Ignore gravity in favour of making your readers move across the poster from left to right. In this way, readers will have to fight their way back to the beginning for the next row.
Readers may even move onto the next poster and save you the annoyance of having to talk to them.
Organise the poster clearly, with an opening, a main body, and a conclusion. The opening should grab attention and lead nicely and logically into the main body.
Start with the general and move onto the specific.
The conclusion is the climax. It should tie in with the opening and leave no doubt about the message you are trying to convey.
Avoid acronyms – especially without full, immediate reference.
Have an accompanying handout ready that offers readers a summary and your contact details.
The title banner and three columns in the template below represent poster panels that would traditionally be mounted. As it is becoming increasingly easy to produce an entire poster (rather than separate panels) using a computer, this may not be necessary. Also, the columns and banner are not meant to be strictly demarcated zones but general areas of the poster that the human eye will navigate easily.
In this template, as with most posters, the title runs across the top. As a general rule, a brief introduction should appear at the upper left of the poster, whilst the conclusion (if there is one) should be located at the lower right of the poster.
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Readers should ideally be able to read the title banner from approximately twenty feet away. It should include institutional and/or departmental logos, if necessary, as well as your name and those of other relevant persons.
DO NOT FORGET graphics, though. Posters are primarily visual, and text should only really support graphics where necessary. Although posters should be self-explanatory, and follow a logical sequence, the usual purpose for them is to stimulate the interest of readers and prompt some kind of conversation or further enquiry. Therefore, NEVER go too heavy on the text. Almost all posters, designed for presentations, do this.
Four Column Poster
This template is a variation on the previous one. It is thought to be bad practice to have more than five columns. Three or four is probably the ideal number in most cases.
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Eight Cell Poster
Posters should always read up-down first, then left to right. If you are using cells, number them to ensure that the reader does not get confused.
