Color
Color can enhance your poster and attract viewers, if used effectively.
You might use color to:
- improve the visual appeal of your poster
- improve the reader's ability to understand it quickly
- highlight important elements in your poster
- connect related information
- distinguish different categories of information
- present results in graphic form
- provide accurate images of examples from your work
Things to watch:
- don't overdo - very bright posters can draw attention, but may be difficult or tiring to read
- dark and brightly colored backgrounds can use a lot of ink when printing
- many prefer to read dark text on light backgrounds
- choose colors with sufficient contrast. Your text must be easily readable against the background, and colors on graphs and charts must be easily distinguished from each other.
- maintain a color scheme
- avoid using green and red next to each other to limit difficulties for those with color-blindness
Poster Content
Your poster should tell the story of your research or project - what you did, why it is important, what your results and conclusions were. It should highlight the main points of your work without going into all the detail that you would include in a research paper. Most viewers will not read your entire poster in detail. They should, however, be able to understand its basic message by looking at the title, abstract or introduction, section headings, figures, and conclusions.
Here are some things to think about as you organize the content of your poster.
- identify the message you want viewers to take away with them
- focus on the main points of your message
- organize your information in a logical flow
- minimize text
- present your story visually as much as possible
- include your results in an easily interpretable form, such as graphs or charts, if possible
- make your conclusions clear and obvious
- use bullet points and lists to make key material readily visible
- describe methodology, but leave out the details that would go into a research paper
- plan on presenting details in conversation with your viewers or in a handout
- choose a title that is specific, informative, and will catch viewers' attention
- if an abstract is required, it should concisely summarize the story of your work
- captions should make clear the significance of an illustration or the conclusion drawn from a chart or graph
- authors' names, affiliations, and contact information should be readily visible
- acknowledge any sponsors, research grants, and assistance
- cite any direct use of others' work
- include any information or content required by the session organizer
Text
Text is an important part of your poster. Use it effectively to tell the essential parts of your story.
- minimize text - long sections of text detract from the visual appeal, make key facts less visible, and take more time to read
- break text into sections that can be separated and arranged with your graphics
- write concisely
- choose fonts that are easily readable
- use font sizes that are readable from at least 5-6 feet away
- titles should be larger than section headings, which are larger than text and captions
- captions should be easily readable and written horizontally
- use bold type for titles and section headings
- use bold type or color to highlight key terms
- using all capitals is generally harder to read than using mixed cases
Layout
In choosing a layout you'll want to keep these issues in mind.
- the story of your presentation should be readily apparent and easy to follow
- the most important parts of your story should appear in the most prominent locations
- the sequence of your presentation should be obvious and natural
- take advantage of natural eye movement patterns - top to bottom and left to right in English
- don't overcrowd - leave blank space to separate the sections of your poster
- leave margins around the edges
- limit text to short blocks
- title should be prominently displayed at the top
- authors' names, affiliations, and contact information should be readily visible near the title
Visuals
Using visual components can help present your story to viewers in an appealing style that helps them grasp your content more quickly. Here are some issues to think about in planning your visuals.
- use the highest resolution images available - what looks good on a page or screen may be pixilated when expanded to full poster size
- insert images as files instead of copying and pasting them to retain the image quality
- use graphs or charts to present results instead of tables if possible. Tables have less visual appeal and don't make your conclusion or any pattern in the data as obvious as a graph does.
- give credit for any images or graphics you did not create
