How can I remove the background from a bokeh photo?

Question

Is there a way to remove the bokeh background from photos using Mathematica? An example photo is given below.

I tried the methods that are answered here and here, but they don't seem to work.

Related: https://mathematica.stackexchange.com/q/132844/280, https://mathematica.stackexchange.com/q/151332/280 — Alexey Popkov, Sep 17 '22 at 06:22
RemoveBackground[img, "Salient"] works pretty well here as a quick background removal screenshot — ydd, Jan 26 '24 at 16:11
@ydd oh it wasn't working in MMA 12 but now it works. Can you post this as an answer, so that I can accept it? — codebpr, Jan 26 '24 at 17:32

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 26 '24 at 17:46

img = Import["https://i.stack.imgur.com/SMAtq.jpg"]

Adding as an answer, here are two methods to remove the blurry background. There are likely several more methods.

Using RemoveBackground

The "Salient" method works well without any further modification needed:

sal = RemoveBackground[img, "Salient"]

Mathematica graphics

This actually might produce the same results as RemoveBackground (other than the black instead of white background), but I'm not sure.

sfil = ImageSaliencyFilter[img];
sfil*img

Mathematica graphics