A face recognition that is robust to external illumination variations is provided. The face recognition apparatus includes a face localizer extracting a predetermined number of feature points from a facial region extracted from an input image, a Gabor filter unit applying a set of Gabor filters with a plurality of orientations and frequencies to each of the facial feature points in order to obtain filter responses and generates a one-dimensional (1-D) vector consisting of the filter responses, a training data set storage storing the 1-D vector when the gaber-filtered 1-D vector is obtained from a training image, and a binary classifier generating a binary determination criterion using the stored 1-D vector, applying the binary determination criterion to the 1-D vector when the gaber-filtered 1-D vector is obtained from an image to be recognized and determining the identity of the image to be recognized.
Face recognition method and apparatus