PURPOSE: To provide the method and device for processing image pickup signals in which aperture correction for a low level luminance signal is suppressed to enable the aperture correction without a sense of incongruity for a display processing image or the like.

CONSTITUTION: A signal from a solid-state image pickup element 101 is separated into a luminance signal and a chrominance signal by a luminance signal/chrominance signal separator 105 and the separated luminance signal is given to a gamma correction circuit 114, a high pass filter 120, a gain adjustment circuit 121 and a base clip circuit 122, from which a luminance signal high frequency component YH subject to gain adjustment and noise elimination is obtained. On the other hand, the separated chrominance signal is given to a simultaneous processing circuit 106, a 1st matrix arithmetic circuit 107, a white balance circuit 108, a gamma correction circuit 109, and a 2nd matrix arithmetic circuit 110, in which arithmetic processing is conducted to obtain a color difference signal and the luminance signal and the luminance signal high frequency component YH is multiplied with a coefficient from a coefficient generating circuit 124 depending on the level of the luminance signal at a multiplier 123 and the result is added to the luminance signal whose phase is adjusted by a delay circuit 115 at an adder 116.