the pygame.image module contains functions for loading and saving images from file or file like object. an image is loaded as a surface object which eventually is rendered on pygame display window.

first we obtain a surface object by load() function.

img = pygame.image.load('pygame.png')

next we obtain a rect object out of this surface and then use surface.blit() function to render the image −

rect = img.get_rect()
rect.center = 200, 150
screen.blit(img, rect)

example

the complete program for displaying pygame logo on the display window is as follows −

import pygame

pygame.init()
screen = pygame.display.set_mode((400, 300))
img = pygame.image.load('pygame.png')
done = false
bg = (127,127,127)
while not done:
   for event in pygame.event.get():
      screen.fill(bg)
      rect = img.get_rect()
      rect.center = 200, 150
      screen.blit(img, rect)
      if event.type == pygame.quit:
      done = true
   pygame.display.update()

output

the output for the above code is as follows −

the blit() function can take an optional special-flags parameter with one of the following values −

blend_rgba_add
blend_rgba_sub
blend_rgba_mult
blend_rgba_min
blend_rgba_max
blend_rgb_add
blend_rgb_sub
blend_rgb_mult
blend_rgb_min
blend_rgb_max

the pygame.surface module also has a convert() function which optimizes the image format and makes drawing faster.

the pygame.image module has a save() function that saves contents of surface object to an image file. pygame supports the following image formats −

loading image formats	saving image formats
jpg png gif (non-animated) bmp pcx tga (uncompressed) tif lbm (and pbm) pbm (and pgm, ppm) xpm	bmp tga png jpeg

loading image formats

saving image formats

jpg

png

gif (non-animated)

bmp

pcx

tga (uncompressed)

tif

lbm (and pbm)

pbm (and pgm, ppm)

xpm

bmp

tga

png

jpeg

example

following program draws three circles on the display surface and save it as a circles.png file using image.save() function.

import pygame

pygame.init()
screen = pygame.display.set_mode((400, 300))
done = false
white=(255,255,255)
red = (255,0,0)
green = (0,255,0)
blue = (0,0,255)

bg = (127,127,127)
while not done:
   for event in pygame.event.get():
      screen.fill(bg)
      if event.type == pygame.quit:
         done = true
      pygame.draw.circle(screen, red, (200,150), 60,2)
      pygame.draw.circle(screen, green, (200,150), 80,2)
      pygame.draw.circle(screen, blue, (200,150), 100,2)
   pygame.display.update()
   pygame.image.save(screen, "circles.png")

output

the circles.png should be created in the current working folder.

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