hat should have been a simple family photograph celebrating Mother’s Day in the U.K. has turned into a worldwide drama and placed the British royal family under a microscope.
On Sunday, Kensington Palace released the first official photo of Catherine, Princess of Wales, since the sudden announcement she had been hospitalized for abdominal surgery in mid-January. The photo, which the palace said was taken by her husband, Prince William, shows Kate posing amongst their three children: Prince George, 10, Princess Charlotte, 8, and Prince Louis, 5. Major international news agencies like the Associated Press and Reuters recalled the picture from distribution just hours after its release, alleging that the source had egregiously manipulated the original snap.
The unprecedented move exacerbated the controversy surrounding Kate’s unusually abrupt disappearance from the public eye. Conspiracy theories gained newfound traction on social media, and outlets like CNN announced they would be rereviewing “all handout photos previously provided by Kensington Palace.”
On Monday, in response to the debacle, the palace issued a personal apology attributed to the Princess of Wales herself, who confessed to editing the photo: “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.” A palace source subsequently told Bazaar that the princess had “made minor adjustments.”
It’s worth nothing that this isn’t the first time the royals have been accused of a bad Photoshop job. It’s likely the palace has pulled off stunts like this before, particularly when it comes to capturing a picture-perfect portrait with multiple (and probably fussy) children.
But if you’re still curious which editing errors are causing all this commotion, we pinpointed five mistakes experts found in Kate’s photo. Scroll ahead to see them all.