Here are some lessons learned and working approaches after many trials-and-errors to build tensor flow experiment virtual environments on Mac OSX. The built playgrounds should be able to experiment with various input / output interactively. Many online articles and FAQs are actually not working correctly, at least on my MacBook. 
  Two kinds of virtual environments are verified, 
    (1) python virtual environment
    (2) docker/container
  This one covers two specific parts:
    (1) a tensorflow container with novnc, so that X11 GUI is accessible via browser. 
    (2) a tensorflow container with ffmpeg, so that matplotlib animation could embed on Jupyter notebook. 
    
  Appendix section contains other verified working alternatives.  

    docker pull quay.io/draft/tensorflow-novnc
    docker run -v $PWD:/source -d -p 8080:8080 quay.io/draft/tensorflow-novnc
    open http://localhost:8080/vnc.html

    // It might be easier to experiment with CLI and see the output figures on browser altogether
    docker exec -it <tensorflow-novnc container id> bash

    docker pull quay.io/draft/tensorflow-ffmpeg
    docker run -it -p 8888:8888 -v ${PWD}:/source --rm quay.io/draft/tensorflow-ffmpeg
    // remember to add followings to embed matplotlib animations
        (1) %matplotlib inline
        (2) from matplotlib import rc
        (3) from IPython.display import HTML
        (4) rc('animation', html='html5') 
            ...
        (5) type <your_animation_variable> in a new cell // it will show the embedded animation video

        Note: refer to
        (1) http://louistiao.me/posts/notebooks/embedding-matplotlib-animations-in-jupyter-notebooks/
        (2) http://louistiao.me/posts/notebooks/save-matplotlib-animations-as-gifs/   

(1) install specific python version:
    brew update
    brew install pyenv 
    brew install pyenv-virtualenv
    pyenv install 3.5.2  // install Python 3.5.2
    
(2) create a virtual environment and activate it:
    eval "$(pyenv init -)" // add this line to ~/.bash_profile if needed
    pyenv virtualenv 3.5.2 tf-py352  // create virtual environment (tf-py352) with Python 3.5.2
    pyenv activate tf-py352 // activate tf-py352 virtual environment
    
    Related commands:
    pyenv deactivate <virtual-env> // deactivate specified virtual environment
    pyenv uninstall <virtual-env> // delete specified virtual environment
    pyenv versions // list installed python versions
    pyenv virtualenvs // list created virtual environments

(3) install libraries/modules within virtual environment:
	brew install freetype   // prerequisite of matplotlib
    pip install numpy matplotlib ipython jupyter opencv-python
    export TF_BINARY_URL=https://storage.googleapis.com/tensorflow/mac/cpu/tensorflow-0.10.0rc0-py3-none-any.whl
    pip install --upgrade $TF_BINARY_URL
    
(4) setup matplotlib backends on Mac:
    // get matplotlib configuration file place
    >>> import matplotlib
    >>> matplotlib.matplotlib_fname()
    // change backend to TkAgg via editor
    
    Notes:
    <1> default backend "macos" doesn't work with python virtual environments. furthermore, the workarounds listed on matplotlib.org's FAQ don't work as well. (http://matplotlib.org/faq/virtualenv_faq.html)
    <2> backend "Qt4Agg" doesn't work as well. To use it, it's needed to have PySide, which will take quite a long time to build. Even worse, after time/space spent for setup build environment/tool (Xcode w/ right SDK version) and built it successfully, it just still not work...

(5) experiment with python: 
    // when use matplotlib.pyplot, its output will show on an interactive window 
    
(6) experiment with ipython:
    // when use matplotlib.pyplot, its output will show on an interactive window
    
(7) experiment with jupyter notebook:
    jupyter notebook // show a new tab for the notebook on the default browser 
    // if you'd like the output figure shown inlined instead of a pop out interactive window, you should add following line.
    %matplotlib inline

    Note:
    As mentioned earlier in "Setup the container with matplotlib animation on Jupyter notebook" section, it needs extra steps to embed matplotlib animation on Jupyter notebook.
    brew install ffmpeg // install ffmpeg on mac
    
    // remember to add followings to embed matplotlib animations
    (1) %matplotlib inline
    (2) from matplotlib import rc
    (3) from IPython.display import HTML
    (4) rc('animation', html='html5') 
            ...
    (5) type <your_animation_variable> in a new cell // it will show the embedded animation video

(1) download official tensor flow Docker image & launch it:
    docker pull gcr.io/tensorflow/tensorflow
    <1> Jupyter notebook
        docker run -it -p 8888:8888 -v ${PWD}:/source --rm gcr.io/tensorflow/tensorflow
        // remember to add "%matplotlib inline" to show matplotlib figures
        
    <2> CLI
        docker run -it -p 8888:8888 -v ${PWD}:/source --rm --entrypoint bash gcr.io/tensorflow/tensorflow
        // can not show matplotlib figures
        
(2) download custom Docker image with tensor flow & novnc:
    // customize official docker image by adding novnc, to enable X11 GUI access via browser
    // refer to earlier "Setup the container with X11 GUI on browser" section

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get install python-pip python-dev python-opencv
$ sudo pip install jupyter