Alright, you want to include some images from your search result into your blog post or use the images in your advertisement campaign. Trouble is that most of the images have watermarks that stock photos websites used to mark and protect the images copyright. The low opacity watermarks added onto stock images are difficult to remove especially if the image has a complex background.
The best way to obtain the images without watermarks is to purchase them from the stock photos websites. Which is good by the way because the image creators or photographers get paid.
However, recently Google Research showcased that the watermarks employed by image creators and photographers can be removed automatically with an algorithm. The algorithm can remove the watermarks simply because the watermarks are added in a consistent manner. The "weakness" or consistency allows the algorithm to recover the original image with high accuracy by estimating the "foreground" automatically.
IF you gain some knowledge or the information here solved your programming problem. Please consider donating to the less fortunate or some charities that you like. Apart from donation, planting trees, volunteering or reducing your carbon footprint will be great too.
