Kensington Palace was plunged into chaos after the Princess of Wales made a public apology for editing a family photograph published around the world.
Kate admitted making several changes to a picture, released to celebrate Mother’s Day, showing her embracing her three children at their Windsor home. The future queen said sorry for the "confusion" over the digitally altered image, which caused the world’s biggest photo agencies to delete it from their libraries accessed by millions.
The princess was compelled to release a personal message on social media on Monday morning after waking up to an outcry that she had “manipulated” her family picture. A friend said she the future queen “would likely be upset by the furore caused by what was supposed to be an innocent family photograph”.
Kate admitted she edited the photo (PA)
The biggest news agencies removed the photo from their libraries (AP)A statement released on social media by the princess at 10.28am today and signed C for Catherine, said: "Like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally experiment with editing. "I wanted to express my apologies for any confusion the family photograph we shared yesterday caused. I hope everyone celebrating had a very happy Mother's Day. C".
The photograph of Kate and her children - Prince George, 10, Princess Charlotte, nine and Prince Louis, five - taken by the Prince of Wales and released by the palace on Sunday morning, was the first to be issued since the princess was hospitalised for two weeks following abdominal surgery on January 16. But it was withdrawn hours later by renowned international picture agencies including the Associated Press (AP) Reuters, Agence France-Presse (AFP) and Getty Images - and today the UK's Press Association news agency - with a “kill notice” over suspicions it had been manipulated.
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Royal sources said the Princess of Wales made "minor adjustments" and insisted that Kate and her husband Prince William simply wanted to offer an informal picture of the family together for Mother's Day. "The Wales family spent Mother's Day together and had a wonderful day," the source added.
The tweet published by the Princess of Wales to apologise for the 'confusion' (INSTAGRAM)Kensington Palace faced mounting pressure to explain the error after aides refused on Sunday to comment on growing speculation over the debacle. After the princess’ statement the palace once again refused to be drawn on what parts of the image had been changed or explain the reasons why.
Royal sources branded the controversy "exceptionally damaging" to the public's trust of the royal family. Concerns were raised over a missing part of Charlotte's sleeve and the misaligned edge of her skirt, with other speculation including the positioning of Kate's zip, and the misshapen patterns on both George’s and Louis’s jumpers.
The picture was released to reassure the public amid escalating conspiracy theories online over the state of Kate's health in recent weeks, but the controversy - dubbed "Kategate" and "Sleevegate" - has been labelled an "extraordinary" turn of events by royal sources. The Waleses have an established track record of issuing their own photographs, often taken by Kate rather than William, to mark special occasions including their children's birthdays.
Prince William leaves Windsor Castle to attend The Commonwealth Day Service at Westminster Abbey (Bruce Bennett)But the princess's confession raises questions over whether - or to what extent - the images have been altered in the past. Public relations and crisis consultant Mark Borkowski called the fiasco a "massive own goal" and said the unedited photograph should be released to regain trust.
He said: "It's plausible she's at home playing with the computer and using an AI tool, but if they're really going to regain any sort of trust they should release the unedited photo, it can't be that bad if they just made a few tweaks. I find they have risen to the challenge, provided the statement as an explanation - the question is with all the conspiracy theories running around, is whether people believe it and I'm not sure that they will."
Mr Borkowski said the Mother's Day photo had exposed a public relations problem for the monarchy: "That's the issue, there doesn't seem to be that much joined up strategic thinking at the heart of the royal family at the moment, which leads to these problems where it's a very difficult organisation to manage in terms of PR. They are under pressure, massively under pressure, this is a massive own goal."
The princess, 42, who is not expected to return to official duties until after Easter following abdominal surgery on January 16, was today seen travelling in a car with William, 41, as he made his way to London for the Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey. She did not accompany her husband to the event, with aides saying she had a “private appointment”.
The Princess of Wales enjoys photography (Getty Images)A royal source said: “It is a bad day at the office for the palace and something which will no doubt be reflected on in future.” The photo row further intensified on Monday after the deputy news director of AFP said the photo had been “badly edited” and manipulated in a way that didn't meet its standards.
The agency also pointed to an inconsistency in the alignment of Princess Charlotte's left hand. Eric Baradat said: “This was done a bit fast by all of us, all the agencies, just by pure habit and total trust with the material that Kensington Palace is usually sending out.
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“The more you look at the picture, the more you enlarge it, it becomes obvious that it's been manipulated or altered or doctored, or whatever you call it, and really badly so. In a way that is really amateur.
“We joked this morning saying if an intern was doing that at AFP they wouldn't get a job, no chance at all. This is really badly done. It's clearly a red line. I'm in no position to comment on what was added or what was erased, I have no idea, I'm not even getting there. We will put out a really strong guideline again for all our editing desks in the world, not to trust the most trustable third party image, because we can fall in that trap very regularly.”
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