diff --git a/manual/conf.py b/manual/conf.py
index c5dea00c7c..996cdcc753 100644
--- a/manual/conf.py
+++ b/manual/conf.py
@@ -20,9 +20,10 @@ sys.path.append(base)
 sys.path.insert(0, os.path.dirname(base))
 from setup import __appname__, __version__
 from calibre.utils.localization import localize_website_link
+import calibre.utils.img as cimg
 import custom
 del sys.path[0]
-custom
+custom, cimg
 # General configuration
 # ---------------------
 
diff --git a/src/calibre/web/fetch/simple.py b/src/calibre/web/fetch/simple.py
index cbcd760490..b629fa9fd5 100644
--- a/src/calibre/web/fetch/simple.py
+++ b/src/calibre/web/fetch/simple.py
@@ -25,7 +25,6 @@ from calibre.ebooks.BeautifulSoup import BeautifulSoup
 from calibre.ebooks.chardet import xml_to_unicode
 from calibre.utils.config import OptionParser
 from calibre.utils.filenames import ascii_filename
-from calibre.utils.img import image_from_data, image_to_data
 from calibre.utils.imghdr import what
 from calibre.utils.logging import Log
 from calibre.web.fetch.utils import rescale_image
@@ -440,6 +439,7 @@ class RecursiveFetcher:
                     x.write(data)
                 tag['src'] = imgpath
             else:
+                from calibre.utils.img import image_from_data, image_to_data
                 try:
                     # Ensure image is valid
                     img = image_from_data(data)