[Image-SIG] PIL DPI trouble - Solved

[Luca De Santis]

> ....
> Any thoughts on this?  Or perhaps can you
> point me to someone who can shed even more light on the matter?

Hi Gary
sorry if it took me some time to get back on this topic.

I made a couple of tests, that I describe below, which seems to
confirm the correct behavior of PIL in managing the dpi of JPEGs. Take
everything "with a grain of salt" since I'm not an expert on the
subject: I just followed an empiric method which seems quite sound.

First of all, I'm dealing with JPEGs so I can't say if what I'm doing
applies to other file formats.
My test environment consists of Python 2.1.3 (I used also Python 2.5
with no apparent changes), PIL 1.1.6 on a Mac OS X 10.4. I'm reading
images with Photoshop 7 plus Preview and Graphic Converter 5.9.5 which
are Mac specific applications.


# First test: reading a JPEG  image #

I started from a simple JPEG created from Photoshop and saved at 150
dpi (image.jpg).
Hexdumping the image I get, as expected, the following values for the
field of the JFIF Segment (cfr.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JFIF#JFIF_Segment_Format ):
   * Density Unit: 0x01 (dpi)
   * X/Y Density: 0x0096 (150)

I read the image with PIL in the following way:
>>> import Image
>>> i = Image.open('image.jpg')
>>> i.info['dpi']
(150, 150)

Opening the image with the other two applications just gives the same
value for the resolution.

Now I opened again the image from Photoshop and saved it with the
"Save for Web" option, using the name "image2.jpg".
Hexdumping the image I had the following values for the JFIF attributes:
   * Density Unit: 0x00 (No units, aspect ratio only specified)
   * X/Y Density: 0x0064 (100)
The 100 value seems to make sense because, according to the Density
Unit value, it is the ratio (100%) by which you should use/visualize
the image.

Now with PIL you (correctly) can't read the dpi attribute anymore.
>>> i = Image.open('image2.jpg')
>>> i.info
{'adobe_transform': 100, 'jfif_density': (100, 100), 'jfif_version':
(1, 2), 'adobe': 100, 'jfif_unit': 0, 'jfif': 258}

Opening the image again with Photoshop and selecting the "Image size"
option you get 72 dpi but this seems a sort of default behavior of
this application.
Preview for example lefts blank in this case the dpi attribute, while
Graphic Converter must have a bug since it thinks that the resolution
is 100 dpi!

_Conclusion_:
PIL seems to interpret correctly the JFIF attributes. PIL also reads
the EXIF attributes if present: they are stored in the 'app'
dictionary associated to the Image instance.


# Second test: saving a JPEG  image #

Things are a bit different when the JPEG image is saved through PIL,
which _by default_ doesn't handle the dpi attribute (see also below).

In fact, I opened again the 150 dpi image, and saved with name
"image3.jpg" through PIL with the following commands:
>>> i = Image.open('image.jpg')
>>> i.info['dpi']
(150, 150)
>>> i.save('image3.jpg')
>>> i3 = Image.open('image3.jpg')
>>> i3.info
{'jfif_density': (1, 1), 'jfif_unit': 0, 'jfif': 257, 'jfif_version': (1, 1)}

Hexdumping image3.jpg you get:
   * Density Unit: 0x00 (No units, aspect ratio only specified)
   * X/Y Density: 0x0001

Now, I don't really know if the correct value here should be 1 or 100
(I honestly assume 100, so probably this could be a PIL bug).

If you want to maintain the original dpi with PIL when saving the
image just do the following:
    i.save(filename, dpi=i.info['dpi'])

In fact:
>>> i = Image.open('image.jpg')
>>> i.info['dpi']
(150, 150)
>>> i.save('image4.jpg', dpi=i.info['dpi'])
>>> i4 = Image.open('image4.jpg')
>>> i4.info
{'dpi': (150, 150), 'jfif_density': (150, 150), 'jfif_unit': 1,
'jfif': 257, 'jfif_version': (1, 1)}

Hexdumping this new image I got:
   * Density Unit: 0x01 (dpi)
   * X/Y Density: 0x0096 (150)
and all the applications, Photoshop included, recognize the right
resolution (150dpi) for the image.

_Conclusion_:
Just remember to specify the 'dpi' parameter when saving a JPEG whose
resolution should be different than 72dpi.

Sorry if I wrote too much! I honestly don't know other things on that
so I hoped I helped to shed some light on this matter.

Ciao,
Luca

Luca De Santis,
Pisa, Italy