Upgrade to opencv-python 4.7 causes import error

Question

While working on a project that uses the opencv-python module, I ended up updating it to version 4.7.0.68 from 4.6.0.66. The next time I ran my program it failed with an import error: ImportError: dlopen(path/to/my/virtualenv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/cv2/cv2.abi3.so, 2): Symbol not found: _VTRegisterSupplementalVideoDecoderIfAvailable

After downgrading opencv-python back to 4.6.0.66 the import error went away and things went back to running without error.

Given that OpenCV 4.7 was released fairly recently and from what I can tell _VTRegisterSupplementalVideoDecoderIfAvailable is a function of macOS I'm guessing that this is some sort of compatibility bug in the new version of opencv-python. On the machine where the error occurred I'm running macOS Catalina (10.15.7).

To isolate that the issue is strictly related to opencv-python, I created a clean environment, installed opencv-python 4.7 and attempted to run a script with the single line import cv2. This failed with the same error.

This issue in an unrelated project hints that it's possible upgrading my OS may be needed.

I can live with downgrading to 4.6 but curious to know if there's an alternative solution to fix this import error.

Answer 1

I got this problem too. The macOS Catalina 10.15.7 system seems too old for the new opencv package

pip3 install opencv-python==4.6.0.66