Image to text python

Question

I'm utilizing python 3.x and utilizing the accompanying code to change over picture into text: 

from PIL import Image

from pytesseract import image_to_string

image = Image.open('image.png', mode='r')

print(image_to_string(image))

I'm getting this error:

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "C:/Users/hp/Desktop/GII/Image_to_text.py", line 12, in <module>

    print(image_to_string(image))

  File "C:\Users\hp\Downloads\WinPython-64bit-3.5.1.2\python-3.5.1.amd64\lib\site-packages\pytesseract\pytesseract.py", line 161, in image_to_string

    config=config)

  File "C:\Users\hp\Downloads\WinPython-64bit-3.5.1.2\python-3.5.1.amd64\lib\site-packages\pytesseract\pytesseract.py", line 94, in run_tesseract

    stderr=subprocess.PIPE)

  File "C:\Users\hp\Downloads\WinPython-64bit-3.5.1.2\python-3.5.1.amd64\lib\subprocess.py", line 950, in __init__

    restore_signals, start_new_session)

  File "C:\Users\hp\Downloads\WinPython-64bit-3.5.1.2\python-3.5.1.amd64\lib\subprocess.py", line 1220, in _execute_child

    startupinfo)

FileNotFoundError: [WinError 2] The system cannot find the file specified

If it's not too much trouble, note that I have placed the picture in a similar directory where my python is available. Additionally It doesn't raise error on image = Image.open('image.png', mode='r') however it raises on the line print(image_to_string(image)). 

Anyone help me where I went wrong?

Answer 1

You must have tesseract installed and accessible in your path.

pytesseract is simply a covering for subprocess.Popen with tesseract binary as a binry to run. It doesn't play out any sort of OCR itself. 

Applicable piece of sources:

def run_tesseract(input_filename, output_filename_base, lang=None, boxes=False, config=None):

    '''

    runs the command:

        `tesseract_cmd` `input_filename` `output_filename_base`

    returns the exit status of tesseract, as well as tesseract's stderr output

    '''

    command = [tesseract_cmd, input_filename, output_filename_base]

    if lang is not None:

        command += ['-l', lang]

    if boxes:

        command += ['batch.nochop', 'makebox']

    if config:

        command += shlex.split(config)

    proc = subprocess.Popen(command,

            stderr=subprocess.PIPE)

    return (proc.wait(), proc.stderr.read())

 

Citing another piece of source: 

# CHANGE THIS IF TESSERACT IS NOT IN YOUR PATH, OR IS NAMED DIFFERENTLY

tesseract_cmd = 'tesseract'

So speedy method of changing tesseract path would be:

import pytesseract

pytesseract.tesseract_cmd = "/absolute/path/to/tesseract"  # this should be done only once 

pytesseract.image_to_string(img)

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