SDL2: Unable to load image error when starting a simple kivy app

[Jinlxz Liu]

I'v just installed kivy and want to have a try, I wrote a simple kivy script and tried to run, the app exited with exception "SDL2: Unable to load image" , the code is as follows

import os
import kivy
kivy.require('1.10.0')
from kivy.app import App
from kivy.uix.label import Label
class MyApp(App):
    def build(self):
        return Label(text='Hello world')
if __name__ == '__main__':
    MyApp().run()

The output is as follows:

E:\workspace\kivy_test>python basic_test.py
[INFO   ] [Logger      ] Record log in C:\Users\liu\.kivy\logs\kivy_17-09-03_0.txt
[INFO   ] [Kivy        ] v1.10.0
[INFO   ] [Python      ] v2.7.13 (v2.7.13:a06454b1afa1, Dec 17 2016, 20:42:59) [MSC v.1500 32 bit (Intel)]
[INFO   ] [Factory     ] 194 symbols loaded
[INFO   ] [Image       ] Providers: img_tex, img_dds, img_sdl2, img_pil, img_gif (img_ffpyplayer ignored)
[INFO   ] [Text        ] Provider: sdl2
[INFO   ] [OSC         ] using <thread> for socket
[INFO   ] [Window      ] Provider: sdl2
[INFO   ] [GL          ] Using the "OpenGL" graphics system
[INFO   ] [GL          ] GLEW initialization succeeded
[INFO   ] [GL          ] Backend used <glew>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] OpenGL version <3.3.11672 Compatibility Profile Context>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] OpenGL vendor <ATI Technologies Inc.>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] OpenGL renderer <ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4300 Series>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] OpenGL parsed version: 3, 3
[INFO   ] [GL          ] Shading version <3.30>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] Texture max size <8192>
[INFO   ] [GL          ] Texture max units <16>
[INFO   ] [Shader      ] fragment shader: <Fragment shader was successfully compiled to run on hardware.>
[INFO   ] [Shader      ] vertex shader: <Vertex shader was successfully compiled to run on hardware.>
[INFO   ] [Shader      ] program: <Vertex shader(s) linked, fragment shader(s) linked.>
[WARNING] [Image       ] Unable to load image <C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\data\glsl\default.png>
[CRITICAL] [Window      ] Unable to find any valuable Window provider.
sdl2 - Exception: SDL2: Unable to load image
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\__init__.py", line 67, in core_select_lib
    cls = cls()
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\window\window_sdl2.py", line 140, in __init__
    super(WindowSDL, self).__init__()
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\window\__init__.py", line 899, in __init__
    self.create_window()
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\window\window_sdl2.py", line 291, in create_window
    super(WindowSDL, self).create_window()
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\window\__init__.py", line 1051, in create_window
    self.render_context = RenderContext()
  File "kivy\graphics\instructions.pyx", line 758, in kivy.graphics.instructions.RenderContext.__init__ (kivy\graphics\instructions.c:12580)
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\image\__init__.py", line 538, in __init__
    self.filename = arg
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\image\__init__.py", line 734, in _set_filename
    mipmap=self._mipmap, nocache=self._nocache)
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\image\__init__.py", line 435, in load
    im = loader(filename, **kwargs)
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\image\__init__.py", line 201, in __init__
    self._data = self.load(filename)
  File "C:\Python27\Lib\site-packages\kivy\core\image\img_sdl2.py", line 41, in load
    raise Exception('SDL2: Unable to load image')

[CRITICAL] [App         ] Unable to get a Window, abort.
 Exception SystemExit: 1 in 'kivy.properties.dpi2px' ignored
[CRITICAL] [App         ] Unable to get a Window, abort.

my computer has the following configuration:

windows 10 32bit
python 2.7.13
Kivy==1.10.0
Kivy-Garden==0.1.4
kivy.deps.glew==0.1.9
kivy.deps.gstreamer==0.1.12
kivy.deps.sdl2==0.1.17

I have uninstalled and reinstalled kivy and added C:\Python27\share\gstreamer\bin, C:\Python27\share\glew\bin, C:\Python27\share\glew\bin to environtment variable path, it didn't work.

can anyone help me with this problem? I searched on google and have not found any helpful solution.

[Ivan Acevedo]

The same mistake has occurred to me.

What you have to do is delete the folder ".buildozer" that is inside the folder of your project

And also (just in case) the folder ".buildozer" that is in the folder "home".

If the error continues to occur, you must do what I said above, and go to buildozer.spec, in the "requirements" section, add the libraries one by one, that is, add one, then compile the application, add the second, compiles and so on.

[Jinlxz Liu]

Hi, my platform is windows 10, I haven't found the .buildozer folder in the project folder and home folder, and I followed your instructions to uninstall all dependencies of kivy, installed each dependency one by one, compiled the app each time when a new dependency was installed, but it didn't work, at last the same error occured. I uninstalled the dependencies including

docutils pygments pypiwin32 kivy.deps.sdl2 kivy.deps.glew kivy.deps.gstreamer
installed each module in the order listed above

[Jinlxz Liu]

I have solved this problem.
The reason is that there is another zlib1.dll in the dll search path, probably this dll file doesn't contain the functions needed by kivy.
you can simply rename or delete zlib1.dll file in the dll search path, in my case, the file is c:\windows\system32\zlib1.dll, and reboot your computer, kivy app started successfully.

[Yunzhao Xing]

Hi Jinlxz,

Thanks so much! Your answer works on my case. Just one more input, it works for the x64 python 3.7.0 but not x86 version of python3.7.0.

Again, thanks so much!