First printed job...help!

I shoot for several local fire departments, and one of them asked me to do a project for them. They want a new picture like the one below. Taking the pics isn't the problem...my question is, where can I get that 'background' made? Also, should I have the pics recessed, with the names printed on the matte, or just have it printed as a solid sheet with the pics and all of the wording on it? I was looking to do this at 24" x 36". I've never done anything like this, but do not want to pass up this opportunity, so any help & suggestions would be very welcomed.

You must have a local framing place. Our local one is custom laminating. They do everything you could imagine with a photo and attaching the to backboard etc, and I live in a very small city.

So I would just take them the pics and they would do the layout and wording? Or, is this a job that I would do in Photoshop, and just have it printed? I wasn't expecting to be asked to do something like this, but like I said, I don't want to pass it up because this would open a ton of opportunities for me. I'm so green with this...I'm hoping to kind of learn this on the fly if it's possible.

Adobe Illustrator or find a graphic designer to lay it out for you.

What background are you referring to? Looks plain white to me.

If you aren't familiar with Photoshop's align and distribute tools, now would be the time to familiarize yourself. These will help you get all those individual pictures lined up in neat rows, and it's many times easier than aligning them each by hand.

The biggest pain for you will be adding the names to their pictures. There are scripts that can lay out composite images like this, including names, but if you are only doing one, then doing everything manually will probably be the easiest.

I would not matte anything, just lay it all out on one print.

Make sure you have them proof it and double check the order, names, other text, etc before you print.

The difference between a photoshop composite and matte windows is huge. The matte gives a sense of luxury and craftsmanship that the composite cant really match. On the other hand the composite allows you a great deal of flexibility in design, typography, and the ability to create multiple of different sizes for additional sales.

Personally I would talk it through with a decent framer, they do this stuff every day.

If they can't print up the names on the Matte then they may know a really good signwriter/calligraphe​r who could do it freehand.

Thanks, guys! I start taking the pics next week (3 different sittings), and I decided to go with a local graphic designer. I am going to try to do a layout as well, but for the finished product, I want to assure it's done right.