Remove background no longer leaves original image in place

Hi ​@Paul Johns ,

I understand that you noticed the recent update has changed how Remove Background behaves, and that this is impacting your workflow.

I just tested it on my end, and I can confirm that Remove Background is currently removing the background directly from the original image.

Just to clarify — previously, when you applied Remove Background, the original fill would be hidden and a new fill with the background removed would be added on top, is that right?

It's a bit hard to confirm, but I noticed a similar behavior in the video within this guide: Make or edit an image with AI - Remove background

I'll check internally to find out whether this change was intentional.

Thanks!

Hi ​@Junko3! Thanks for your reply. Yes, in that video, you can see that the original layer is still there, just hidden. Exactly. Here is a screenshot of what usually happens:

In this image (above), the top layer is the image with the background removed. The middle layer is a gradient I added (unimportant), and the bottom is the original image, still preserved. I have unhidden it. This used to be the result (minus the gradient) after an image had its background removed. Now, no matter what was there before, when I remove a background, it reduces to one layer. The one with its background removed, like this (below): 

Thank you for your help in this matter.

Hello ​@Paul Johns ! Thanks for confirming and sharing the additional info! I've gone ahead and passed this along internally for review. I'll update you once I hear back!

​@Junko3 Thank you so much! I was worried this would just get buried. I really appreciate your efforts.

​@Junko3 I’m not trying to overload you, but something related that I’m noticing now, is that all sorts of layers are being combined together. So, If I have an image of a man, and I type “words” on top of him, then I remove background on the image, those “words” are now embedded in the resulting image, even when I hide or delete that layer (see below):

Thank you Paul Johns for bringing this issue up! We’ve just noticed this and it is impacting work efficiencies across our organization.

​@SirenaBarrell Glad to be of help!

Please bring back the original image layer! This also allowed me and my team to easily create neat effects in Figma without having multiple copies of the same image. 

Thank you for sharing the additional info and helpful screenshot!
All the information you've shared has been passed along to our engineering team, who are currently reviewing and considering it based on feedback like yours. I'll update this thread as soon as I hear back with more details.

Just jumping in to say that this is critical to the way our agency works as well. Would love to have the original functionality reinstated.

Thank you ​@Ayub Beriev! I didn’t even restart and it worked! Shout out to ​@Junko3 for all your help and work on this. I appreciate you. :) 

So glad to hear it's working as you expected. Yes, the Remove Background behavior has been reverted back to how it was before.
Thank you for bringing this to our attention — feedback like yours helps make Figma better for everyone! 😊