diff --git a/modules/highgui/src/loadsave.cpp b/modules/highgui/src/loadsave.cpp
index 6658b1335e..81c708acdd 100644
--- a/modules/highgui/src/loadsave.cpp
+++ b/modules/highgui/src/loadsave.cpp
@@ -137,9 +137,9 @@ static ImageDecoder findDecoder( const Mat& buf )
         maxlen = std::max(maxlen, len);
     }
 
+    string signature(maxlen, ' ');
     size_t bufSize = buf.rows*buf.cols*buf.elemSize();
     maxlen = std::min(maxlen, bufSize);
-    string signature(maxlen, ' ');
     memcpy( &signature[0], buf.data, maxlen );
 
     for( i = 0; i < codecs.decoders.size(); i++ )
diff --git a/modules/python/test/test.py b/modules/python/test/test.py
index 10f32260b4..212fdbcd99 100755
--- a/modules/python/test/test.py
+++ b/modules/python/test/test.py
@@ -73,7 +73,7 @@ class OpenCVTests(unittest.TestCase):
 
     def get_sample(self, filename, iscolor = cv.CV_LOAD_IMAGE_COLOR):
         if not filename in self.image_cache:
-            filedata = urllib.urlopen("https://raw.github.com/Itseez/opencv/master/" + filename).read()
+            filedata = urllib.urlopen("https://raw.github.com/Itseez/opencv/2.4/" + filename).read()
             imagefiledata = cv.CreateMatHeader(1, len(filedata), cv.CV_8UC1)
             cv.SetData(imagefiledata, filedata, len(filedata))
             self.image_cache[filename] = cv.DecodeImageM(imagefiledata, iscolor)