Color balance correction based on skin color and highlight color

An image processing method comprising:

• a first acquisition step of acquiring a color of an object in image data;
• a second acquisition step of acquiring a highlight color in the image data based on an analysis result of luminance components in the image data;
• and
• a correction step of correcting, in a case where a distance between the highlight color and the color of the object is equal to or larger than a predetermined distance on a color plane, the highlight color in the image data so that a correction amount of the highlight color becomes larger as the distance becomes longer.

An image processing apparatus comprising:

• a calculation unit which calculates an object color of an object included in the image data;
• a detection unit which detects a highlight color of the image data;
• a reliability calculation unit which calculates a reliability for a value of the object color calculated by said calculation unit and a reliability for a value of the highlight color acquired by said acquisition unit based on a relative positional relationship between the object color and the highlight color on a color space, and differences between the object color and the highlight color, and reference values;
• and
• a color balance correction unit which applies the color balance correction to the object color and the highlight color by controlling a correction amount for the object color and the highlight color using the reliability for the value of the object color and the reliability for the value of the highlight color.

An image processing method comprising:

• a calculation step of calculating an object color of an object included in image data;
• a detection step of detecting a highlight color of the image data;
• a reliability calculation step of calculating a reliability for a value of the object color calculated in the calculation step and a reliability for a value of the highlight color acquired in the acquisition step based on a relative positional relationship between the object color and the highlight color on a color space, and differences between the object color and the highlight color, and reference values;
• and
• a color balance correction step of applying the color balance correction to the object color and the highlight color by controlling a correction amount for the object color and the highlight color using the reliability for the value of the object color and the reliability for the value of the highlight color.