how to correctly duplicates pillow images

Question

when I wanted to have the same image 2 time in 2 differents variables so i can modify one while keeping the other as a reference. I used to to it like that:

im1 = Image.open(imagepath)
im2 = im1

and i always got issues while doing that because, if i modify one image, the other will also be modified. You can try it yourself if you want:

from PIL import Image
im1 = Image.open(r"D:\python\pixelartor\pixelartor_v3.1\pkg\trezor\trezor_0007.png")
im1.show()
im2 = im1
for x in range(100):
    for y in range(100):
        im2.putpixel((x,y),(255,0,0))
im1.show()

as you can see in the above script, i show im1, then i modify im2 and show im1 again but the first im1 and the second aren't the same but i never asked pillow to modify im1:

I think there is a much clever way to copy PIL.Images but i don't find anything on the web. And please don't tell me to open the image 2 times because it won't work in my case. I hope someone will hep me because i faced this issue 2 weeks ago, so i abandonned my project and i restarted the same project from scratch this week and the same problem happened, but this time, i tried to understand what was happening.

`im2 = im1` *makes* them the same image. You don't even have to copy the pixels – check it, you'll see. `im2` should be a new Image instead (with the same size, colors, etc.). — Jongware, Mar 14 '20 at 12:05
@usr2564301 But If I copy his code,the two pictures will change. — jizhihaoSAMA, Mar 14 '20 at 12:16
Does this answer your question? [Python Copy Through Assignment?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2438938/python-copy-through-assignment) — AMC, Mar 14 '20 at 17:31

jizhihaoSAMA · Accepted Answer · 2020-03-14T12:29:37.887

I tried your code,it is my code and result:

from PIL import Image

im1 = Image.open("1.ico")
im2 = im1

print(im1)
print(im2)

for x in range(30):
    for y in range(30):
        im2.putpixel((x,y),(255,0,0))

im2.show()
im1.show()
print(im2 is im1)
# <PIL.IcoImagePlugin.IcoImageFile image mode=RGBA size=64x64 at 0x1AF1EB163C8>
# <PIL.IcoImagePlugin.IcoImageFile image mode=RGBA size=64x64 at 0x1AF1EB163C8>
# True

They have the same address,so they are the same objects. Maybe you can use deepcopy,like this:

from PIL import Image
import copy
im1 = Image.open(r"2.png")
im2 = copy.deepcopy(im1)
print(im1)
print(im2)

for x in range(30):
    for y in range(30):
        im2.putpixel((x,y),(255,0,0))

im2.show()
im1.show()
print(im2 is im1)
# <PIL.PngImagePlugin.PngImageFile image mode=RGBA size=255x255 at 0x211FEBE60B8>
# <PIL.PngImagePlugin.PngImageFile image mode=RGBA size=255x255 at 0x211FFCF70F0>
# False

how to correctly duplicates pillow images

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