If the speculation around Kate Middleton's health was at a fever pitch last week, it is off the charts today because of the photo.
This drama is very much developing at the moment.
By the time the photo-is-manipulated revelation came out, it was very late in the UK already. It's still very early morning over there, so I would expect things to start happening again in the next few hours as people wake up.
But let me bring you up to speed on where we're at with this, because I think this has the potential to be quite a serious problem for the royals, depending on how they handle it.
Because of the rumours around Kate's health, Kensington Palace put out a photo of Kate and the kids, taken by William for Mother's Day.
But then- people started seeing the problems. Kate wasn't wearing her wedding ring and at Charlotte’s left hand, the sleeve disappears in a weird way. Behind wee Louis, a step has an unnatural break in the line, and there's a duplication on his right sleeve by the shoulder.
Kate's one hand is blurry while the other is crystal clear- and they should actually be the same because they’re at the same focal point for the camera.
And there is a tree in the background that some say shouldn't have leaves at this time of year.
As a result, major international agencies like The Associated Press, Reuters and Getty have all issued a kill notice on the photo and told media outlets around the world to delete it immediately because as AP says- "It appears that the source has manipulated the image."
The source being the royals.
What makes this worse is that Kensington Palace is refusing to comment on it. Which means we can't even ask the question- was this photo just photoshopped (minor problem) or was it totally artificially created and the family never sat for it (major problem)?
Now hopefully there is a very simple explanation. Like maybe they just mashed multiple photos together to get the best take of each person.
So maybe if Louis had his eyes closed in one shot and Charlotte had her eyes closed in another shot, they took the best shots of everyone and mashed them into a single photo. It might be something simple like that.
But whatever it is, they need to start talking fast.
Because they put this photo out to quell speculation and rumours about Kate Middleton’s health and they have just turbo-charged those rumours.
Let's be clear, it's not that they owe anyone an explanation over a private health problem, but it’s that they need to protect Kate Middleton from what they've just done- and what they've unleashed on her.
People are getting so nutty over this that Kate Middleton got papped by TMZ on a school run last week.
If people were fascinated then and hungry for that photo, can you imagine the pressure for a pap now?
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