About Us

How It All Began

Moving Visual Tributes was originally created by Richard Hanrahan after having met Simon Iredale as the family’s funeral director in the summer of 2021 when he was faced with arranging the send-off for his mother. After this encounter, their paths were destined to cross again just a few months later when Richard's uncle passed away.  

Simon's comment suggesting Richard should work on crematorium slide shows professionally, got him thinking. At both funerals it was evident that Richard's slideshows, set to the beat of the music, were far superior to those produced by the two big media companies typically used by the crematoria. 

So, in 2023 Richard formed Moving Visual Tributes, with Simon eventually giving up funeral directing in order to work exclusively with Richard on his new project. The combination of Richard’s technical expertise and Simon's many years of experience working as a funeral director, has made them a formidable and complementary team. 

What We Do

Instead of families uploading their photos directly to Obitus or Wesley, they send them to us instead. We then work our magic and we don't stop until the final result is breathtaking. Our secret is quite simple. Unlike the big companies, nothing we do is automated; every tribute is an individually handmade piece of art made with love and compassion. 

Once we are completely satisfied, the family get a preview and the opportunity to comment if necessary before we then upload it to the relevant media company.  The funeral director can also make any checks. The media company will charge for handling our tribute, but this is always less than the cost of a basic slideshow with music. We only charge the difference between those two figures. That means nobody pays a penny extra, but the difference in quality is undeniable. 

Is it really that much better?

The difference is like night and day! 

So far no funeral director has ever worked with us once only; they always continue with us. Yes, families are usually highly satisfied with the basic slideshows, but our own funeral directing experience has shown that when given the choice, they ALWAYS prefer what we offer.  It’s really no surprise. Everyone likes to get more for the same price, and that's exactly what we do. There simply are no disadvantages.

We offer 10 clear advantages over the basic visual tributes

Perhaps the biggest difference is that we bring movement to every slide. This will include a variety of methods which will give the tribute more movement. We use panning and zooming in or out; all of which must be set individually depending on each photograph to make sure not to lose the focal point of the shot, which often isn’t in the centre. We also utilise different transitions between photographs, which again will be carefully selected for the maximum effect. We've noticed that families tend not to pick the higher cost photo numbers so with us they can have a lot more photographs and video in a visual tribute, without any additional cost.

The standard slideshows set to music begin at the start of the song and finish at the end of the song, but that's as far as it goes. We literally sync every slide to the music so they change on the beat. It's just attention to detail, and that matters. 

Too many times we've seen slideshows where the meaning of a particular photograph isn't obvious to a lot of the audience, and this is where adding on screen text can really make a difference. We can also make existing text readable. Due to the way we do things, it means that even an old love letter for example can be read from the back of the crematorium's chapel!

We all know how much photography has improved in recent decades. We don't think it's good enough to just use an old photograph the way it is, if it could be improved. We'll put the effort in to sharpen photographs, we will reinstate realistic colours to faded photos and we can restore images to their former glory by removing damage, or even in some cases replace a missing part of a torn photo.

Finally, we know a lot more families would choose to keep the visual tribute but are put off by the extra cost. We don't work like that, so we offer better value with a FREE copy which the family can keep. Sometimes families will choose to show it again at the reception/wake following the funeral. Some might play it every year on their loved one’s birthday, for example. There are so many ways our tributes can be used after the funeral day to celebrate the life of a special person so they are never forgotten. 

Our promise to you is simple. We take the time to make the most of every cherished memory. Try us.