AI Remove for LightCraft

Remove objects and people from RAW photos with local AI, from inside
LightCraft — like Lightroom's Generative Remove, but on your own computer.
The result goes back into a RAW DNG, so you keep developing it like any raw file.

Italiano

AI Remove is an unofficial plug-in. It is not made, sponsored or endorsed by the ArtCraft team, who make
LightCraft.

How it works

1. In LightCraft, select a raw photo and press Ctrl+Shift+X (Cmd+Shift+X on a Mac).
2. Click what should go: SAM 3 selects the whole object. Alt/Option+click takes a part out, Shift+click adds one, and
   the brush and eraser handle the rest.
3. Remove selection generates a few variants with the model you chose. Pick the best one. To remove the
   object's shadow or reflection too, press Include the shadow first: it adds them to the selection, in blue.
   On a long removal (a pole, a cable, a railing), Full detail redraws the chosen variant at the photo's own
   resolution.
4. Save to LightCraft writes <name>-AIRemove.dng, stacked on the original with the same development.

Every removal stays editable: regenerate it, pick another variant or delete it whenever you like. Everything lives in
one project file next to the raw (<raw>.airemove). The original raw is never modified.

Features

• One-click selection with SAM 3, refined with more clicks, a brush and an eraser.
• Three fill models. LaMa is fast and runs on the processor. SDXL Inpainting makes generative variants. FLUX.1 Fill
  [dev] with Turbo-Alpha is the most realistic.
• Shadows and reflections (optional). OSOR and ObjectClear remove an object together with its shadow and
  reflection, though only the object is selected. "Include the shadow" uses OSOR to add the shadow to the selection,
  so every model removes it.
• Writes a real RAW. The fill is converted back into the camera's linear space and re-mosaicked into the Bayer data
  with matching sensor noise, so the DNG develops like the original.
• Seamless blending: a Poisson membrane plus texture transfer from the ring around the hole.
• Long removals stay sharp. A pole as tall as the photo, a cable or a railing is filled in tiles along it, each
  close to the model's own size, so the fill is not a small picture enlarged; thin ones also get a LaMa variant, which
  continues what is behind them best. Full detail redraws the chosen variant the same way, at the photo's
  resolution, keeping what it shows.
• Editable removals, each with its own variants, kept in a project file; reopening a photo brings them back.
• Windows, macOS (Apple Silicon) and Linux, on NVIDIA, AMD (ROCm), Intel Arc or Apple GPUs. It falls back to
  the processor without one.
• English and Italian. More languages are one catalog file away (see Languages).
• An MCP server, so an AI assistant can install, configure and use it (see For AI assistants).

Requirements

• LightCraft installed (getartcraft.com).
• Windows 10/11 with NVIDIA, AMD Radeon RX 7000/9000 or Intel Arc graphics. Without a GPU only LaMa is practical.
• macOS 12+ on Apple Silicon (M1 or later; 16 GB of memory recommended). Intel Macs are not supported.
• Linux x86-64 with NVIDIA, or AMD with ROCm.
• Disk: 5 to 30 GB, depending on the models.
• Internet: while installing. Afterwards only a check for a new AI Remove on GitHub, at most once a day: it
  sends nothing about you or your photos, and "update_check": false in work/settings.json turns it off.

Install

Download a package from the releases, or clone this repository, then run the installer for your system:

The installer:

1. detects the GPU and picks the right PyTorch build;
2. asks which models to install, showing what each one is for, its size and its licence. A model you already have
   on disk can be used from its folder instead of being downloaded again (see below);
3. puts a private Python 3.12, PyTorch and the models in ~/AIRemove;
4. creates the AI Remove app with its icon (Start menu, Applications, or the app menu);
5. sets LightCraft up: it enables LightCraft's local control channel (LIGHTCRAFT_CONTROL_PORT), makes AI Remove its
   external editor, and assigns Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+X.

Restart LightCraft once afterwards: it reads the control-channel setting only when it starts.

Non-interactive install:

sh installer/bootstrap.sh --yes --models lama,sam3,sdxl

On Windows:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File installer\bootstrap.ps1 --yes --models lama,sam3,sdxl

Other options:

Hugging Face token

SAM 3 is the same model LightCraft uses for its Object masks. When LightCraft has already downloaded it, AI Remove
links that copy and downloads nothing.

FLUX, and SAM 3 when LightCraft does not have it, are gated:

1. accept the licence on facebook/sam3 or
   black-forest-labs/FLUX.1-Fill-dev;
2. create a Read token at huggingface.co/settings/tokens and paste it when
   the installer asks.

AI Remove does not keep the token: it is used for the download only. The MCP server passes it to the installer in a
temporary file, and the installer deletes that file as soon as it has read it.

Models you already have

If a model is already on your disk, answer its question with its folder instead of y: you can drag the folder into
the installer's window. Any of these works:

• another AI Remove install, or its models folder;
• a Hugging Face cache (~/.cache/huggingface/hub), where the models are kept as models--<org>--<name>;
• ComfyUI's models folder (FLUX's GGUF in models/unet);
• the model's own folder.

The installer looks a few levels down, checks the files the same way the app does, and tells you what it found. A part
it does not find there is downloaded, for example FLUX's text encoders when only its GGUF is in ComfyUI. What it found is
used where it is: nothing is copied, and uninstalling AI Remove leaves that folder alone. The folders are recorded in
airemove.json (model_paths), so keep them where they are.

Without questions: --model-dir flux=D:\ComfyUI\models --model-dir sdxl=~/.cache/huggingface/hub.

Models

The installer shows the same descriptions, sizes and licences (from airemove/model_files.py).

An optional prompt in English guides SDXL and FLUX, for example "old plaster wall" or "dark doorway".

Using it

AI Remove also opens from the Start menu, Applications or the app menu. It always works on LightCraft's active photo.

Headless. A LightCraft mask named Remove (or Rimuovi, or Remove: <English prompt>) on the photo is the
starting selection. airemove-cli --auto sdxl fills it without opening the window, writes the DNG, and prints the
result as JSON.

Files it writes

Languages

AI Remove speaks English (the source language) and Italian. It picks the language in this order:

1. the AIREMOVE_LANG environment variable;
2. the language chosen in the window's top bar (the EN ▾ button);
3. LightCraft's own language;
4. the system's language;
5. English.

Translations are airemove/locales/<code>.json catalogs that map each English text to its translation, the way
LightCraft does it. To add a language:

1. copy airemove/locales/it.json to <code>.json and translate its values, keeping the {fields};
2. add the code and the language's own name to LANGUAGES in airemove/i18n.py;
3. run python tools/i18n_check.py. It lists missing or unused texts and broken placeholders, and --update adds
   new texts to every catalog.

For AI assistants

• mcp/ holds an MCP server that uses only the Python standard library. It works before AI Remove is installed, and
  can check the computer, install, configure LightCraft, open the app and run headless removals. Setup is in
  mcp/README.md.
• Agents with a shell should read AGENTS.md.

Uninstall

Uninstalling removes the app, its models and the LightCraft settings it added. Your photos, the DNGs it made and the
.airemove projects stay.

Privacy and security

Your photos never leave your computer. The only request to the internet after the install is the daily check for a
new version (above). AI Remove drives LightCraft through LightCraft's control channel. That
channel only accepts connections from your own computer (127.0.0.1, port 7980), but it has no password: while
LightCraft runs, any program on your computer can drive it. Uninstalling turns the channel off.

Development

Run from source with an install's Python:

~/AIRemove/venv/bin/python airemove/airemove.py --check

Build the release zips into dist/ and check them:

python tools/build_dist.py
python tools/check_dist.py

Releases are built by GitHub Actions (.github/workflows/release.yml). Set VERSION in airemove/system.py, then
push a tag v<VERSION>: the workflow builds the four packages from the tag, checks them, writes SHA256SUMS and
attaches everything to a draft release. Write its notes on GitHub, then publish it.

Licences

The code and the icon are under MIT (LICENSE.txt). The models are downloaded from their publishers
under their own licences, and none is bundled. Details: THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md.