Kate Middleton Picture Editing: The New Theories

Kate Middleton's botched photoshopped Mother's Day picture has sparked a variety of theories about when and where the image came from.

The Princess of Wales acknowledged she edited a family portrait taken by Prince William that showed her with Prince George, Prince Louis and Princess Charlotte at their home, Adelaide Cottage, in Windsor.

The frank admission sparked a guessing game about exactly what changes she made, with numerous imperfections visible in the photo.

Kensington Palace said on Sunday, March 10, that the image was taken earlier in the week but some felt the outfits suggested it may have come from November while others suggested Kate's face appeared similar to a Vogue cover from 2016.

One expert told CNN there may be no single original image while another told the BBC it may have been a composite of several similar images of the same scene containing the same people.

All in all, there appear to be more questions than answers and there is still no clear, un-doctored image of Kate post surgery.

Christmas Video

Some on social media compared the outfits in Kate's photo to a video released before Christmas of Kate, George, Charlotte and Louis helping out at The Baby Bank in Windsor.

Charlotte's outfit does appear to show some similarities, though Prince Louis is wearing a different knitted jumper in the Mother's Day picture compared with the Christmas video.

George and Charlotte are dressed in similar garments but with different color schemes, which would require Kate to have altered the colors.

One TikTok video suggested the princess might have changed the outfits to stop internet sleuths piecing together that it was an old photograph.

However, the possibility still remains that Kate simply has another similar jumper in black and that George owns more than one checked shirt, which is entirely plausible.

Some have suggested the foliage in the background is too full for March though, and would make more sense for an image taken in the fall.

The 2016 Vogue Cover Theory

Some, including Ruby Naldrett, a senior social media editor at the Daily Mirror and Daily Star, argued Kate's face came from a 2016 Vogue cover image which appeared to line up closely when superimposed on top of the Mother's Day image.

In a post that was viewed 35 million times, she wrote: "My analysis of the Kate Middleton photo saga is that they took her face from the vogue cover she did years ago and edited it in."

Kate's hair is slightly different in each picture so it would have required further editing there, though her facial expression was also similar in both images.

Needless to say, as some on social media pointed out, it is the same woman in both pictures and therefore maybe not a huge surprise her face has the same shape.

Luke Bailey, head of digital at the i, wrote on X: "Clip going around that uses a fade to 'prove' the Kate Middleton photo is actually her Vogue cover. and there's actually a reason you don't use a fade to do that, because it makes images appear more similar than they are. if you take individual details—they're a long way apart."

In addition, he took aim at speculation that the image was taken in the fall: "Would also really like everyone to engage some critical thinking skills about a theory based on them all wearing the same outfits as Nov 23, except that the outfits are all different in at least one way."

What the Experts Say

Ramesh Raskar, associate professor at MIT Media Lab, told CNN: "The manipulation in this image is very unique. It's unlikely that it was ever one single image. A photo editing app probably introduced these errors."

"It all comes from real pieces of photos, but it's more like a collage," he added, noting that he felt it was not AI generated.

Professor Hany Farid, of the University of California, Berkeley, told the BBC Kate may have been trying to create a perfect photograph from several images within the same shoot: "There is a relatively new feature where you have a group of people, the camera identifies them through face detection, and it takes a series of photos in rapid succession.

"And invariably what happens when you take a photo of a group of people is somebody has their eyes closed or someone's not smiling, and so what this feature does is it looks at four, five, six, seven, 10 photos, whatever, and composites them together.

"When it does that it sometimes makes mistakes."

Jack Royston is Newsweek's chief royal correspondent based in London. You can find him on X, formerly Twitter, at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.

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