diff --git a/check_modules.py b/check_modules.py
index 15bb921..14c402a 100644
--- a/check_modules.py
+++ b/check_modules.py
@@ -1,4 +1,7 @@
-import imp
+import subprocess as sp
+import sys
+import importlib
+
 
 MODULES = [
     'os',
@@ -7,7 +10,7 @@
     'subprocess',
     'fnmatch',
     'logging',
-    'pylab',
+    'matplotlib',
     'errno',
     'datetime',
     'warnings',
@@ -16,16 +19,53 @@
     'argparse',
     'statsmodels',
     'PIL',
-    'astroscrappy']
+    'astroscrappy',
+    'skimage']
 
 missingModules = []
+installedModules = []
+failedToInstall = []
 
 
 def is_missing():
-    for m in MODULES:
+    for module in MODULES:
         try:
-            imp.find_module(m)
+            importlib.import_module(module)
         except ImportError:
-            missingModules.append(m)
+            missingModules.append(module)
 
     return missingModules
+
+
+def install_packages(packages):
+    print(('Missing modules: ' + ', '.join(packages)))
+
+    if 'PIL' in packages:
+        idx = packages.index('PIL')
+        packages[idx] = 'Pillow'
+
+    if 'skimage' in packages:
+        idx = packages.index('skimage')
+        packages[idx] = 'scikit-image'
+
+    for package in packages:
+        try:
+            if sys.version_info[0]  == 2:
+                sp.check_call([sys.executable, '-m', 'pip', 'install', '-q', package], stderr=sp.PIPE)
+            else:
+                sp.check_call([sys.executable, '-m', 'pip', 'install', '-q', package], stderr=sp.DEVNULL)
+
+            installedModules.append(package)
+
+        except sp.CalledProcessError:
+            failedToInstall.append(package)
+
+        if package == 'Pillow':
+            package = 'PIL'
+
+        if package == 'scikit-image':
+            package = 'skimage'
+
+        #globals()[package] = importlib.import_module(package)
+
+    return installedModules, failedToInstall
diff --git a/config.py b/config.py
index aa4d8db..21c4ad5 100644
--- a/config.py
+++ b/config.py
@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
+VERSION = '0.9.17'
+
 params = {}
 
 # command line arguments
diff --git a/gui.py b/gui.py
index 6314a04..6888657 100644
--- a/gui.py
+++ b/gui.py
@@ -1,11 +1,10 @@
-import os
 import check_modules
 
 requiredModules = check_modules.is_missing()
 if requiredModules:
-    print(('Missing modules: ' + ', '.join(requiredModules)))
-    os.sys.exit()
+    check_modules.install_packages(requiredModules)
 
+import os
 from datetime import datetime
 import threading
 import time
diff --git a/nsdrp.py b/nsdrp.py
index 666df84..f5e12d4 100644
--- a/nsdrp.py
+++ b/nsdrp.py
@@ -3,8 +3,13 @@
 
 requiredModules = check_modules.is_missing()
 if requiredModules:
-    print(('Missing modules: ' + ', '.join(requiredModules)))
-    os.sys.exit()
+    installedModules, failedModules = check_modules.install_packages(requiredModules)
+    if installedModules:
+        print('Installed: ' + ', '.join(installedModules))
+    if failedModules:
+        print(('Failed to install: ' + ', '.join(failedModules)))
+        print('Aborting NSDRP')
+        os.sys.exit()
 
 import config
 import nsdrp_cmnd
@@ -17,7 +22,6 @@
 # from DrpException import DrpException
 # import FlatCacher
 
-VERSION = '0.9.17'
 
 warnings.filterwarnings('ignore', category=UserWarning, append=True)
 
@@ -126,7 +130,7 @@ def init(out_dir, in_dir=None):
     if (config.params['cmnd_line_mode'] is False):
         setup_main_logger(logger, in_dir, out_dir)
 
-        logger.info('start nsdrp version {}'.format(VERSION))
+        logger.info('start nsdrp version {}'.format(config.VERSION))
         logger.info('cwd: {}'.format(os.getcwd()))
         logger.info('input dir: {}'.format(in_dir.rstrip('/')))
         logger.info('output dir: {}'.format(out_dir.rstrip('/')))
diff --git a/products.py b/products.py
index 7bb3526..7234031 100644
--- a/products.py
+++ b/products.py
@@ -18,7 +18,6 @@
 from skimage import exposure
 import image_lib
 import config
-import nsdrp
 
 warnings.filterwarnings('ignore')
 
@@ -110,7 +109,7 @@ def gen(reduced, out_dir):
 
     # prepare extended fits header
     header = reduced.header
-    header['NSDRPVER'] = (nsdrp.VERSION, 'NSDRP Version')
+    header['NSDRPVER'] = (config.VERSION, 'NSDRP Version')
     header['COMMENT'] = ('NSDRP', 'NSDRP')
     if reduced.frameCalRmsRes is not None:
         header['WFITRMS'] = (round(reduced.frameCalRmsRes, 4),
diff --git a/reduce_frame.py b/reduce_frame.py
index 7533fd0..919db5e 100644
--- a/reduce_frame.py
+++ b/reduce_frame.py
@@ -8,7 +8,6 @@
 import ReducedDataSet
 import reduce_order
 import wavelength_utils
-import nsdrp
 import Flat
 from logging import INFO
 import Order
@@ -434,7 +433,7 @@ def log_start_summary(reduced):
     """
     # TODO: structure and format this like nsdrp_cmnd.write_summary()
 
-    logger.info('nsdrp version {}'.format(nsdrp.VERSION))
+    logger.info('nsdrp version {}'.format(config.VERSION))
 
     loggers = ['obj']
     if config.params['cmnd_line_mode'] is False: