Picture agency reissues Princess Kate's Mother's Day image but highlights Photoshop errors

Princess Kate apologises and takes blame for editing photo

A picture agency has reissued Princess Kate's "manipulated" Mother's Day photo, but also pointed out all of the Photoshop "inconsistencies".

French photo agency AFP took to X to highlight the "several inconsistencies in alignments" in the snap shared by Kensington Palace.

The picture was initially released on Sunday to mark Mother's Day and was the first update from Princess Kate since she underwent abdominal surgery in January.

In the image Kate is seen smiling and posing with her three children Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis, with the photo supposedly being taken by Prince William.

However, last night several photo agencies, including Getty, PA and Reuters flagged the image as being possibly altered and they promptly "killed" it.

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The release of the photo had been intended to calm speculation about Kate's health, as she has not been seen in public since Christmas Day at Sandringham last year.

However, it had the opposite effect, with AFP sharing the image afresh on X with red circles around the areas that have seemingly been edited.

The agency commented on the post: "The official photo released by Kensington Palace (L) alongside close crops highlighting several inconsistencies in alignments after it came to light that the handout image had been manipulated."

Princess Kate was last seen at Sandringham for Christmas (Image: Getty)

The four inconsistencies highlighted by AFP are the fact that Princess Charlotte's sleeve does not align correctly, the length of her hair ending abruptly and the straightness of her skirt, as well Kate's zip sitting further left than it should.

But there are other issues that have been flagged online, including blurriness in Prince Louis' jumper and the ledge they are posing on apparently being distorted.

On Monday Kate took responsibility for the editing fails in the picture as she admitted she occasionally likes to experiment with altering photos of her family.

Prince William has not revealed any details about his wife's condition (Image: Getty)

She said in a statement shared on social media: "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."

Analysis from Sky News of the photo's metadata found the image was taken with a Canon camera and was saved in Adobe Photoshop twice on an Apple Mac, with other experts suggesting AI may have been used.