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Portraits of Heroes: Form Guidance

To assist in collecting information and a photo to submit to the National D-Day Memorial for the “Portraits of Heroes” art project, we’ve provided this worksheet for you to read and/or print. Please follow the instructions on this document as you collect details about a service member you wish to honor in this project.

When you have all the relevant (and required) information described on this page, you can view and fill out the form at https://www.dday.org/portraits-of-heroes

Form Instructions

The form is broken up into three parts: the introduction and a qualifying question, information about the service member, and contact information for yourself should we need to clarify or confirm details.

Submission Qualifier

Did the veteran you are honoring serve with the Allies’ Normandy campaign during Operation Overlord (June 6, 1944, to August 31, 1944)?

If the answer is yes, then you may continue to collect and submit details regarding this service member.

If the answer is no, then we thank you for your time and consideration in honoring a veteran. However, we are only collecting information and photos about veterans who participated in the Normandy campaign from June 6, 1944 to August 31, 1944 for this specific project.

Honoree Details

Several fields in this section may require you to do a little more research and confirmation on your part before you can fill out and submit this form. We’ve outlined the fields you may encounter below. Some fields may or may not be visible based on answers you’ve provided in other fields.

  • Honoree’s Full Name (text; required)
  • Honoree’s Date of Birth (date; required)
  • Honoree’s Hometown (text; required)
  • Is This Honoree Still Living? (yes/no; required)
    • If no: Honoree’s Place of Burial (text)
  • Allied Nation With Which the Honoree Served (select field; required)
  • Honoree’s Branch of Service (text; required)
  • Honoree’s Division/Group/Taskforce (text)
  • Honoree’s Unit/Squadron/Ship (text)
  • Honoree’s Service # (text)
  • Honoree’s Highest Service Rank Achieved (text)
  • Honoree’s First Date of Service in France (date)
  • Honoree’s Last Date of Service in France (date)
  • Brief Description of Honoree’s Service (freeform text; 500 characters maximum)
  • Photo upload field for Honoree (see “Photo Instructions” section below for more information)
  • Date Photograph Taken (If Known)
  • If This is a Group Photograph, Please Describe/Identify Where the Honoree Is (text)

Submitter’s Contact Information

  • Your Name (text; required)
  • Your Phone Number (phone)
  • Your Email Address (email; required)
  • Your Mailing Address (address)
  • Your Relation to the Honoree (select; required)
    • If Other, Please Describe Your Relation to Honoree (text; required)
  • Would You Like This Submission to Remain Anonymous to the Honoree/Public? (checkbox)
    • Unless you check the checkbox above, your name will be associated with the veteran you are honoring on the Memorial’s printed programs, on the project’s webpage, and on the Memorial’s app.

Photo Instructions

Do:

  • Submit a digital (scanned) photo with the following dimension and format requirements:
    • Full-color or black/white photo set to the correct color or grayscale setting
    • A minimum of 300 and a maximum of 2,400 DPI (dots per inch)
      • A full 8″ x 10″ photo can be scanned at 300 DPI
      • A 1 1/2″ x 2″ passport-size photo can be scanned at 2,400 DPI so it remains sharp in appearance when printed at a larger size
    • TIFF, JPEG, or PNG formatting with as little-to-no file compression as possible
    • 100 MB maximum in filesize
  • If scanning a photo from a newspaper, ensure that you are scanning at no less than 1,800 DPI and have a piece of solid black paper (or any other piece of solid black material) behind the photo to help prevent the reverse side of the paper from showing in the scan
  • Ensure that the photo is free from as many defects as possible; the National D-Day Memorial and its vendors cannot restore damaged photos for you and only basic editing and cropping will be performed

Don’t:

  • Send any photograph that is considered inappropriate, explicit, or depicting of graphic violence, bodily injury, or harm to others
  • Take a photo of a printed or framed picture or of a photo album; we must have as close of a reproduction to the original photo as possible without any reflections, glare, annotations/captions, hand-drawn text, or borders of any kind
  • Submit a photo that you do not have permission to send