Now that you have all of your pictures selected, it’s time to order them in a fashion that tells a story. Rather than run through all of the pictures chronologically (which is an option), we suggest that you try to group them into sections. Looking through your selected photos, you will notice some themes. Some pictures will naturally fall into groups. Some typical scenes are: baby pictures, immediate family, extended family, siblings, sports, vacations, birthdays, school, friends, camp, work / career, hobbies, Halloween / costumes, and music. These groups can be broken down further if necessary. Because each section is usually set to a different song(s) you will want to have at least 6-8 pictures per section (we think 12-14 pictures is a good number).

Now that you have your sections, you will want to lay them out in a fashion that best tells the story of your loved one. You may want to have the group shots and family pictures at the beginning of the collage because these scenes usually go at a slower pace and therefore build up to sports, hobbies, or action pictures at the end of the collage, which will keep the collage exciting. We feel that the last section should be something that really focuses on the guest of honor, so we often suggest ‘alone’ pictures for the last section.

At this point you should place your pictures, in order, into separate envelopes for each scene.