The Latest Kate Middleton Photo Is Not a Fake, Says the Photographer

This photographer is standing by his work. After Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, admitted to editing a photo her family released to celebrate Mother’s Day in the UK, internet sleuths decided to take a critical look at the latest picture of her, a grainy image published in UK tabloids that shows the prince and princess in the backseat of a car. In the picture, the princess faces away from the camera.

A widely circulated TikTok theory is that Middleton’s profile was actually lifted from an earlier picture, and that the brick wall(s) behind the car are also a giveaway that something about the image is amiss.

But the photographer and the photo agency who distributed the car pic are standing behind their work. Goff Photos told E! that the picture was “cropped and lightened” but “nothing has been doctored.”

Photographer Jim Bennett went into more detail with People, telling the outlet, “We don’t change our photos in Photoshop other than adjusting the light levels if necessary. Car shots are unpredictable at the best of times and with some reflection on the glass it can be difficult.”

The intense picture scrutiny is due to ongoing speculation about Kate Middleton’s “mysterious absence,” even though the very first statement we got about her abdominal surgery made it clear that she wouldn’t be back to work until, at the earliest, the end of March, and that the public shouldn’t expect frequent updates about her progress.

Are the bricks in the photo the smoking guns they’ve been made out to be? The outside of Windsor Castle, where the photo was taken, is covered in all kinds of old bricks that don’t necessarily match, especially once you start playing around with the color balance, as the photographer admitted to doing. Bricksperts (brick experts), we await your findings.