuts which approximates the functionality of cv.FindStereoCorrespondenceGC(), so my problem is solved! The implementation is here, thanks to a French CV scholar called Pascal Monasse:

        http://www.ipol.im/pub/art/2014/97/

        The results are frankly tremendous (and a demo is provided.) Again, the power of Open Source shines through 😉

        Again, thanks for your great site!

  60. mrfksiv

    Thanks for this extremely concise tutorial! The AKAZE example works perfectly? But what is this anyway?:p

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      AKAZE is a type of keypoint and local invariant descriptor. We often use it to describe the contents of an image. A great application is recognizing the covers of book, which I cover inside Practical Python and OpenCV.

  62. David Sterling

    Thanks for the fantastic write-up Adrian — I followed your instruction but built OpenCV 3.1.0 on a fresh install of El Capitan 10.11. Everything went smoothly and Python bindings seem to work so far.

    For anyone interested in the Matlab bindings the openCV 3.1 “contrib” installation doesn’t seem to be quite ready for prime time. The matlab compiler/code generator is only compiling *some* of the cpp files needed to implement the matlab bindings. Specifically line #30 in compile.cmake located in opencv_contrib/modules/matlab

    file(GLOB SOURCE_FILES “${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/src/*.cpp”)

    should be something like:

    file(GLOB SOURCE_FILES “${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/src/*.cpp” “${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/src/private/*.cpp”)

    so that the cpp files in build/modules/matlab/src/private are also compiled. Without these “Bridge” files some of the matlab bindings still work, but others (e.g. VideoCapture) produce errors about undefined “Bridge” functions) like this:

    >> camera = cv.VideoCapture();
    Undefined function or variable ‘VideoCaptureBridge’.

    Error in cv/VideoCapture (line 15)
    this.ptr_ = VideoCaptureBridge(‘new’, varargin{:});

    A second issues with opencv_contrib/modules/matlab is that the compiler settings for Xcode 7.2.1
    Apple LLVM version 7.0.2 (clang-700.1.81)
    Target: x86_64-apple-darwin14.5.0
    Thread model: posix

    aren’t quite right as there is an issue with c++11 standards and resulting collision between cmath and math.h that causes some of the cpp files in the source/private to throw compiler errors. Maybe this is why they weren’t included in the first place??

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Thanks for the detailed comment David! I’m not much of a MATLAB users, but I know other PyImageSearch readers are and this comment is super helpful.

  63. Matt Lashinsky

    Awesome, got it to work!! Dude, you’re such a great teacher.

    I had some issues setting up the build and ran into issues during compilation, but that’s because I installed openCV in a different directory rather than the home directory. So it’s important to be really diligent about specifying those paths to make sure they’re accurate.

    Thanks Adrian.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      You can open the ~/.bash_profile file using your favorite text editor. If you’re just getting used to using the command line, then I highly recommend using nano:

      $ nano ~/.bash_profile

      • Michiel

        I have the same problem as above, I use Sublime text 2, after which i type the ‘$ nano ~/.bash_profile’ tag at the line which i find by unhiding the console. I’m very new to this, any idea where I am going wrong?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Hey Michiel — you should be typing nano ~/.bash_profile into your terminal, not Sublime Text.

          If you are very new to computer vision, OpenCV, and the terminal, I would suggest working through my book, Practical Python and OpenCV which will teach you the basics.

          Furthermore, the Quickstart Bundle and Hardcopy Bundle of Practical Python and OpenCV include a pre-configured Ubuntu VirtualBox virtual machine with OpenCV pre-installed. This will allow you to skip the installation step and start learning immediately. Be sure to take a look!

  65. cc

    Thank you for this nice tutorial. I use OSX 10.10. A little bit of feedback:

    1. ffmpeg is also needed. (easy installation by brew)

    2. I got some errors and linking errors when I didn’t set

    -D CMAKE_OSX_SYSROOT=/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.10.sdk -D WITH_QUICKTIME=OFF -D BUILD_opencv_hdf=OFF

    , as a reference for people who can’t successfully install opencv by following this tutorial.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Interesting, I personally haven’t ran into an issue where FFMPEG was required. Were you getting an error message at install related to FFMPEG?

  66. Hilman

    Hey Adrian, I need to ask something.
    I already installed Python 2.7 with OpenCV 3.0 using this tutorial, but now I will need to upgrade to OpenCV 3.1 because I will need the extra modules inside the opencv_contrib. How can I do that? Do I need to delete anything first?

    And because of problems with Matplotlib before this, I also think I need to download back the Python for its framework version. Will this effect anything?

    Thanks.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      You don’t need to revert your Python version, just use an old version of matplotlib. I recommend matplotlib==1.4.3.

      As for uninstalling OpenCV, you should be able to delete all libopencv* files from /usr/local/lib. You’ll also want to cleanup the Python OpenCV bindings (i.e., the cv2.so file).

      • Hilman

        Thanks! As for the matplotlib issue, it is solved! Thank you so much! This makes me loves this blog even more! Keep up the good work of educating us! 🙂

      • Hilman

        About uninstalling the OpenCV, can i just `sudo make uninstall` it? I’ve read that this is possible.

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          I personally have never done this so I can’t say whether or not it would work. However, this would imply that you kept your original Makefile generated from CMake. Most people delete these after OpenCV has been compiled and installed.

  67. Samvaran

    Thank you for the great tutorial! It was very clear and incredibly helpful – there’s nothing else like this that I could find on the web.

    I was able to build everything successfully and install everything just fine. My question is – if I want to redo the build and installation (e.g. if I want to install CUDA files and compile it with those added), and I repeat these steps (i.e. cmake and make), will anything bad happen given that all the files have already been installed? For instance, is there any kind of “uninstall” necessary, or can I just repeat these steps again without worrying?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      If you decide to recompile and re-install OpenCV, then nothing bad should happen. You’ll simply overwrite the existing files with the new ones.

  68. ryan

    thank you for the tutorial.

    i’m getting this error when running the script though:
    File “test_akaze.py”, line 15, in
    detector = cv2.AKAZE_create()
    AttributeError: ‘module’ object has no attribute ‘AKAZE_create’

    any help would be appreciated.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Ryan — can you confirm which version of OpenCV you installed? Also, it would be worth checking the comments by “versionHell” and “aaz15” above. Both of them mentioned similar issues.

  69. Lucky Dube

    Hello Adrian, I’m a beginner and your tutorial was very useful. I managed to get all the way to step 9 without any issues but I don’t know how to place the code and the image in the same directory. This might be a very simple step but would it be possible for you to explain to me how to do it?

    Thanks for your help

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      All you need to do is download the image and the code. You can copy and paste the code into your favorite text editor and save the file. Both the code and the image should be saved to the same folder on your computer.

  70. stefan

    Thank you Adrian for your post on this issue which is LACKING from the opencv.org site. They cover installation to most ALL other OSes except OS X. I successfully followed your clear recipe and also especially appreciate all the thoughtful comments of your other readers. I am however getting an error with cmake –‘ffmpeg/avformat.h’ file not found. I wrote up all the details here:

    https://stackoverflow.com/questions/36949053/opencv3-1-compilation-error-ffmpeg-avformat-h-file-not-found

    How can I troubleshoot this?

    Regarding the PYTHON2_NUMPY_INCLUDE_DIRS
    the actual .h files are here:
    ~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages/numpy/core/include/numpy

    not here
    ~/.virtualenvs/cv/lib/python2.7/site-packages/numpy/core/include

    Well, I tracked down another error. Tried compiling with CUDA on but apparently that doesn’t work so easily on a mac. It has to do with compiler incompatibility with Clang and CUDA. Apparently I have to set a different compiler with CUDA_HOST_COMPILER. Do you have any insight about this?

    I solved the ffmpeg problem. It seems there are certain source files that brew install ffmpeg doesn’t get. so i did
    brew uninstall ffmpeg
    brew install ffmpeg –build-from-source

    Known issue.
    https://github.com/Itseez/opencv/issues/6435

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Thanks for the comments Stefan! I’ve consolidated them into a single thread to make them a bit easier to read. Congrats on resolving the FFMPEG issue. As for CUDA, I try to avoid enabling that on OSX if at all possible. It’s always given me problems when compiling as well.

  71. Greg n

    These are super clear and useful instructions. Thanks for the taking the time and for all your responses to others’ issues. It meant I didn’t hit anything that hadn’t already been covered.

  72. Mathilde

    Hi,
    Thank you for this tutorial, this really help me out! I did everything and it’s working great! But now I have to install matplotlib and I can’t manage to do that. What should I do ? Do I have to restart the c-make part ?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      The matplotlib library is completely independent from OpenCV, so there is absolutely no need to worry about CMake. What is the error you are getting with matplotlib?

  73. Damon

    Thanks for the great tutorial, Adrian! I really appreciate the effort! I’ve managed to get core OpenCV working, but I can’t seem to get any of the useful stuff working, like the SURF classifier. I’m told that modules such as xfeatures2d aren’t available. These are the modules found in opencv_contrib. I’ve followed your guide to the tee, but for some reason the extra modules simply are not linked to the core module. Then dylib files even exist at my /usr/local/lib folder. Any ideas?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      My favorite way to debug if the opencv_contrib modules are installed is to investigate the output of CMake. Under the list of components/packages to be built, you should see a list of OpenCV modules. Ideally, you’ll also see the xfeatures2d module in their, indicating that your compile will include the opencv_contrib. If you do not see these extra modules, then it’s likely that your path to the opencv_contrib directory is incorrect. I would suggest deleting your current build directory, re-creating it, and then re-running CMake, supplying the correct path to opencv_contrib.

  74. Sumanth Mallya

    Brilliant tutorial ! Everything worked like clockwork, however when i was trying to use openCV in IDLE i was getting an cv2 not found error, after a little research and trying things out if found the solution, i had to edit my .bash_profile file to add a path using the pythonpath variable. Here is the what i added to the file after which it worked perfectly. Hope this helps someone with the same issue.

    PS – Im guessing you can also ammend the below code for a different location of the cv2.so file

    export PYTHONPATH=/Users/Sumanth/opencv/build/lib:$PYTHONPATH

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Are you referring to the GUI version of IDLE? If so, the GUI IDLE doesn’t place nice with Python virtual environments. Otherwise, if you want to access IDLE via command like, just be sure to execute the workon command first.

  75. Olivera

    Hi Adrian. I need your help, please. I try to follow your directions to install openCV on El Capitan but I get error on the step 4. I installed virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper, but when I update the bash_profile with the lines you have it shows me “no such file found in the directory”. Also I can not create the cv virtual environment. When I add the command “mkvirtualenv cv” it shows me “the command not found”. I have been trying to installl for few days alredy but I’m not succeeding. Please, help me. Thank you in advance.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      In order to run mkvirtualenv, you’ll need to make sure you have your ~/.bash_profile updated properly. Try editing it using nano:

      $ nano ~/.bash_profile

  76. Vidhi Jain

    For my system, even the sudo make install command seems to be failing. Any suggestions?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      If sudo make install isn’t working, then the make command like failed as well. Check the output of make to ensure that OpenCV compiled correctly.

  78. Geert

    Thank you for this awesome and easy to follow tutorial. Now I want to use matplotlib but I do not get it to work. I tried to install it with pip within the virtual environment. There were no problems there but when I try to import matplotlib in my code which i’m running with pyCharm I get this error:

    RuntimeError: Python is not installed as a framework. The Mac OS X backend will not be able to function correctly if Python is not installed as a framework. See the Python documentation for more information on installing Python as a framework on Mac OS X. Please either reinstall Python as a framework, or try one of the other backends. If you are Working with Matplotlib in a virtual enviroment see 'Working with Matplotlib in Virtual environments' in the Matplotlib FAQ

    Please help me and tell me what i’m doing wrong. Thank you in advance.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      There are some know issues with Python virtual environments and the latest release of matplotlib that cause this error. As far as I know, there is no fix yet, but for the time being, you can use a previous version of matplotlib and it will work on OSX:

      $ pip install matplotlib==1.4.3

      If you already have matplotlib installed, make sure you uninstall it before you execute the above command.

  79. Chris

    Was wondering if anyone was having an issue when importing cv2 in python. The install for openCV worked great but when I try to import cv2 I get the following: ImportError: numpy.core.multiarray failed to import

    Anyone have a fix?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Chris — it sounds like you do not have NumPy installed on your system or you do not have NumPy installed in your Python virtual environment. I would suggest going back to Step #5 and ensuring you have NumPy installed.

      • Chris

        Thanks for the advice. I tired that to no avail. I removed all traces of NumPy and re installed it ensuring the paths are correct in the cmake but still get the error” ImportError: numpy.core.multiarray failed to import” I am a bit of a noob when it comes to working in the terminal so probably just missing something small.

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          This definitely seems to be an issue either related to your PYTHONPATH or your Python virtual environment. Unfortunately, without physical access to your machine, I can’t diagnose what the exact issue is. Make sure you are in the cv virtual environment before installing NumPy and running CMake.

  80. Tanya

    Trying to do “pip install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper”. However, when I edit my .bash_profile as the instructions say and run “source ~/.bash_profile” I get the error “/usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh: No such file or directory”. Then when I run “which virtualenv” to see where the virtualenv is being installed, I get “/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/virtualenv”. I’ve tried uninstalling and then installing again, but that has not worked. How can I fix this problem?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Tanya — I suspect this is a Python versioning issue. Did you install Python via Homebrew? And if so, did you apply Step #3 wen updating your .bash_profile file? I would run which python and see if it’s the same Python that virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper are installed on.

      • Apple

        Thanks for your tutorial, I have the similar problem. Trying to do “pip install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper”, but when I run “source ~/.bash_profile”, I was told “No module named virtualenvwrapper. virtualenvwrapper.sh: There was a problem running the initialization hooks. ” I am sure the output of ‘which python’ is /usr/local/bin/python, and I have run “pip install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper”

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Try running pip freeze and ensuring that both virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper are among the installed packages. If they are present, then the issue is likely due to the path updates to your .bash_profile file.

      • E

        I have this same problem. When I run which python, I get “/usr/local/bin/python” but when I run which virtualenv, I get “/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin/virtualenv”
        How do I make it so that the virtualenv is installed on the correct python?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          It’s hard to say what the exact issue is without physical access to your machine. What is the output of which pip? I get the impression that pip, for whatever reason, is using the original version, not the Homebrew version.

  81. MTS

    Hello, i just using python 2.7 and will instal opencv, so i must using other hardware (rashberry) or can just using computer ?

  82. Mike Sharps

    Brilliant tutorial. Followed instructions step by step and Installed Opencv 3.1.0 on El Capitan no problems. Ubuntu is next. What IDE / Dev environment do you recommend I’ve just been using either textmate or emacs for some basic python projects but not an IDE as such.
    Also I’m not too sure where to go next to explore opencv, any suggestions ?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      If you’re just getting started learning OpenCV, then you should absolutely go through Practical Python and OpenCV. This book will help you get up to speed super quickly. It also covers a number of interesting computer vision projects including face detection, handwriting recognition, and identifying the covers of books.

      As for an IDE, take a look at PyCharm. I detail how to setup PyCharm for computer vision development in this blog post.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Joas — after make has finished executing, make sure you take a look in the build/lib directory and see if the cv2.so file is in there.

  84. minho

    Thanks for your awesome tutorial!

    I’m first time to python opencv and OSX.

    I got error in ‘make -j4’ step like follows

    [ 26%] Built target opencv_face
[ 26%] Built target opencv_shape
/Users/minhominho/opencv/modules/videoio/src/cap_qtkit.mm:46:9: fatal error: 'QTKit/QTKit.h' file not found
#import 
        ^
1 error generated.

    how can I solve this problem ? T_T

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      I assume based on this error message that you are using either OSX – El Capitan or macOS Sierra. Unfortunately, these versions of OSX have been breaking OpenCV builds because QTKit is no longer bundled with the OS and the OpenCV developers are not supporting AVFoundation. It’s a bit of a mess right now and I’m actually investigating it myself. In the meantime, I would suggest downgrading to OSX Yosemite (10.10) where QTKit is still found.

      • Alexander

        One solution for this for now is to simply disable the videoio module while compiling. You can do that with this flag in cmake: “-D BUILD_opencv_videoio=OFF” (from https://github.com/opencv/opencv/issues/6913)

        After that I also had another issue, “fatal error: ‘opencv2/highgui.hpp’ file not found” around 86% of the way through. I’m not sure if this is caused because I’m running Serria, but I couldn’t find anything online about it. Disabling the xphoto module let it compile though. (the flag is “BUILD_opencv_xphoto=OFF”)

        Hopefully they’ll fix these issues soon though so we can recompile with these two modules.

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Thanks for the tip Alexander. I got OpenCV 3.1 to compile on El Capitan yesterday. I’m planning on trying Sierra later this weekend. I’ll be sure to turn my findings into a blog post 😉

          • Adrian Rosebrock

            As I mentioned in the previous comment, I’ll be finalizing my steps and turning the result into a new blog post within the next couple of weeks.

          • Roger

            Hi Adrian,

            Your post has been really helpful, thank you very much. I have enrolled to your course and followed the tutorial so far, but hit the brick when tried to install the opencv 3.1.0 on macOS Sierra 10.12.

            Since you have mentioned that you will post new updated steps, I was wondering if you have any update on this matter?

            Many thanks

          • Adrian Rosebrock

            Hey Roger — I’m planning on creating a brand new blog post for macOS Sierra. I’m also waiting for Sierra to stabilize and closing monitoring the OpenCV commits to determine the right time to create this blog post. Right now everything is too volatile.

      • Madeline

        I am encountering this same problem now. Is there an updated solution? I would rather not downgrade to OSX Yosemite, but I need to compile OpenCV with the videoio module.

  86. Margareta

    Great guide!
    However I couldn’t install opencv without doing some modification on El captain. I did the following modifications:

    1. Never checkout out a certain version from the gitrepo, I only cloned down the repo and skipped the checkout part for both opencv and opencv_contrib
    2. Had -D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON instead of off as suggested.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Great job getting OpenCV installed on your system Margareta! I’m in the process of creating updated OpenCV install tutorials for both El Capitan and macOS Sierra to avoid confusions like these in the future.

    • Roger

      Hi Margareta,

      Thanks you very much!

      I have followed your steps and successfully installed opencv 3.1.0 on macOS Sierra 10.12; executed the test drive suggested in this tutorial, so far so good : )

      To Adrian, I hope this information is useful for your new tutorials.

      Kind regards

  87. Belal C

    I got around the issue with compiling on macOS Sierra by switching to the ‘pr7266’ branch for opencv and the ‘master’ branch for opencv_contrib (https://github.com/opencv/opencv/pull/7266).
    I’m pretty sure the AVFoundation functionality developed to replace QTkit is merged with the master branch. not sure why it wasn’t compiling…

    Anyway, thanks so much for this thorough guide Adrian – really helped me as a beginner to compiling + installing software (interesting to see the steps broken down!)

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Thanks for sharing Belal! Once we get another update to OpenCV (ideally v3.2) I’ll make another blog post on installing on OSX. I’d also like to see macOS Sierra mature a bit.

  88. Alex Ogilvie

    Hi Adrian,

    Thanks for the tutorial. I’ve managed to get OpenCV installed within the virtual environment I set up, but need to have it installed on my main environment. When I am trying to run python scripts that use OpenCV from MATLAB, MATLAB cannot find the cv2 module. Do you have any idea how to get OpenCV onto the main machine?

    Thanks,

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Alex — I honestly haven’t used MATLAB in many years so I’m not sure regarding this.

      • Alex Ogilvie

        I guess what I’m trying to ask is how do you access python from outside the virtual environment? I’ve been into the site-packages folder of the virtual environment and the main environment, and a lot of the files – particularly the .so and .py files – aren’t in the main environment. Could this be why it’s not working?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          Typically I would suggest not creating Python projects without a virtual environment. But if you must have access to OpenCV outside of your virtual environment(s) simply copy the cv2.so files into your system site-packages directory.

  89. Christian Egglin

    I figured it out using Belal’s solution, I guess I should have checked before I commented. But now I am having the problem around the 85% mark:
    /Users/Christian/opencv/modules/python/src2/cv2.cpp:6:10: fatal error: ‘Python.h’ file not found
    #include

    Most people commenting seem to have suggested that it come from the CMake step at the -D PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/Frameworks/Python.framework/Headers.

    But Python.h is located there. I am not sure how to fix this. I am using Python 2.7 and have Sierra

    Thanks again,
    Christian

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Installing OpenCV on macOS Sierra is a major pain right now. I’m currently working on a tutorial to make the process easier. However, your PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR should look something like this:

      PYTHON2_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.12/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/include/python2.7

      Keep in mind that you should be compiling against the Homebrew version of Python, not your system version.

  90. Walid Ahmed

    Hi Adrian
    I have both OpenCV2.4 and OpenCV3 installed on my Mac with python.

    My code now only sees how OpenCV2.4, can I direct my system to use OpenCV3?

    Thanks

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      It really depends on how you actually installed both OpenCV 2.4 and OpenCV 3. Without knowing that I can’t direct you.

  91. Benabbou

    Hi Adrian,
    Thanks for this tutorial i find it very useful and explicit however I got stuck at Compiling error 

    [code] /Users/anasnadir/opencv/modules/videoio/src/cap_qtkit.mm:46:9: fatal error: 'QTKit/QTKit.h'
      file not found
#import 
        ^
1 error generated.

    I don’t really get what is the problem .

    • Benabbou

      I solved the Problem by deleting OpenCv and Opencv_rep .. directories and Cloned new ones but this time I used the Master Version I didn’t check out on both of them, then I did The other steps .

  92. Rakshith

    Hey Adrian, I’m getting a fatal error at “make -j4” step.

    [ 21%] Building CXX object modules/videoio/CMakeFiles/opencv_videoio.dir/src/cap_qtkit.mm.o
[ 21%] Built target opencv_dnn
/Users/rakshithgb/opencv/modules/videoio/src/cap_qtkit.mm:46:9: fatal error: 
      'QTKit/QTKit.h' file not found
#import 
        ^
1 error generated.
make[2]: *** [modules/videoio/CMakeFiles/opencv_videoio.dir/src/cap_qtkit.mm.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [modules/videoio/CMakeFiles/opencv_videoio.dir/all] Error 2
make: *** [all] Error 2

    Is there any fix to this?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Rakshith — this error is because you are using either El Capitan or macOS Sierra where QTKit is no longer used. OpenCV 3.2 will resolve this issue for good, but in the meantime, make sure you download the latest code from the GitHub via git clone and do not run git clone. This will ensure you are compiling against the bleeding edge version of OpenCV where the issue has been resolved.

      • Rakshith

        Yeah I am on Sierra. However Alexander had posted a work around, will that work on Sierra? Or can you please post steps to compile with the latest version?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          The solution is to simply checkout the latest version of OpenCV from GitHub instead of downloading a tagged .zip archive. This will indeed work on Sierra. I’ll be posting an updated tutorial covering macOS Sierra (ideally) within the next month.

  93. Ajay

    Adrian: you Rock. As of Nov 2016 this is still the best resource on how to install opencv from source in virtualenv on mac

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Thanks so much Ajay, I really appreciate that! 🙂 Congrats on getting OpenCV installed on your Mac.

  94. Jacob

    Thanks for this tutorial:

    At “make -j4” I’m getting at fatal error at 31% that says “‘QTKit/QTKit.h’ file not found”

    Any ideas how to solve this?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Install OpenCV via Homebrew is a different process. The post you linked is for OpenCV 2.4, not OpenCV 3. I’ll have an updated tutorial for OpenCV 3 + Homebrew online this Monday, December 19th 2016.

  97. Syeda Hasan

    Hey,

    Thank so much for the installation guide.I am trying to detect face in a video and store it as a series of images at different time intervals (for instance: the video is about 1 minute long and I want to capture the face every 10 seconds -that is 6 times) and store it in different files, is there an easy way to do that?

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      To start, you’ll want to determine the frame rate of your video. Most videos are in the range 24-32 frames per second. Then, you just set a counter. You detect a face. Then start your counter and wait (for example) 24 * 10 frames until you detect your next face.

  98. Danny

    Hi, I am a beginner. I followed every step above and have successfully installed the OpenCV. I have a question now. Right now I can only run the OpenCV-installed python in the terminal where I can access the virtual environment and it is not convenient to edit at all. When I try to write a program in the python IDLE without the terminal, I cannot import OpenCV anymore and I have to pretend it is imported. So is there any way to import OpenCV library while I am editing it, instead of only using OpenCV when running the program?
    I don’t know if I clearly explained it, but hope you can get my point.
    Thanks for your awesome tutorial again!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Python IDLE does not respect virtual environments. You should use either (1) the terminal version of IDLE or (2) use Jupyter Notebooks. The GUI version of IDLE is not recommended.

  99. sponge

    hello, first thanks so much for ur installation guide, I just follow ur steps, but in the step 4, when I pip install virtualenv virtualenvwrapper, I will always have a problem that
    No module named virtualenvwrapper
    virtualenvwrapper.sh: There was a problem running the initialization hooks.

    If Python could not import the module virtualenvwrapper.hook_loader,
    check that virtualenvwrapper has been installed for
    VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON=/usr/local/bin/python and that PATH is
    set properly.
    I do not know how to solve it ,really hope ur advice
    thanks so much

  101. Pat

    Adrian,

    Thanks for posting this. I’m new to OpenCV and this has really helped me get up and running without any grief.

    When I make my first million from OpenCV I’ll buy you a beer.

  103. Jaypee

    I am having problem in the step 8 when I run the $ make -j4. Can yanyone help me fix it. It would be of great help. Thanks.
    The error is as follows:
    [ 30%] Building CXX object modules/videoio/CMakeFiles/opencv_videoio.dir/src/cap_qtkit.mm.o
    /Users/akshalsharma/opencv/modules/videoio/src/cap_qtkit.mm:46:9: fatal error: ‘QTKit/QTKit.h’
    file not found

  104. crazyfang

    I met a question that fatal error: ‘Python.h’ file not found #include when i make.What should i do to solve it.Help…thanks

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Your PYTHON_LIBRARY configuration is incorrect. Double-check the path to your Python include directory.

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      The easiest way? Re-install macOS/OSX. Otherwise without knowing what step you are having trouble with it’s impossible to provide any suggestion on how to clean and restart the process.

  106. Guy Hoffman

    Great tutorial!

    Small comment – in OpenCV 3.2.0 you need to go to

    ~/opencv_contrib/modules/freetype/CMakeLists.txt

    and replace

    ${freetype2_LIBRARIES} ${harfbuzz_LIBRARIES}

    with

    ${FREETYPE_LIBRARIES} ${HARFBUZZ_LIBRARIES}

  107. ARUN UPADHYAYA

    Hi,Adrian,
    I successfully executed step3 but while i am trying to execute step 4 its telling me that pip command not found then i tried to install pip using sudo easy_install pip but then its telling command not found,I am screwed please guide me further.
    Thanks.

  108. Edgar Acosta

    USING OPEN CV IN OTHER PYTHON VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT:

    I follow this Procedure to Install Open CV… and It Works… I install it in the CV Virtual Environment..

    But i need to use it in Tensor Flow, Tensor Flow is in another Virtual Environment. How can i use OpenCV in the Virtual Environment, is there any way …

    Please help..

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      Hey Edgar — simply access the Python virtual environment that has OpenCV installed and use “pip” to install TensorFlow, etc.:

      $ workon your_env_name
$ pip install tensorflow

  109. nck

    Thanks a lot. Everything was almost smooth.
    1º I had to change my version for 2.7.13.
    2º I had a problem with cmake which was solved in the comments.
    3º Adding some code in step 4 which I found in stackexchange, because some code was missing.

  110. Michelle

    Hi Adrian! I’ve followed this tutorial in the past to download OpenCV in one of my computers and worked like a charm. However, now that I am installing it in another one I had the issue that when I type “which python” it still gives me the system version.

    Further, when I type “which python2” it correctly gives me the /usr/local/bin location. Seems like the home-brew installation is installing python as such. At the end I followed an instruction that appeared in the terminal saying that if I wanted the /usr/bin/local version then I should add this path to the bash_profile: “/usr/local/opt/slash/openssl/bin:$PATH”

    The installation worked when I did that but I still get /usr/bin after writing “which python”, and the new path above when I try “which python2”. Any thoughts on this?

    Thanks a million!

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      It’s hard to say without physical access to your machine, but it seems like your $PATH has been updated to point to your system install of Python before Homebrew. I would double-check your .bash_profile and try to debug this. $PATH issues can be a real pain to debug.

      • Daniel

        This had stumped me too for a while, but it seems since the original publishing of this article that the requirements for pointing to the Homebrew version of Python have changed slightly (possibly could update article?).

        As per the caveats of `brew info python`:

        > This formula installs a python2 executable to /usr/local/bin.
        If you wish to have this formula’s python executable in your PATH then add
        the following to ~/.bash_profile:
        export PATH=”/usr/local/opt/python/libexec/bin:$PATH”

        So the initial `usr/local/bin` for Homebrew, and the above path for Homebrew’s Python. Works after that!

        • Daniel YEH

          I added export PATH=”/usr/local/opt/python/libexec/bin:$PATH” to the bash profile and used source command. After that, all of my command can’t work!
          It showed command not found.
          I need to type the following code to let terminal work properly:

          export PATH=”/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin”
          export PATH=”/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:$PATH”

          but my problem of python”2″ didn’t solve…

    • David

      I struggled with this too because no matter what, “which python” still pointed to my system Python rather than brew’s.

      However, “which python2” points to the brew Python:

      $ which python
/usr/bin/python
$ which python2
/usr/local/bin/python2
$ which python3
/usr/local/bin/python3

      It is also good to check pip:

      $ which pip
/usr/local/bin/pip
$ which pip3
/usr/local/bin/pip3

      The next step and trouble is when running the virtualenvwrapper.sh script from your .bash_profile.

      It will complain when you source your .bash_profile after adding the line: source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh:

      $ source ~/.bash_profile
-bash: /usr/local/bin: is a directory
virtualenvwrapper.sh: There was a problem running the initialization hooks.

If Python could not import the module virtualenvwrapper.hook_loader,
check that virtualenvwrapper has been installed for
VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON=/usr/local/bin and that PATH is
set properly."

      That prompted me to read and modify that script.

      $ sudo vim /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh

      on Line 50 change
      VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON="$(command \which python)"
      _to_
      VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON="$(command \which python2)"

      That will get the right path to Python2 for you (brew’s Python).

      Then:
      $ source ~/.bash_profile

      And now you’re ready to:
      $ mkvirtualenv cv -p python2

      and if you want python3
      $ mkvirtualenv cvpy3 -p python3

      Hopefully this helps someone and isn’t just a one off issue that I’ve had to figure out.

      • kram

        I’m still getting the same complaint even after editing the virtualenvwrapper.sh, I changed python to python3 as it is my brew’s Python. any idea what else can be wrong?

        • Adrian Rosebrock

          I actually was working on this problem yesterday. Update your .bash_profile to look like this:

          # virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper
export VIRTUALENVWRAPPER_PYTHON=/usr/local/bin/python3
source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh

          Then source it again. From there it should work. You might also have to edit the virtualenvwrapper.sh file and ensure it has its original contents (I didn’t have to edit the file).

  111. Allan

    Hello,

    Thanks for the tutorial. I am having an issue with step #3. Running “which python” still returns usr/bin/python.

    However, “which python2” returns usr/local/bin/python2.

    How do I get “which python” to return the expected output? My .bash_profile looks OK.

    Thanks,
    Allan

    • Adrian Rosebrock

      This is an update to Homebrew on how it handles the “python” command. You can use “python2” throughout the rest of this tutorial and it will work as expected.

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