1. A face illumination normalization method, comprising: (a) acquiring a digital image including data corresponding to a face that appears to be illuminated unevenly; (b) applying separate sets of directional and uniform illumination classifier programs to the face data; (c) identifying the face data as corresponding to a projection of said face within the digital image on one or a combination of the directional illumination classifier programs plus a constant vector representing said face according to one or a combination of the uniform illumination classifier programs, thereby decomposing the face data into orthogonal subspaces for directional and uniform illumination; (d) normalizing an illumination condition for the face including setting one or more illumination parameters of the directional illumination projection to zero; (e) electronically storing, transmitting, applying a face recognition program to, editing, or displaying the corrected face image, or combinations thereof.