torchfree-ocr 1.0.0

End-to-End English Optical Character Recognition

Torchless EasyOCR

This package is EasyOCR-based English optical character recognition. Unlike EasyOCR, this package uses pre-saved with onnx English language model, so it doesn't need a 1-2 Gb pytorch dependency. This is particularly useful for deleloping light-weight applications that utilize text recognition.

Limitations

Each language requires generating corresponding .onnx file, therefore, for the purpose of reducing package size only English is supported. Additionally, there is no GPU CUDA support.

Performance of torchfree_ocr vs easyocr

In tems of recognition, there is no visible recognition quality difference between torchfree_ocr and easyocr. In terms of speed torchfree_ocr works slightly faster than easyocr in CPU mode (~20% faster). Obviously, easyocr generally runs much faster in GPU mode, which torchfree_ocr doesn't support.

Examples

Installation

Install using pip

For the latest release:

pip install torchfree_ocr

Usage

import torchfree_ocr
reader = torchfree_ocr.Reader() # English recognition is default, other languages are not supported
result = reader.readtext('english.png')

The output will be in a list format, each item represents a bounding box, the text detected and confident level, respectively.

[([[231, 32], [672, 32], [672, 64], [231, 64]], 'Reduce your risk of coronavirus infection:', 0.8413621448628567), 
 ([[326, 98], [598, 98], [598, 124], [326, 124]], 'Clean hands with soap and water', 0.9633979603853523), 
 ([[328, 124], [540, 124], [540, 148], [328, 148]], 'or alcohol-based hand rub', 0.802668636048309), 
 ([[248, 170], [595, 170], [595, 196], [248, 196]], 'Cover nose and mouth when coughing and', 0.9529594602295661), 
 ([[248, 196], [546, 196], [546, 222], [248, 222]], 'sneezing with tissue or flexed elbow', 0.8406205896147358), 
 ([[320, 240], [624, 240], [624, 266], [320, 266]], 'Avoid close contact with anyone with', 0.8602271367787114), 
 ([[318, 265], [528, 265], [528, 293], [318, 293]], 'cold or flu-like symptoms', 0.9378307488433589), 
 ([[248, 322], [510, 322], [510, 348], [248, 348]], 'Thoroughly cook meat and eggs', 0.7159722535422908), 
 ([[332, 370], [640, 370], [640, 396], [332, 396]], 'No unprotected contact with live wild', 0.8346977728209518), 
 ([[334, 396], [464, 396], [464, 420], [334, 420]], 'or farm animals', 0.7179850171130348), 
 ([[595, 427], [683, 427], [683, 447], [595, 447]], 'World Health', 0.9979501800152029), 
 ([[597, 445], [685, 445], [685, 463], [597, 463]], 'Organization', 0.9977550970521537)]

Note 1: Instead of the filepath english.png, you can also pass an OpenCV image object (numpy array) or an image file as bytes. A URL to a raw image is also acceptable.

Note 2: The line reader = easyocr.Reader() is for loading a model into memory. It takes some time but it needs to be run only once.

You can also set detail=0 for simpler output.

reader.readtext('english.png', detail = 0)

Result:

['Reduce your risk of coronavirus infection:', 'Clean hands with soap and water', 'or alcohol-based hand rub', 'Cover nose and mouth when coughing and', 'sneezing with tissue or flexed elbow', 'Avoid close contact with anyone with', 'cold or flu-like symptoms', 'Thoroughly cook meat and eggs', 'No unprotected contact with live wild', 'or farm animals', 'World Health', 'Organization']

Averall, usage is the same as with EasyOCR, except Reader in this package only has recognizer= parameter and there is no readtextlang() method.

Usage for EasyOCR can be found in their tutorial and API Documentation.

Run on command line

$ torchfree_ocr -f english.png --detail=1