The manipulation of royal photos is nothing new. Official photos have been altered over the decades – to flatter the sitter, of course.
In January 1852, Queen Victoria asked the fashionable London photographer William Kilburn to photograph her sitting with her five eldest children.
Similar to Kate’s Mother’s Day photo, the children posed on either side of her, but unlike Kate, the resulting image showed Victoria sitting with her eyes closed.
She looked shocked – and not happy about it.
The Mother’s Day photo that caused a storm for the Prince and Princess of Wales
Another royal photo showing the late queen with her great-grandchildren was found to have been doctored. Some of the many signs that the original has been modified are circled
With nine children and forty grandchildren, group photos of Queen Victoria and her family were difficult to organize. Especially in the latter part of her reign, photographers resorted to deception
Towards the end of her long life, Victoria’s faithful photographers would retouch the images. They trimmed her waist, removed her wrinkles, the bags under her eyes and one of her double chins. They also added extra hair
“Mine, unfortunately, were horrible, but the children’s were beautiful,” she noted.
Not wanting anyone to see such a lèse-majesté, Victoria scratched her face off the daguerreotype image – the first known example of royal photo editing.
With nine children – and eventually forty grandchildren – group photos of the Queen and her family were a logistical nightmare.
Agencies and newspaper editors resorted to photomontages showing the elderly monarch surrounded by her descendants at a reunion that never actually took place.
Towards the end of her long life, Victoria’s faithful photographers retouched the photos they had taken, trimming her waist, removing her wrinkles, the bags under her eyes and one of her double chins, and adding extra hair.
Thanks to their skill, Victoria, who was well into her 70s at the time, looked fresh-faced in her official Diamond Jubilee photo.
The tiny monarch, who was less than five feet tall, grew taller in front of the cameras by standing on a box.
Victoria’s daughter-in-law, Princess Alexandra, was another who tried to maintain her youthful appearance into old age by convincing photographers to retouch her images.
The official photos of her 1902 coronation event made 57-year-old Alexandra look several years younger.
Edward VII’s wife often appeared in family portraits to have as smooth skin and a slim waist as her three daughters.
Queen Elizabeth, later the Queen Mother, was almost 39 when Cecil Beaton took an iconic series of photographs at Buckingham Palace.
To the casual observer, the photos suggest a 30-year-old woman. Of course, thanks to flattering retouches by the society photographer.
“Can you do much after that?” the queen had asked, which was more or less a royal decree.
Equally flattering images emerged from a post-war hearing when she was a motherly 48.
Victoria’s daughter-in-law, Alexandra, tried to maintain her youthful appeal into old age and asked photographers to retouch her images. In this 1902 portrait, Alexandra wears the crown made especially for her coronation and features the Koh-i-Noor diamond
In some family portraits, Alexandra, seated, appears as smooth-skinned and slender-waisted as her three daughters
“Over many years, every photograph of the Queen Mother taken by Beaton and chosen for publication was retouched,” said her biographer, Michael De-La-Noy.
Beaton used natural light shining through the future Queen Mother’s crinoline dresses to create a slimming effect.
Another royal favorite, Norman Parkinson, used what he called “magic light” to soften the features of his royal minders.
Princess Margaret was photographed by ‘Parks’ in the summer of 1978 on the occasion of her upcoming tour of Tuvalu.
It was noted at the time that she looked fresh and slightly younger than her 48 years – suspiciously enough.
Two years later he photographed Margaret with her mother and sister in a memorable series of photographs commemorating the Queen Mother’s 80th birthday.
Taken at the Royal Lodge in Windsor, Parks used both sunlight and fill flash to create a flattering image
When it came to photos of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, an often-repeated approach was to overlay two separate images (taken during the same session).
This can be seen, for example, in the commission that Parkinson carried out for the Post Office – for use on a set of stamps on the occasion of their Silver Wedding in 1972.
Patrick Lichfield, the Queen’s photographer, used the same trick in November 2001 at a gathering to mark the upcoming 2002 Golden Jubilee.
Once again, two separate photos were taken – this time digital – and then superimposed.
Lord Lichfield also took a memorable group photo of the extended royal family at Windsor during the Christmas holidays of 1971, to mark the Queen’s upcoming Silver Wedding Anniversary.
There wasn’t enough space to take a single photo, so Lichfield took three separate photos of the group and then expertly merged them into one composite photo.
At the turn of the new millennium, the increasing use of digital photography made such manipulation relatively easy.
According to biographer Michael De-La-Noy, all of Beaton’s published photographs of the Queen Mother had been retouched
Another royal favorite, Norman Parkinson, used ‘magic light’ to soften the features of his royal minders
A quarter of a century before the Prince of Wales took the awkward Mother’s Day photo, William himself was the subject of headlines when he was digitally manipulated at his uncle Edward’s wedding to Sophie Rhys-Jones.
Unlike the Kate photos, there was no media frenzy and the story was treated lightly by the media
The photographer who took the official family photo was Sir Geoffrey Shakerley, who was married to the Queen’s cousin, Lady Elizabeth Anson.
He said Prince Edward decided his cousin “wasn’t looking his best” so the photo was digitally altered to replace William’s face with a photo from another photo of him smiling.
In an interview on ITN News, Shakerley claimed
“Prince Edward said he didn’t think Prince William was looking his absolute best, so we were able to digitally insert another photo of Prince William from one of the other photos of him smiling and laughing.”
The Princess of Wales is an experienced amateur photographer.
She studied art history at the University of St Andrews and is a natural when it comes to composition, use of color and the ability to relax the sitter.
While her photographs of William and their children, as well as those of Charles and Camilla and the late Queen and Prince Philip, have been widely praised, a few have been criticized for less than professional photo editing.
In the summer of 2022, Kate took an iconic photo of the late Queen, taken at Balmoral in the final weeks of her life, and released in April 2023 to mark the late Queen’s 97th birthday.
A recurring theme with photos of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip was the superimposition of one photo
While many applauded the informal photo, which showed Queen Elizabeth with two of her grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren, the photo sparked some negative reactions from the public.
Still, many felt that cutting and pasting the photo would have been necessary, because allowing ten little children to pose happily is akin to herding cats.
More importantly, Kate wouldn’t have wanted to put William’s vulnerable grandmother through a lengthy photo session.
And as we have seen, it was nothing new.