image_parser.py

from PIL import Image
import pytesseract
import argparse
import cv2
import os
# construct the argument parse and parse the arguments
ap = argparse.ArgumentParser()
ap.add_argument("-i", "--image", required=True,
	help="path to input image to be OCR'd")
ap.add_argument("-p", "--preprocess", type=str, default="thresh",
	help="type of preprocessing to be done")
args = vars(ap.parse_args())


# from PIL import Image
# import pytesseract

# image = args["image"]
# text = pytesseract.image_to_string(Image.open(image), lang="eng")
# print(text)

# this much code is enough to recognise typed text with white background


# load the example image and convert it to grayscale
image = cv2.imread(args["image"])
gray = cv2.cvtColor(image, cv2.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)
# check to see if we should apply thresholding to preprocess the
# image
if args["preprocess"] == "thresh":
	gray = cv2.threshold(gray, 0, 255,
		cv2.THRESH_BINARY | cv2.THRESH_OTSU)[1]
# make a check to see if median blurring should be done to remove
# noise
elif args["preprocess"] == "blur":
	gray = cv2.medianBlur(gray, 3)
# write the grayscale image to disk as a temporary file so we can
# apply OCR to it
filename = "{}.png".format(os.getpid())
cv2.imwrite(filename, gray)

text = pytesseract.image_to_string(Image.open(filename))
os.remove(filename)
print(text)