[Tkinter] createing a tkinter photoimage from array in python3

[pootle]

Well some more digging and I prised the answer out of a combination of several different places.

Larz60's approach is the way I was already doing it - loading a file, but I eventually found out that the data needs to be in ppm format which is pretty simple to generate. This approach goes twice as fast as writing /  reading a file and isn't really stressing the PC either:

import tkinter
import numpy
import time
#python2 version (original) -> 120fps
#full physical file io and new image each cycle -> 130fps
#reuse PIL Image instead of create new each time -> 160fps
#and... direct image into tkinter using ppm byte array -> 240 fps

class mainWindow():
    times=1
    timestart=time.clock()
    data=numpy.array(numpy.random.random((400,500))*900,dtype=numpy.uint16)
    
    def __init__(self):
        self.root = tkinter.Tk()
        self.frame = tkinter.Frame(self.root, width=500, height=400)
        self.frame.pack()
        self.canvas = tkinter.Canvas(self.frame, width=500,height=400)
        self.canvas.place(x=-2,y=-2)
        xdata = b'P5 500 400 255 ' + self.data.tobytes()
        self.photo = tkinter.PhotoImage(width=500, height=400, data=xdata, format='PPM')
        self.imid = self.canvas.create_image(0,0,image=self.photo,anchor=tkinter.NW)
        self.root.after(1,self.start) # INCREASE THE 0 TO SLOW IT DOWN
        self.root.mainloop()
    
    def start(self):
        global data
        xdata = b'P5 500 400 255 ' + numpy.clip(self.data,0,255).tobytes()
        self.photo = tkinter.PhotoImage(width=500, height=400, data=xdata, format='PPM')
        if True:
            self.canvas.itemconfig(self.imid, image = self.photo)
        else:
            self.canvas.delete(self.imid)
            self.imid = self.canvas.create_image(0,0,image=self.photo,anchor=tkinter.NW)
        self.times+=1
        if self.times%33==0:
            print("%.02f FPS"%(self.times/(time.clock()-self.timestart)))
        self.root.update()
        self.root.after(0,self.start)
        self.data=numpy.roll(self.data,-1,1)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    x=mainWindow()