Last Alarm:Tributes to Fallen Firefighters (Year 3 of a 3 year survivor perspective)

I've been off the forums for quite some time now, but wanted to share a bit about a self-generated project. Below is one side of a 2 sided pitch I'll be mailing to Canon USA's director of marketing. My dad was a Line Of Duty Death in 1977 in Maine (I was a little under 4 when it happened). On the 36th anniversary of his death, I was in Worcester, Massachusetts from a concert the evening before. I visited their fallen firefighters memorial, which they created in response to the Worcester Cold Storage Facility Fire and Collapse (3 December 1999, 4 days before the 22nd anniversary of my dad's death). Worcester was the first event where I truly empathized with what those families would go through, as I neared my 22nd Christmas without my dad. Over the last 3 years, I have photographed memorials and services that have resonated with my survivor story. I've been to the National Memorial Service in Emmitsburg, Maryland in 2014 and 2015, the IAFF service in Colorado Springs in 2015, Worcester's 15th anniversary service and the Massachusetts State Fallen Firefighters Service in 2014 (the latter recognizing 2 LODDs that occurred on my 40th birthday, Ed Walsh and Mike Kennedy). I still hope to make it to the 9/11 memorial before the 15th anniversary (I attempted to gain the right to photograph the 15th anniversary service, but you need to be credentialed with an international news agency to even have a chance at the pool). Ultimately, I hope to have a significant gallery archival quality photo book when it's wrapped up. I've had 2 kickstarters fail to generate funds to complete the project, but I'm determined to find a way to see this through to the end. The top photo is Emmitsburg 2014, the middle Boston 2014 and the bottom one is a photo I travelled over 2000 miles for. The woman is the widow of my town's deputy chief, an LODD in June of 2014. She didn't know until 24 hours before I took this picture who I was or that I was there to photograph those who were there to remember him. When I got that shot, I was overwhelmed with emotion. One member of the IAFF who was there saw me and offered words of comfort and encouragement, he was from California. I'm hoping, if it isn't already too late, that CanonUSA might use an image of the 9/11 plaque from Emmitsburg for their print ads in September periodicals. It's a long shot, but I owe it to my family and to LODD survivors everywhere to try.

The top photo is great, the other two not so much and the graphic design is appalling.

I feel like an ass for saying those things, because your cause is very commendable. I wish you good luck with your project.

My original design had a straight red circular gradient for the background instead of the red and white stripes. All 3 images are horizontal crops of 8x12s. I liked my original better, but I was attempting to be responsive to my wife (who has no shortage of "opinions"). Thank you for your brutal honesty and respect for the project as a whole.

These are 2 alternates with the original background design

Two images used in the design from Emmitsburg 2014

Colorado Springs 2015

2014 Massachusetts Fallen Firefighters Memorial Service in Boston, September 11th, 2014

This is a 2 image composite from Emmitsburg 2014 after the close of the memorial service. The butterfly was photographed in a horizontal composition on the wreath about 10 seconds before the vertical background. As I depressed the shutter on the vertical comp, the butterfly was closing it's wings. So I selected the butterfly and inverted in photoshop at 400%, deleted all information except the butterfly, then imported it over the butterfly with the image where it's wings were closing and used a subtle drop shadow effect.