Installing PIL on Mac OS

install-pil-macos

Sure, you should use Pillow.  But sometimes you want PIL.  Directions tested on Mac OS 10.11.3 with Xcode 7.2.1.

Install Xcode command line tools, if needed:

$ xcode-select --install


Download the PIL source distribution (Imaging 1.1.7) from http://effbot.org/downloads#imaging.  Do an in-place build, and run the self test before installing:

$ tar -xvf Imaging-1.1.7.tar
$ cd Imaging-1.1.7
$ python setup.py build_ext -i
$ python selftest.py


Sample setup summary from build command:

--- TKINTER support available
*** JPEG support not available
--- ZLIB (PNG/ZIP) support available
*** FREETYPE2 support not available
*** LITTLECMS support not available


Oops, we want JPEG support.  Download jpegsrc.v9b.tar.gz from http://www.ijg.org/files/.  Configure, make, and install (assuming 9b):

$ ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/libjpeg-9b
$ make
$ sudo make install


Create a symbolic link that points /usr/local/libjpeg to /usr/local/libjpeg-9b:

$ sudo ln -s /usr/local/libjpeg-9b /usr/local/libjpeg


From in Imaging-1.1.7 directory, try the build again:

$ python setup.py clean
$ python setup.py build_ext -i


If it still can’t find JPEG support, edit setup.py and set:

JPEG_ROOT = libinclude("/usr/local/libjpeg")


Re-run build command and selftest.  If everything is ok, install into your virtualenv:

$ <path to virtualenv>/bin/python setup.py install


Activate virtualenv and make sure it is there in pip freeze.