How do I convert a numpy array to (and display) an image?

I have created an array thusly:

import numpy as np
data = np.zeros( (512,512,3), dtype=np.uint8)
data[256,256] = [255,0,0]

What I want this to do is display a single red dot in the center of a 512x512 image. (At least to begin with... I think I can figure out the rest from there)

The following should work:

from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
plt.imshow(data, interpolation='nearest')
plt.show()

If you are using Jupyter notebook/lab, use this inline command before importing matplotlib:

%matplotlib inline 

A more featureful way is to install ipyml pip install ipympl and use

%matplotlib widget 

see an example.

You could use PIL to create (and display) an image:

from PIL import Image
import numpy as np

w, h = 512, 512
data = np.zeros((h, w, 3), dtype=np.uint8)
data[0:256, 0:256] = [255, 0, 0] # red patch in upper left
img = Image.fromarray(data, 'RGB')
img.save('my.png')
img.show()