Oblique projection ($Q(v+w)=v(H=V\oplus W)$)

If two closed subspaces of a Hilbert space give $H=V\oplus W$, the projection onto $V$ along $W$ fixes $V$ and vanishes on $W$. It need not be an orthogonal projection. The bounded inverse theorem applied to the addition map $(v,w)\mapsto v+w$ on the complete component spaces proves boundedness of the component maps. With both complementary subspaces nonzero, its operator norm and that of $I-Q$ equal $\sec {\theta }_{V,W^{\perp }}$, with the directed subspace angle convention. Indeed, for fixed $v\in V$, the smallest possible norm of $v+w$ over $w\in W$ is $\Vert P_{W^{\perp }}v\Vert$, which proves the formula for $\Vert Q\Vert$. Equality with $\Vert I-Q\Vert$ follows from the block representation $Q=\left(\begin{array}{cc}I& B\\ 0& 0\end{array}\right)$ on $V\oplus V^{\perp }$: both squared operator norms are $1+\Vert B{\Vert }^2$. If a summand is zero, $Q$ is zero or the identity operator, and one complementary operator norm is zero; those cases must be treated directly.

For equal finite-dimensional closed subspaces of a Hilbert space $T,S$, positivity of $\cos {\theta }_{T,S}$ makes $P_S{|}_T$ invertible. The displayed reconstruction is the unique element of $T$ whose orthogonal projection onto $S$ matches that of $f$. It is the oblique projection onto $T$ along $S^{\perp }$. Its operator norm is the value of the secant function at the directed subspace angle, and its error is at most that secant function value times the best orthogonal projection error. The lower error bound follows from the Pythagorean identity. Zero-dimensional cases are handled directly.