Shadows seriously affect the target detection accuracy in a complex scene. A traditional target-detection method can easily misidentify moving shadows as moving targets. To solve this problem, this study proposes an improved video-shading removal algorithm combining the Laplace-Gaussian (log) operator with the ViBe algorithm. A two-dimensional (2D) digital filter based on the log operator was used for filter detection. The coefficient matrix of the 2D digital filter was rotated by 180° to create a convolution kernel, which was convoluted with the input image matrix to achieve image edge detection. Finally, the improved log operator was used to extract the outer contour and foreground target edges. The two edges were subtracted to obtain the inner edge, which was the moving target edge with the shadow eliminated. Experiment results reveal that the improved algorithm is robust and can effectively eliminate shadows.