EYE OPEN/CLOSE DETECTION THROUGH CORRELATION

A region of the eyes in an image of the face photographed by a camera 1 and input to an image input means 2 is specified by an eye-region determining means 8. The image of the eyes in the eye region is binarized by an eye-image binarizing means 9. The coordinates of the binarized image are rotated by a coordinate rotating means 10 to obtain an adequate correlation coefficient. The image of the eyes, the coordinates of which have been rotated, is used in a calculation which is performed by a correlation calculating means 11. In accordance with an obtained correlation coefficient, an opening/closing determining means 12 determines whether the eyes are opened or closed.