IMAGE PROCESSOR AND IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processor and an image processing method for accurately detecting the presence/absence of the face and the position of the face even when an illuminating environment fluctuates in an imaging region for detecting the presence/absence and position of the face. SOLUTION: A template image as the density gradient direction image of one or more illumination models for a predetermined imaging region is prestored in a face detection template storage part 12, and when an image input part 11 inputs image data which is obtained by imaging the predetermined imaging region by an imaging part 1 and which is used for detecting the face position included in the predetermined imaging region, a density gradient direction image is prepared by a density gradient direction extracting part 13, and stored in a density gradient direction image storage part 14. Then, a face detecting part 15 compares the density gradient direction image of the density gradient direction image storage part 14 with the template image for each illumination model to calculate the similarity of both images, and detects the presence/absence of the face in the predetermined imaging region and the position of the face based on the similarity. COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT