An image processing method separates an input image into a skeleton component, and residual component. In the method a local variation amount, which is a variation amount between a target pixel and a pixel adjacent to the target pixel, is calculated; a skeleton component extraction filter weight is calculated based on the local variation amount; an image feature amount of a gradient direction of a pixel value around the target pixel, and an image feature amount of a gradient strength of the pixel value around the target pixel, are calculated; the skeleton component extraction filter weight is corrected based on these image feature amount; a skeleton component extraction filter coefficient is calculated based on the corrected skeleton component extraction filter weight; and the skeleton component is extracted by applying skeleton component extraction filtering to the target pixel using the calculated skeleton component extraction filter coefficient.