Disclosed herein is an image processing apparatus including an upper body feature data storage unit (110) which stores upper body directional feature data, which indicates the upper body of a person and indicates that the upper body is facing a specific direction, for each of a plurality of directions in conjunction with directional data indicative of the direction of the upper body directional feature data; and an upper body detection unit (140) which extracts upper body image data indicative of the upper body of the person from image data by reading the plurality of upper body directional feature data stored in the upper body feature data storage unit (110) in conjunction with the directional data and using each of the plurality of upper body directional feature data.