32

PROC. OF THE 14th PYTHON IN SCIENCE CONF. (SCIPY 2015)

Scientific Data Analysis and Visualization with Python,

VTK, and ParaView
Cory Quammen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ugmkKaYKxM
F

AbstractVTK and ParaView are leading software packages for data analysis
and visualization. Since their early years, Python has played an important role
in each package. In many use cases, VTK and ParaView serve as modules
used by Python applications. In other use cases, Python modules are used to
generate visualization components within VTK. In this paper, we provide an
overview of Python integration in VTK and ParaView and give some concrete
examples of usage. We also provide a roadmap for additional Python integration
in VTK and ParaView in the future.
Index Termsdata analysis, scientific visualization, VTK, ParaView

are written either by hand or generated as a trace of events

during an interactive visualization session is available for
offline visualization generation.
This paper is organized into two main sections. In the first
section, I introduce basic VTK usage, describe the relationship
between VTK and Python, and describe interfaces between the
two. In the second section, I detail the relationship between
ParaView and Python. Examples of Python usage in VTK 6.2
and ParaView 4.3 are provided throughout. I also provide a
roadmap for additional Python support in VTK and ParaView.

Introduction

The Visualization Toolkit (VTK) is an open-source, freely

available software system for 3D visualization. It consists of a
set of C++ class libraries and bindings for Python and several
other languages. VTK supports a wide variety of visualization
algorithms for 2D and 3D scalar, vector, tensor, and volumetric
data, as well as advanced algorithms such as implicit modeling, polygon reduction, mesh smoothing, cutting, contouring,
and Delaunay triangulation. VTK has an extensive information
visualization framework and a suite of 3D interaction widgets.
The toolkit supports parallel processing and integrates with
various GUI toolkits such as Qt. Python bindings expose
nearly all VTK classes and functions, making it possible
to write full VTK-based applications exclusively in Python.
VTK also includes interfaces to popular Python packages such
as NumPy and matplotlib. Support for writing custom VTK
algorithms in Python is also available.
ParaView is a scalable visualization tool based on VTK that
runs on a variety of platforms ranging from PCs to some
of the largest supercomputers in the world. The ParaView
package consists of a suite of executables for generating
data visualizations using the techniques available in VTK.
ParaView executables interface with Python in a number of
ways: data sources, filters, and plots can be defined via
Python code, data can be queried with Python expressions,
and several executables can be controlled interactively with
Python commands. Batch processing via Python scripts that
* Corresponding author: [email protected]
Kitware, Inc.
c 2015 Cory Quammen. This is an open-access article distributed
Copyright
under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits
unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the
original author and source are credited.

Python and VTK

VTK Data Model

To understand Python usage in VTK, it is important to

understand the VTK data and processing models. At the
most basic level, data in VTK is stored in a data object.
Different types of data objects are available including graphs,
trees, and data sets representing spatially embedded data
from sensors or simulations such as uniform rectilinear grids,
structured/unstructured grids, and Adaptive Mesh Refinement
(AMR) data sets. This paper focuses on spatially embedded
data sets.
Each spatially embedded data set consists of cells, each
of which defines a geometric entity that defines a volume
of space, and points that are used to define the vertices of
the cells. Data values that represent a quantity, e.g. pressure,
temperature, velocity, may be associated with both cells and
points. Each quantity might be a scalar, vector, tensor, or
string value. Vectors and tensors typically have more than one
numerical component, and the quantity as a whole is known
as a tuple.
The full collection of a quantity associated with points or
cells is known by a number of names including "attribute",
"field", "variable", and "array". VTK stores each attribute in a
separate data array. For a point-associated array (point array),
the number of tuples is expected to match the number of
points. Likewise, for cell-associated arrays (cell array) the
number of tuples is expected to match the number of cells.
VTK Pipeline

Data processing in VTK follows the data-flow paradigm. In

this paradigm, data flows through a sequence of processing algorithms. These algorithms are chained together in a pipeline.

SCIENTIFIC DATA ANALYSIS AND VISUALIZATION WITH PYTHON, VTK, AND PARAVIEW

33

At the beginning of a pipeline, a source generates a VTK data

set. For example, an STL file reader source reads an STL file
and produces a polygonal VTK data set as an output. A filter
can be connected to the file reader to process the raw data
from the file. For example, a smoothing filter may be used to
smooth the polygonal data read by the STL reader. The output
of the smoothing filter can be further processed with a clipping
filter to cut away part of the smoothed data set. Results from
this operation can then be saved to a file with a file writer.
An algorithm in a pipeline produces one or more VTK data
sets that are passed to the next algorithm in the pipeline.
Algorithms need only update when one of their properties
changes (e.g., smoothing amount) or when the algorithm
upstream of it has produced a new data set. These updates are
handled automatically by an internal VTK pipeline executive
whenever an algorithm is updated.
Because VTK is intended to produce 3D interactive visualizations, output from the final algorithm in a pipeline
is typically connected to a mapper object. A mapper is
responsible for converting a data set into a set of rendering
instructions. An actor represents the mapper in a scene, and
has some properties that can modify the appearance of a
rendered data set. One or more actors can be added to a
renderer which executes the rendering instructions to generate
an image.

file vtk/__init__.py to the PYTHONPATH environment

variable, but using vtkpython avoids the need to do this.
To access VTK classes, you simply import vtk:

Python Language Bindings for VTK

# Express point as tuple

sphere.SetCenter((0, 1, 0))

Since 1997, VTK has provided language bindings for Python.

Over the years, Python has become increasingly important
to VTK, both as a route to using VTK, as well as to the
development of VTK itself.
The Python binding support in VTK has evolved so that
today nearly every semantic feature of C++ used by VTK has
a direct semantic analog in Python. C++ classes from VTK
are wrapped into Python equivalents. The few classes that are
not wrapped are typically limited to classes that are meant for
internal use in VTK.
Python Wrapping Infrastructure

Python classes for VTK classes and special types are generated using a shared lex/yacc-based parser tailored for VTK
programming conventions and custom code generation utilities
for Python wrapping. VTK is organized into a number of C++
modules. When built with shared libraries enabled, a library
containing C++ classes is generated at build time for each C++
module. Each Python-wrapped source file is likewise compiled
into a shared library corresponding to the C++ module. All
wrapped VTK C++ modules are provided in a single vtk
Python package.
VTK Usage in Python

For convenience, an executable named vtkpython is provided in VTK binaries. This is the standard Python executable
with environment variables set to make it simple to import
the vtk package. It is also possible to use VTK in the
same python executable from the Python installation against
which VTK was built by prepending the location of VTKs
shared libraries and the location of the parent directory of the

import vtk

VTK is somewhat unusual for a Python package in that all

modules are loaded by this import statement.
Creation of VTK objects is straightforward:
contourFilter = vtk.vtkContourFilter()

Each Python object references an underlying VTK object.

Objects in VTK are reference counted and automatically
deleted when no longer used. The wrapping interface updates
the underlying VTK objects reference count and alleviates the
need for explicit memory management within Python.
One particularly nice semantic equivalence between VTKs
C++ and Python interfaces involves member functions that
accept a pointer to a C++ array representing a small tuple of
elements. Such functions are common in VTK to do things
like set a 3D Cartesian coordinate as a property of a class.
In Python, the corresponding function accepts a tuple or list
object. This works well as long as the list or tuple has the
expected number of elements.
sphere = vtk.vtkSphereSource()
# Express point as list
sphere.SetCenter([0, 1, 0])

Member functions that return pointers to arrays with a fixed

number of elements are also supported. Such functions require
a hint to the wrapping infrastructure indicating how many
elements are in the tuple that is returned.
>>> center = sphere.GetCenter()
>>> print center
(0, 1, 0)

For VTK classes that have operators <, <=, ==, >=, > defined,
equivalent Python operators are provided.
Some functions in VTK return information via parameters
passed by reference. For example, in the following code
block, the parameter t is a return parameter from the member
function IntersectWithLine.
double t, x[3]
plane->IntersectWithLine(point1, point2, t, x);

In Python, the equivalent is

t = vtk.mutable(0.0)
plane.IntersectWithLine(point1, point2, t, x)

Class and function documentation is processed by the wrapping infrastructure to make it available via Pythons built-in
help system.
>>> help(vtk.vtkSphereSource)

The above shows the full documentation of the

vtkSphereSource class (too extensive to list here), while
the code below produces help for only the SetCenter
member function.
>>> help(vtk.vtkSphereSource.SetCenter)
Help on built-in function SetCenter:

34

SetCenter(...)
V.SetCenter(float, float, float)
C++: void SetCenter(double, double, double)
V.SetCenter((float, float, float))
C++: void SetCenter(double a[3])

Some less often used mappings between C++ and Python

semantics, as well as limitations, are described in the
file VTK/Wrapping/Python/README_WRAP.txt in the
VTK source code repository in versions 4.2 and above.
A full example below shows how to create a VTK pipeline
in Python that loads an STL file, smooths it, and displays the
smoothed result in a 3D render window.
import vtk
reader = vtk.vtkSTLReader()
reader.SetFileName(somefile.stl)
smoother = vtk.vtkLoopSubdivisionFilter()
smoother.SetInputConnection(reader.GetOutputPort())
mapper = vtk.vtkPolyDataMapper()
mapper.SetInputConnection(smoother.GetOutputPort())
actor = vtk.vtkActor()
actor.SetMapper(mapper)
renderer = vtk.vtkRenderer()
renderer.AddActor(actor)
renWin = vtk.vtkRenderWindow
renWin.AddRenderer(renderer)
interactor = vtk.vtkRenderWindowInteractor()
interactor.SetRenderWindow(renWin)
interactor.Initialize()
renWin.Render()
iren.Start()

Many additional examples of VTK usage in Python are

available in the VTK/Examples/Python wiki page [Wik15].
Integration with NumPy

There are limited functions within VTK itself to process

or analyze point and cell arrays. Since 2008, a low-level
interface layer between VTK arrays and NumPy arrays has
been available in VTK. This interface layer can be used to
map VTK arrays to NumPy arrays and vice versa, enabling the
full power of NumPy operations to be used on VTK data. For
example, suppose that we have a data set from a computational
fluid dynamics simulation that we can load with a VTK reader
class, and suppose further that the data set has a point array
representing pressure. We can find several properties of this
array using NumPy, e.g.,
import numpy as np
import vtk.util.numpy_support as nps
# Load data with a VTK reader instantiated earlier
reader.Update()
ds = reader.GetOutput()
pd = ds.GetPointData()
pressure = pd.GetArray(pressure)
np_pressure = nps.vtk_to_numpy(pressure)
min_p = np.min(np_pressure)
max_p = np.max(np_pressure)

PROC. OF THE 14th PYTHON IN SCIENCE CONF. (SCIPY 2015)

This interface can also be used to add data arrays to loaded

data sets that can be handed off to VTK for visualization:
norm_pressure = (np_pressure - min_pressure) / \
(max_pressure - min_pressure)
vtk_norm_pressure = np.numpy_to_vtk(norm_pressure, 1)
vtk_norm_pressure.SetName(normalized pressure)
pd.AddArray(vtk_norm_pressure)

The second argument to np.numpy_to_vtk indicates that

the NumPy array should be deep copied to the VTK array.
This is necessary if no reference to the NumPy array will
otherwise be kept. If a reference to the numpy array will be
kept, then the second argument can be omitted and the NumPy
array will be shallow copied instead, saving memory and time
because the array data does not need to be copied. Note that
the Python interpretter might crash if a NumPy array reference
is not held and the data is shallow copied.
More recently, a higher-level NumPy-like interface layer
has been added to VTK. This numpy_interface was
designed to combine the ease of use of NumPy with the
distributed memory parallel computing capabilities and broad
data set type support of VTK. The straightforward interface
between VTK data arrays and NumPy described above works
only when the entire data set is available on one node.
However, data sets in VTK may be distributed across different
computational nodes in a parallel computer using the Message
Passing Interface [Sni99]. In this scenario, global reduction
operations using NumPy are not possible. For this reason, a
NumPy-like interface has been added to VTK that properly
handles distributed data sets [Aya14].
A key building block in VTKs numpy_interface is a
set of classes that wrap VTK data set objects to have a more
Pythonic interface.
import vtk
from vtk.numpy_interface import dataset_adapter as dsa
reader = vtk.vtkXMLPolyDataReader()
reader.SetFileName(filename)
reader.Update()
ds = dsa.WrapDataObject(reader.GetOutput())

In
this
code,
ds
is
an
instance
of
a
dataset_adapter.PolyData
that
wraps
the
vtkPolyData output of the vtkXMLPolyDataReader.
Point and cell arrays are available in member variables
PointData and CellData, respectively, that provide the
dictionary interface.
>>> ds.PointData.keys()
[pressure]
>>> pressure = ds.PointData[pressure]

Note that the pressure array here is an instance

of VTKArray rather than a wrapped VTK data array.
VTKArray is a wrapper around the VTK array object that
inherits from numpy.ndarray. Hence, all the standard
ndarray operations are available on this wrapped array, e.g.,
>>> pressure[0]
0.112
>>> pressure[1:4]
VTKArray([34.2432, 47.2342, 38.1211], dtype=float32)
>>> pressure[1:4] + 1

SCIENTIFIC DATA ANALYSIS AND VISUALIZATION WITH PYTHON, VTK, AND PARAVIEW

VTKArray([35.2432, 48.2342, 39.1211], dtype=float32)

>>> pressure[pressure > 40]
VTKArray([47.2342], dtype=float32)

The numpy_interface.algorithms module also provides NumPy-like functionality:

import vtk.numpy_interface.algorithms as algs
>>> algs.min(pressure)
VTKArray(0.1213)
>>> algs.where(pressure > 38)
(array([2, 3], dtype=int64),)

In addition to providing most of the ufuncs provided by

NumPy, the algorithms interface provides some functions
to access quantities that VTK can compute in the wide
variety of data set types available in VTK. This can be used
to compute, for instance, the total volume of cells in an
unstructured grid:
>>> cell_volumes = algs.volume(ds)
>>> algs.sum(cell_volumes)
VTKArray(847.02)

This example illustrates nicely the power of combining a

NumPy-like interface with VTKs uniform API for computing
various quantities on different types of data sets.
Another
distinct
advantage
of
the
numpy_interface.algorithms module is that all
operations are supported in parallel when data sets are
distributed across computational nodes. [Aya14] describes
this functionality in more detail.
Integration with matplotlib

While VTK excels at interactive 3D rendering of scientific

data, matplotlib excels at producing publication-quality 2D
plots. VTK leverages each toolkits strengths in two ways.
First, as described earlier, convenience functions
for exposing VTK data arrays as NumPy arrays are
provided in the vtk.util.numpy_support and
numpy_interface.algorithms
modules.
These
arrays can be passed to matplotlib plotting functions to
produce publication-quality plots.
Second, VTK itself incorporates some of matplotlibs rendering capabilities directly when possible. When VTK Python
wrapping is enabled and matplotlib is available, VTK uses
the matplotlib.mathtext module to render LaTeX math
expressions to either vtkImageData objects that can be
displayed as images or to paths that may be rendered to a
vtkContextView object, VTKs version of a canvas. The
vtkTextActor, a class for adding text to visualizations,
uses this module to support rendering complex LaTeX math
expressions.
Qt applications with Python

Python support in VTK is robust enough to create full-featured

applications without writing a single line of C++ code. PyQt
[PyQt15] (or PySide [PyS15]) provide Python bindings for Qt.
A simple PyQt example adapted from an example by Michka
Popoff is provided below:

35

import sys
import vtk
from PyQt4 import QtCore, QtGui
from vtk.qt4.QVTKRenderWindowInteractor \
import QVTKRenderWindowInteractor
class MainWindow(QtGui.QMainWindow):
def __init__(self, parent = None):
QtGui.QMainWindow.__init__(self, parent)
self.frame = QtGui.QFrame()
layout = QtGui.QVBoxLayout()
self.vtkWidget = \
QVTKRenderWindowInteractor(self.frame)
layout.addWidget(self.vtkWidget)
self.renderer = vtk.vtkRenderer()
rw = self.vtkWidget.GetRenderWindow()
rw.AddRenderer(self.renderer)
self.interactor = rw.GetInteractor()
cylinder = vtk.vtkCylinderSource()
mapper = vtk.vtkPolyDataMapper()
mapper.SetInputConnection( \
cylinder.GetOutputPort())
actor = vtk.vtkActor()
actor.SetMapper(mapper)
self.renderer.AddActor(actor)
self.renderer.ResetCamera()
self.frame.setLayout(layout)
self.setCentralWidget(self.frame)
self.show()
self.interactor.Initialize()
if __name__ == "__main__":
app = QtGui.QApplication(sys.argv)
window = MainWindow()
sys.exit(app.exec_())

This simple application does little besides what is possible

with pure VTK code alone. However, this example can easily
be expanded to provide interaction through UI elements such
as a menu bar, buttons, text entries, sliders, etc.
VTK filters defined in Python

While VTK sources and filters are available in Python, they

cannot be subclassed to create new sources or filters because
the virtual function table defined in C++ cannot dispatch
to member functions defined in Python. Instead, one can
subclass from a special VTKAlgorithm class defined in
vtk.util.vtkAlgorithm. This class specifies the interface for classes that interact with vtkPythonAlgorithm,
a C++ class that delegates the primary VTK pipeline update
functions to equivalent pipeline update functions in the Python
VTKAlgorithm class. Subclasses of VTKAlgorithm can
(and usually should) override these functions. By doing this,
it is possible to implement complex new sources and filters
using Python alone. For more details on the VTKAlgorithm
class, see [Gev2014].
Python integration in VTK tests

As a project that follows a quality software process, VTK has

many regression tests. At present, 26% of tests (544 out of
2046) are written in Python. This integration of Python in

36

VTKs testing infrastructure shows how important Python is

in VTKs development.
Obtaining VTK

VTK and its Python bindings are available on many Linux

distributions including Ubuntu, Debian, OpenSUSE. It is
also available in Anaconda and Enthought Canopy. Binary
installers and source code for the most recent versions are
available on the VTK web site [VTK15] for Windows, Mac,
and Linux.
Python and ParaView

ParaView is a suite of scalable parallel visualization executables that use VTK to read data, process it, and create
visualizations. One of the executables includes a graphical user
interface (GUI) to make it possible to create visualizations
without programming (when ParaView is mentioned in this
section, it is the executable with a GUI unless otherwise
specified). Data processing in ParaView follows the same dataflow paradigm that VTK follows. In ParaView, sources and
filters are chained together in a Pipeline Browser as shown
in Figure 1. Visualization controls are modified with user
interaction widgets provided by Qt.

PROC. OF THE 14th PYTHON IN SCIENCE CONF. (SCIPY 2015)

a fully-featured Python console with the environment set up so

that the vtk package and a paraview package are available.
When first started, the command
from paraview.simple import *

is automatically executed to import the paraview.simple

module. This layer is described in more detail later.
Running commands in ParaViews Python console is identical to running commands in other Python consoles. The key
difference is that commands can be used to change the state of
the ParaView application. This provides a similar experience
to using a Python console to change matplotlib plots.
The Python console also provides a button to load and
execute a Python script with ParaView commands from a file.
This feature is ideal for iterative Python script development.
pvpython and pvbatch

The ParaView suite of tools includes two Python-based utilities

for both interactive and batch generation of visualizations.
pvpython is an interactive Python shell that provides the
same access to the vtk and paraview packages as provided by the Python console in ParaView. The key difference
between ParaView and pvpython is that no GUI controls are
available to modify pipeline or visualization state. pvbatch
is a non-interactive executable that runs a Python script and is
intended to perform offline data processing and visualization
generation.
Python Tracing and State Files

Fig. 1: The ParaView GUI with an example visualization of a data

set from a simulation of airflow past a blunt fin. The Pipeline
Browser (upper left) shows the sources and filters used to create
the visualization. Filter and visualization parameters are shown in
the Property window (lower left).

While ParaView can be used to make visualizations without

programming, it is also possible to use Python scripting
to automate certain operations or even create entire visualizations. In this section, I describe how Python scripting
is integrated into ParaView at several different levels. At a
high level, Python commands are issued via a console to
change properties of a visualization. At a lower level, Python
commands are used to set up entire visualizaion pipelines. At
an even lower level, Python is used to create custom sources
and filters to provide additional data analysis and visualization
functionality.
Python Console

ParaView includes a Python console available under the

Tools -> Python Console menu item. This console is

While documentation is available to learn how to write Python

scripts for ParaView, it can take some time to find the function
calls needed to replicate a sequence of actions performed
through the GUI. To reduce script development time, ParaView
supports tracing of user interactions where the generated trace
is in the form of a Python script. Running the resulting trace
script through the ParaView Python console, pvpython or
pvbatch reproduces the effects of the user interactions with
the GUI.
Python tracing is implemented by instrumenting the ParaView application with Python generation code at various user
event handlers. The tracing mechanism can record either the
entire state of ParaView objects or just modifications of state
to non-default values to reduce the trace size. Traces can be
started and stopped at any time - they do not need to record
the full user interaction history.
An application where tracing is useful is the batch conversion of data files. If ParaView can read the source file format
and write the destination file format, it is easy to perform the
conversion manually one time with the ParaView GUI. For
a large list of files, though, a more automated approach is
useful. Creating a trace of the actions needed to perform the
conversion of a single file produces most of the script that
would be needed to convert a list of files. The trace script can
then be changed to apply to a list of files.
In addition to saving a trace of user interaction sequences,
a Python state file may also be produced. Like a Python trace,
the state file contains Python commands that set up the pipeline
and visualization settings, but unlike a trace, it does not record

SCIENTIFIC DATA ANALYSIS AND VISUALIZATION WITH PYTHON, VTK, AND PARAVIEW

interaction events as they happen but rather the final state of

ParaView.

37

ParaView traces and Python state files are expressed in terms

of paraview.simple module functions. For more information on how to use this module, see [Kit15].

Simple Python Interface

Much of ParaView is implemented in C++ as VTK classes.

These classes are wrapped in Python with the same mechanism
that wraps VTK classes. As such, they are accessible within
the Python console, pvpython, and pvbatch. However
using these classes directly is often unwieldy. The example
below illustrates how to use the direct ParaView API to create
a sphere source with radius 2.

Python Programmable Filter

ParaView provides many data filters for transforming data

and performing analysis tasks. There are, however, an infinite
number of operations one may want to perform on a data
set. To address the need for custom filters, ParaView supports
a rich plugin architecture that makes it possible to create
additional filters in C++. Unfortunately, creating a plugin this
way is a relatively involved process.
from paraview import servermanager as sm
Aside from the C++ plugin architecture, ParaView provides
pm = sm.vtkSMProxyManager.GetProxyManager()
a Programmable Filter that enables a potentially faster develcontroller = \
sm.vtkSMParaViewPipelineControllerWithRendering() opment path. The Programmable Filter has a text property that
stores a Python script to execute when the filter is updated.
ss = pm.NewProxy(sources, SphereSource)
Inputs to the Programmable Filter are available within this
ss.GetProperty(Radius).SetElement(0, 2.0)
script. Complete specification of the output data set is possible
controller.RegisterPipelineProxy(ss)
within the script, including setting the output data type, the
view = pm.GetProxy(views, RenderView1)
data set toplogy (i.e., type and number of cells), as well as
rep = view.CreateDefaultRepresentation(ss, 0)
point and cell arrays.
controller.RegisterRepresentationProxy(rep)
rep.GetProperty(Input).SetInputConnection(0, ss, 0)
At
its
core,
the
Programmable
Filter
is
rep.GetProperty(Visibility).SetElement(0, 1)
defined by the VTK-derived C++ class named
controller.Show(ss, 0, view)
vtkPythonProgrammableFilter. Using the Python
view.ResetCamera()
C API, the vtkPythonProgrammableFilter passes a
view.StillRender()
reference to itself to the Python environment in which the
Note in this example the various references to proxies. A proxy script executes so that it is available within the script itself.
here refers to the proxy programming design pattern where This makes it possible to access the inputs and outputs to the
one object provides an interface to another object. Proxies filter via:
are central to ParaViews design. In a number of the various input = self.GetInput()
client/server configuration in which ParaView can be run, the output = self.GetOutput()
client software running on a local workstation connects to
Arbitrarily complex Python scripts can be executed to generate
a remote server running one or more processes on different
the filters output. The following example moves points in
nodes of a high-performance computing resource. Proxies for
an input vtkPointSet along normals associated with the
each pipeline object exist on the ParaView client, and they
points if available.
provide the interface for communicating state to all the VTK
ipd = self.GetInput()
objects in each client and server process.
opd = self.GetOutput()
In the example above, a new proxy for a
vtkSphereSource object is created. This proxy has # Output is shallow-copied by default
a property named Radius that is modified to the value # Deep copy the points so that we are not modifying
# the input points.
2.0. Changes to the Radius property are forwarded to the opd.DeepCopy(ipd)
Radius property of the underlying vtkSphereSource.
As this example demonstrates, creating a new data source, a na = ipd.GetPointData().GetArray(Normals)
if na != None:
representation for it (how it is rendered), and adding the reprefor i in xrange(ipd.GetNumberOfPoints()):
pt = ipd.GetPoint(i)
sentation to the view (where it is rendered), is an involved pron = na.GetTuple(i)
cess when using the paraview.servermanager module
newPt = (pt[0]+n[0], pt[1]+n[1], pt[2]+n[2])
directly. Fortunately, ParaView provides a simplified Python
opd.GetPoints().SetPoint(i, newPt)
interface that hides most of these details, making Python
The
Programmable
Filter
also
uses
the
scripting much more accessible.
vtk.numpy_interface.dataset_adapter
module
The paraview.simple layer provides simpler Python
functions to create pipelines and modify filter and visual- to wrap the inputs to the filter. All of the wrapped inputs
ization properties. The same example above expressed with are added to a list named inputs, and the single output is
wrapped in an object named output. By using the wrapped
paraview.simple functions is reduced to
inputs and outputs, the filter above becomes simply
from paraview import simple
Sphere(Radius=2.0)
Show()
Render()

ipts = inputs[0].Points
normals = inputs[0].PointData[Normals]
output.Points = ipts + normals

38

It is important to note that Python scripts in the Programmable

Filter may use only VTK classes and other Python modules,
but not any of the modules in the paraview package. If
those modules are imported, the behavior is undefined.
Python Programmable Source

Within ParaView it is also possible to define Python script that

defines data sources using the Python Programmable Source.
This source functions much like the Python Programmable
Filter, but does not require any input data sets.
Python Calculator

ParaViews Python Calculator filter is a light-weight alternative to the Programmable Filter used to compute
additional point or cell arrays using NumPy or the
numpy_interface.algorithms module. The following
expression computes the areas of polygons in a surface mesh:
algs.area(inputs[0])

Note that the numpy_interface.algorithms is imported with the name algs in the Python environment in
which the expression is evaluated. In the Python Calculator,
the property Array Association, which indicates whether the
output array should be a point or cell array, must be set to
Cell Data because one area value is produced per cell. Note
that like the Programmable Filter, the inputs are wrapped
with the vtk.numpy_interface.dataset_adapter
module functions and stored in an inputs list.
Python Annotation

PROC. OF THE 14th PYTHON IN SCIENCE CONF. (SCIPY 2015)

Python View

While ParaViews roots are in the loading and display of

traditional 3D scientific visualizations, it has grown over the
years to support more data set types and different displays of
those data set types. These different displays, or "Views" in
ParaView parlance, include a 3D interactive rendering view,
a histogram view, a parallel coordinates view, and a large
number of others.
One of these other view types is the Python View. This view
is similar to the programmable filter in that the user supplies
a Python script that generates some data. In the case of the
Python View, the data that is generated is an image to display
in the ParaView window. This makes it possible to use Python
plotting packages, such as matplotlib, to generate plots to be
displayed directly in ParaView.
Scripts used in the Python view are required to define two
functions, a setup_data function and a render function.
Rendering in the Python view is done on the local client,
so data that resides on remote server processes must first be
brought over to the client. Because data sets may be larger
than the clients RAM, only a subset of the data arrays in
a data set are copied to the client. By default, no arrays are
copied. Arrays can be requested using functions available in
the vtkPythonView class instance that is passed in as an
argument to the setup_data function, e.g.,
def setup_data(view):
view.SetAttributeArrayStatus(0, \
vtkDataObject.POINT, "Density", 1)

The actual generation of the plot image is expected to be

done in the render function. This function is expected to
take the same view object as is passed to the setup_data
function. It also takes a width and height parameter that tells
how large the plotted image should be in terms of pixels. This
function is expected to return an instance of vtkImageData
containing the plot image. A few utilities are included in the
paraview.python_view module to convert Python arrays
and images to vtkImageData. An example that creates a
histogram of an array named "Density" is provided here:
def render(view, width, height):
from paraview \
import python_view.matplotlib_figure
figure = matplotlib_figure(width, height)

Fig. 2: Three annotations filters in the scene show the minimum,

maximum, and total areas of polygons in the sphere source.

It is often desirable to annotate visualizations with numerical values taken either directly from the data set or
computed from the data. The Python Annotation filter in
ParaView provides this capability in a convenient way. The
filter takes a Python expression that is evaluated when the
filter is executed and the value returned by the expression
is displayed in the render view. Importantly, these annotations can come from data analysis results from NumPy
or numpy_interface.algorithms. Figure 2 shows an
example using the Python Annotation filter.

ax = figure.add_subplot(1,1,1)
ax.minorticks_on()
ax.set_title(Plot title)
ax.set_xlabel(X label)
ax.set_ylabel(Y label)
# Process only the first visible object in the
# pipeline browser
do = view.GetVisibleDataObjectForRendering(0)
dens = do.GetPointData().GetArray(Density)
# Convert VTK data array to numpy array
from paraview.numpy_support import vtk_to_numpy
ax.hist(vtk_to_numpy(dens), bins=10)
return python_view.figure_to_image(figure)

For more information on the Python View, see Section 4.11

in [Aya15] or [Qua13].

SCIENTIFIC DATA ANALYSIS AND VISUALIZATION WITH PYTHON, VTK, AND PARAVIEW

ParaViewWeb

ParaViewWeb is a framework for remote VTK and ParaView processing and visualization via a web browser. The
framework on the server side is based on the Autobahn,
Twisted, Six, and ZopeInterface Python libraries. On the client
side, ParaViewWeb provides a set of JavaScript libraries that
use WebGL, JQuery, and Autobahn.js. Images are typically
generated on the server and sent to the client for display, but
if the visualized geometry is small enough, geometry can be
sent to the client and rendered with WebGL.
A nice feature of ParaViewWeb is that the server component
can be launched with pvpython. No separate web server
is needed. For example, on Linux, the following command
launches the ParaViewWeb server from the ParaView installation directory
./bin/pvpython
\
lib/paraview-4.1/site-packages/paraview/\
web/pv_web_visualizer.py --port 8080
\
--content ./share/paraview-4.1/www \
--data-dir /path-to-share/ &
\

Once the server is running, it can be accessed through a web

browser at the URL http://localhost:8080/apps/Visualizer. This
is one example application that comes with the framework. It
has much of the same functionality as the ParaView desktop
application. ParaViewWeb can also be used to display images within an iPython notebook. For additional information
about using and extending the ParaViewWeb framework, see
[Pvw15].

39

parallel computing resources, the amount of RAM available

per node can be relatively limited. As a result, when running
ParaView on such a resource, it is important to reduce the size
of the executables as much as possible to leave room for the
data. One way to do this is to use the Python wrapping to communicate among processes instead of using the client/server
communication class. Indeed, when this option is enabled,
the process of creating the special communication classes
is skipped. Instead, communication is performed by sending
strings with Python expressions to destination processes. These
expressions are then evaluated on each process to change the
state of local VTK classes. In this approach, we get the same
functionality as the custom client/server communication layer
wrapping, but with smaller executables.
Conclusions

Python has been integrated into VTK and ParaView for many
years. The integration continues to mature and expand as
Python is used in an increasing number of ways in both
software packages. As Python continues to grow in popularity
among the scientific community, so too does the need for
providing easy-to-use Pythonic interfaces to scientific visualization tools. As demonstrated in this paper, VTK and
ParaView are well-positioned to continue adapting to the future
needs of scientific Python programmers.
Future Work

VTK and ParaView currently support Python 2.6 and 2.7.

Support for Python 3 is targeted for sometime in 2016.
Acknowledgements

Contributions to Python support in VTK and ParaView have

come from many VTK community members. Deserving special recognition are key contributors David Gobbi, Prabhu
Ramachandran, Ken Martin, Berk Geveci, Utkarsh Ayachit,
Ben Boeckel, Andy Cedilnik, Brad King, David Partyka,
George Zagaris, Marcus Hanwell, and Mathieu Malaterre.

R EFERENCES
Fig. 3: The ParaViewWeb Visualizer application web interface.

[Aya14]

Unified Server Bindings

[Aya15]

As previously discussed, ParaView uses proxies to manage

state among VTK class instances associated with pipeline
objects on distributed process. For example, when the proxy
for a cross-section filter has its cutting plane property changed,
the underlying VTK filter on each process is updated so that
is has the same cutting plane. These instances are updated
via a client/server communication layer that is generated
automatically using a wrapping mechanism. The client/server
layer consists of one communication class per VTK class that
serializes and deserializes state in the VTK class.
As discussed, a similar wrapping process is also performed
to generate Python bindings for VTK classes and ParaView
classes. Each of these wrappings adds to the size of the
executable files and shared libraries. On very large scale

[Gev14]
[Kit15]
[Pvw15]
[PyQt15]
[PyS15]
[Qua13]
[Sch04]
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