Remove Background Shadows

ROLE
Act as a senior professional photo retoucher, image editor, photographer and AI image-editing specialist. Perform a controlled, production-quality edit of the uploaded image. Treat the source image as the ground truth: preserve everything that is not explicitly requested to change.

EDIT
Remove only unwanted or distracting shadows cast onto the background of the uploaded image. Reconstruct the affected background areas naturally using the surrounding background's existing color, texture, illumination and perspective. Preserve the foreground subject, objects, composition, lighting and every unrelated detail exactly.

PRIMARY OBJECTIVE
Execute the requested "Remove Background Shadows" edit convincingly and naturally. The finished background should appear clean and evenly illuminated where the unwanted shadows were removed, while retaining realistic texture, tonal variation and environmental character. The result must not look artificially flattened, over-brightened or digitally reconstructed.

EDITING PRIORITY
1. Remove only unwanted shadows affecting the background.
2. Preserve the foreground subject and all unrelated image content exactly.
3. Reconstruct obscured background detail naturally and consistently.
4. Maintain realistic background color, texture, illumination and perspective.
5. Prefer subtle localized correction over global brightening or artificial flattening.

BACKGROUND SHADOW REMOVAL — IMPORTANT
- Identify shadows that are visibly cast onto the background and are appropriate to remove.
- Remove only those targeted background shadows.
- Do not remove natural shading that defines the physical shape, depth or geometry of background objects.
- Do not remove shadows from the subject, clothing, face, hair or foreground objects.
- Do not globally brighten the entire image.
- Do not replace the background.
- Do not blur or smooth the background merely to hide the shadow.
- Reconstruct the underlying background as though the unwanted cast shadow had not been present when the photograph was taken.
- Match surrounding brightness and color conservatively.
- Preserve natural gradual illumination changes already present in the scene.
- The corrected area should integrate seamlessly with adjacent unaffected background regions.

BACKGROUND RECONSTRUCTION
- Infer obscured background appearance from immediately surrounding visible information.
- Preserve existing walls, floors, surfaces, architecture, furniture and environmental elements.
- Preserve background geometry, perspective and spatial relationships.
- Continue existing textures naturally through corrected areas.
- Maintain realistic surface imperfections, grain and subtle tonal variation.
- Preserve seams, edges, corners and structural lines.
- Preserve readable text, logos, patterns and artwork whenever present.
- Do not invent new objects or decorative details.
- Do not create repeated, cloned or mirrored texture patterns.
- If the exact hidden detail cannot be reliably determined, use the simplest visually consistent reconstruction rather than inventing complex information.

LIGHTING & TONAL CONTINUITY
- Match the surrounding background's existing exposure and illumination.
- Preserve the original scene's overall light direction, intensity, softness and color temperature.
- Remove the targeted cast shadow without changing the global lighting of the photograph.
- Maintain believable brightness gradients where naturally present.
- Preserve natural ambient illumination and color spill.
- Avoid making corrected areas brighter than comparable surrounding surfaces.
- Avoid creating flat, uniformly illuminated surfaces when subtle natural variation should remain.
- Preserve highlights and legitimate shadows unrelated to the requested removal.
- Do not introduce artificial glow or additional light sources.

TEXTURE PRESERVATION
- Preserve the original background material and surface texture.
- Maintain realistic detail in painted walls, concrete, wood, fabric, stone, flooring and other surfaces.
- Match the source image's sharpness, focus, grain, noise and compression character.
- Reconstructed areas must not appear smoother, sharper or more detailed than adjacent areas.
- Preserve subtle surface imperfections where visible.
- Do not use excessive noise reduction or smoothing.
- Do not create obvious cloning patterns or texture repetition.

SUBJECT & FOREGROUND PRESERVATION
- Preserve the foreground subject exactly.
- Preserve facial identity, expression, hairstyle and skin texture.
- Preserve body shape, proportions, anatomy and pose.
- Preserve clothing design, material, color, fit, patterns, logos and text.
- Preserve accessories, jewelry and handheld objects.
- Preserve subject lighting, including genuine shadows and highlights.
- Do not relight the subject as part of the background correction.
- Protect fine boundaries such as hair strands, eyelashes, fingers, glasses and clothing edges.
- Do not allow reconstructed background texture to overlap foreground elements.

SHADOW BOUNDARY INTEGRATION
- Carefully correct areas where the unwanted background shadow meets the subject or foreground objects.
- Preserve fine hair and clothing boundaries.
- Remove residual dark halos caused by the targeted background shadow only when they belong to the background.
- Do not erase genuine contact shadows or edge shading belonging to foreground objects.
- Maintain natural anti-aliased boundaries appropriate to the source resolution.
- Avoid visible masking edges, halos or abrupt brightness transitions.

STRICT PRESERVATION RULES
- Do not change anything outside the requested background-shadow removal unless a tiny correction is absolutely necessary for seamless integration.
- Preserve the original composition, crop, camera position, perspective and aspect ratio.
- Preserve all people who are not explicitly targeted by the edit.
- Preserve facial identity, body proportions, pose, hand position and anatomy.
- Preserve clothing, accessories, jewelry, tattoos, scars, freckles, moles, logos and other distinctive details.
- Preserve background architecture, furniture, objects, text and environmental details.
- Do not introduce unrelated props, people, text, logos, decorations or environmental changes.
- Do not remove legitimate environmental shadows that are unrelated to the targeted background shadow.

REALISM & INTEGRATION
- Match the source image's existing photographic characteristics.
- Match local reflections, ambient light and color spill where relevant.
- Match the original camera perspective, lens characteristics, depth of field, focus falloff and motion blur.
- Match image grain, noise structure, sharpness and compression character.
- Maintain correct scale, depth and occlusion between foreground and background elements.
- Ensure reconstructed areas follow the original background's geometry and focal characteristics.
- Keep corrected transitions clean but naturally invisible.

ANATOMY & GEOMETRY SAFETY
- Keep human anatomy physically correct.
- Do not alter facial features, limbs, hands, clothing or body proportions.
- Do not warp straight architectural lines or nearby background geometry.
- Do not distort objects while reconstructing shadowed regions.
- Do not create duplicate objects, broken edges or impossible perspective.
- Preserve the subject's original scale and position within the frame.

ARTIFACT PREVENTION
Avoid:
- global image brightening
- removing shadows from the subject
- removing legitimate structural shadows
- replacing the background
- flat or artificial background lighting
- overexposed corrected areas
- visible bright patches
- blurred shadow-removal areas
- excessive skin or background smoothing
- repeated or cloned textures
- smeared background detail
- warped architectural lines
- corrupted text or logos
- halos around the subject
- visible masking boundaries
- mismatched color temperature
- invented objects or environmental details
- altered subject lighting
- obvious generative-AI artifacts

QUALITY CONTROL
Before finalizing, inspect the entire image and mentally compare it with the source. Verify that:
- the unwanted background shadow has been removed;
- legitimate shadows elsewhere remain intact;
- the subject and foreground objects remain unchanged;
- reconstructed background areas match surrounding color, brightness and texture;
- natural tonal variation remains present;
- the background has not been artificially flattened or globally brightened;
- architectural lines, objects, patterns and textures remain coherent;
- subject lighting and facial identity remain unchanged;
- fine foreground boundaries remain clean;
- no halos, bright patches, cloning patterns or reconstruction artifacts are visible;
- all untouched areas remain faithful to the original;
- the result looks like the background shadow was never present;
- the correction remains believable at close inspection.

OUTPUT
Return one polished final image only. Preserve the original aspect ratio and framing unless the requested edit explicitly requires otherwise. Use the highest practical image quality and detail available. Do not add captions, watermarks, borders or explanatory text to the image.