AttributeError: module 'pillow_heif' has no attribute 'register_avif_opener' when importing Roboflow

[krisnawan8-rahmanto]

Problem Description

When trying to import Roboflow in Google Colab after installing dependencies, encountering an AttributeError related to pillow_heif module.

Error Details

AttributeError: module 'pillow_heif' has no attribute 'register_avif_opener'

The error occurs in /usr/local/lib/python3.11/dist-packages/roboflow/util/image_utils.py at line 14 when trying to call pillow_heif.register_avif_opener(thumbnails=False).

Environment

• Platform: Google Colab
• Python Version: 3.11
• Roboflow Version: 1.1.66
• pillow-heif Version: 1.0.0

Steps to Reproduce

1. Install dependencies:

   !pip uninstall -y pillow-heif
   !pip install roboflow torch torchvision matplotlib pillow pycocotools pandas

2. Try to import Roboflow:

   from roboflow import Roboflow

3. Error occurs during import

Expected Behavior

Roboflow should import successfully without any AttributeError.

Actual Behavior

Import fails with AttributeError about missing register_avif_opener method.

Context

This is part of a Fish Counter FRCNN project using hyperparameter tuning. The error is blocking the ability to download datasets from Roboflow for training.

Potential Solutions

1. Pin pillow-heif to a compatible version
2. Use alternative installation method
3. Skip AVIF support if not required
4. Update Roboflow's dependency handling

Impact

This error prevents users from using Roboflow in Google Colab environments, which is a common platform for machine learning experiments.

[Sefurus]

Same problem with kaggle notebooks

[MuhammadHadiofficial]

Same problem on google colab as of today
Proposed following fix: #391

[SasaniP]

Same problem on google colab as of today Proposed following fix: #391

Followed your solution by cloning for the time being. It worked for me. Thanks.
Simply downgrading to pillow-heif==0.18.0 also works.

[skdrums]

If you don't use avif images, after installing roboflow, the following code worked fine on colab.

!sed -i '/register_avif_opener/d' /usr/local/lib/python3.*/dist-packages/roboflow/util/image_utils.py

[iurisilvio]

Issue fixed in latest package version (v1.1.67)!

I'll work soon on a proper fix to be able to use latest pillow-heif lib.

[iurisilvio]

Thank you @MuhammadHadiofficial for the fix PR!

[iurisilvio]

FYI I removed pillow-heif upper limit. We now use pillow-avif-plugin to support AVIF images.

[MuhammadHadiofficial]

Thanks @iurisilvio

[MuhammadHadiofficial]

Thanks @iurisilvio