Poster

Presentations

Assessed coursework can take the form of a poster presentation. This can be, for
example, an individual piece of research, a group project or as a visual essay where
you present the ideas of a particular topic. Whatever the content of your poster, a
poster is a visual presentation format and as with any other form of communication,
it should ‘tell a story’.

Checklist
Clarify what is expected from your poster
assignment

Before you do anything, start with a checklist

1. The purpose of the poster and the intended audience.

2. The size of the poster required.
3. Any specifications for the production, e.g. does it have
to be through particular software, can you produce it
by hand, or use a cut and paste method.
4. Expectations regarding display, e.g. do you need to
print it out or display via a PC/laptop.
5. Printing quality, i.e. can you print out in draft form as
this is much cheaper.
6. The presentation, e.g. in a conference setting with
your posters set up around a room or as part of an
oral presentation.
7. The assessment criteria

Pat Maier
Planning what you want to say

Identify your audience

Establish who your audience is. Your tutor should give you guidance here. Don’t
just assume that you are writing for your tutor because there is a tendency to think
he or she knows this material already and you don’t need to explain it in such detail.
So, it is be better to assume your audience is an intelligent 14 year old.

NOTE
Researchers are now asked by the Research Councils to write an abstract of their
research that could be understood by an intelligent 16 year old.

Identify your message

The key to any poster is deciding what your message is. In order to do this
you need to distil the key points of your work on to some rough paper and arrange
the order of your ‘story’.

If you are reporting on work from your individual research project or a group project,
it is good to write a short section at the beginning (approximately 200 words) which
outline:
ƒ Why you did this research (gives a context)
ƒ How you did it (method)
ƒ Issues it raised (there may be some interesting things to solve on the
way)
ƒ Key findings/conclusion/recommendation

This is similar to an ‘abstract’, which is found at the beginning of a journal article in

order to prepare the reader for the content of the paper. Once you have the
abstract, you have the key ideas for your poster and your introduction.

If you have not carried out any data-gathering research, you may be asked to
present a poster on a topic. This is something like a visual essay and you will also
need to start by jotting down a summary of your reading by:

ƒ Stating the importance of this topic (gives context)

ƒ Listing the key points/issues/positions (either as theoretical positions,
key researchers, key solutions etc)
ƒ Offer critical reflection on what you have read and a concluding
remark.
Once you have summarised what you have found, you have the key ideas for your
poster and can be part of your poster introduction.

Your poster must also have a very clear message. The information in your abstract
or introduction can be further developed in the boxes on your poster (see Designing
your Poster below).

Pat Maier
How we read a poster
A poster is not a jumble of things that can be read in any order (unless you are using
the poster as a form of art). Generally, we read a poster from the top left and work
our way down to the bottom right, as with any page we read. However, you can
break this rule if your route through the poster is clear and logical.

Coherence (progression of ideas) is important in any written document and a poster

is no different. Make sure your start and end-points are obvious. More creative
subjects may want to flout this rule and offer a more visually demanding display. If
this is the case, you need to decide if your reader needs to come away with key
pieces of information and how you will visually identify them.

Remember readers will probably spend no more than about 5 minutes reading your
poster. In that time you have to convey your message through words and images
(see Identify your Message above).

Designing your poster

Layout
A fairly transparent way to design your poster is to allocate text and picture boxes to
the size of paper you have. Your first decision is the size (A1?) and the orientation
(portrait or landscape?) of your poster.

Portrait Landscape

You need to play around with ideas on how you want to set out your text and images
and the kind of information you want to include. Remember to think of how your
information will flow, so it is obvious for the reader. Also, make sure your colour
scheme enables easy reading. Your colour scheme should enhance the message, not
dominate it. Pastel coloured backgrounds with dark text are easy on the eye. Dark
backgrounds with light text can look effective, but be careful it doesn’t become too
garish and difficult to read. Your topic should also give you a feel for the colour
scheme you want to adopt.

Pat Maier
Portrait: mixed column solutions

Predominantly single column Predominantly double column

with lined boxes without lined boxes

Clear title Clear catchy title here

Introduction Intro Supporting

Crisp message here image from
project

Aim of Method used

Image / Image / work
Photo/ Photo/
Graph/ Graph/
chart chart
Supporting images from project

Conclusions / take home

message
Key findings/conclusions
here

Name and contact details

Contact info

Landscape : a more visual poster

Clear precise meaningful title

intro More detail Conclusions/ findings

Image Image
or or
Image/ graph graph
graph
Image or
graph Future work

Pat Maier Contact details

Landscape - collage effect

Clear precise meaningful title

intro More detail

image

image
image

image Future work

Contact details

Acknowledgement: Thanks to Adam Warren from the University of Southampton for the inspiration of
poster making through these diagrams.

Poster size
Paper sizes are standardised and the ISO (international standards office) paper sizes
we use are labelled as ‘A’ size papers and they range from A7 to A0; the smaller the
number the larger the paper size. The paper size we can most orientate ourselves to
is A4. Most student writing blocks are A4 size and it is the standard size for most
photocopiers and printers.

Some paper sizes are as follows and the usual size for a poster is A1.

A5 + A5 = A4 [height 29cm x width 21cm]

A4 + A4 = A3
A3 + A3 = A2
A2 + A2 = A1 [height 84cm x width 59cm]

Text: size of font and choice of font

Remember people will be standing some distance away from your poster, so make
your text easy to read from about 1.5 meters. You may want to use fancy fonts, but
be careful; simple, clear and well proportioned fonts are better. Try to use a point
range between 20-35, but this will depend on the font you use as some appear
clumsy when too big.

Pat Maier
Some of the options you have are

Typeface: serif or san serif?

The basic choice is serif and san serif fonts.

Garamond is an example of a serif font. Serif fonts have letter faces with decorative
tops and bottoms to them.

Arial is an example of a san serif font. The letters don’t have the decorative parts and
they are often seen as a ‘cleaner’ font.

Many studies have shown that san serif and a wide letter look are easier to
read.

Times New Roman is a serif font but with a rather narrow letter look. This
generally rates poorly on readability tests. This is also now considered rather ‘old
fashioned’.

Garamond is also a serif font but the letters look a lot wider and this makes it easier
to read. If you prefer to use a serif font, this is probably better than Times.

Arial is a san serif font and the letters have a narrow look although an uncluttered letter
shape.

Verdana on the other hand is also a san serif font, but the letters have a
wider look which makes it easier to read.

Font size
It will depend on the typeface you use, but as a guide: the main title at
approximately 100 points, subheadings 50 points and the body of text 25 points.

Emphasis
You may want to emphasise key points Below are some possibilities.
However, only use two, at the most, in one poster. You can:
• Use bold, italics, underline or capitals
• Change the text colour
• Put text in a graphic or box

Alignment
The human eye can detect very quickly if text is not aligned and this can
make it look unprofessional. It is like wearing clothes that are not ironed.
Make sure your text does align and if you have a list ensure that all the first
words in your list start the same, i.e. not a mixture of capitals and lower case.

Line Length
Line lengths that are too long or too short interfere with the speed of reading.
A good average line-length to work with is approximately 39 characters long.

Graphics
Select graphics that enhance your text. Some stray image will look very odd.

Pat Maier
 Checklist : Do’s and Don’ts

• Don’t have lots of different typefaces.

• Don’t use lots of different point sizes
• Don’t use your emphasis features for a large block
of text.

• Do have a consistent layout

• Do include white space around your text as this
gives contrast to text and rests your eyes.
• Do print a draft copy to check before the final print
(A2 or A3 size just to see).

Hot Tip
Don’t use an unusual font as the printer may not recognise it.

Tools to use
You can prepare a poster by freehand drawing, writing text in a word processor,
printing and then cutting and pasting on to your paper or, through a software
package. Check with your tutor how they want you to prepare your poster. Part of
your assignment may in fact be the use of a particular piece of software.

Microsoft PowerPoint is a natural choice for most as it is already part of Microsoft

Office. As a UK student (of recent years!) you will probably have used this software
for school coursework. Before you start you need to set up the page size and
orientation you want to use. To do this in PowerPoint for an A1 poster, open a new
file and select file/page set up/custom/width 60 cm/height 84 cm and either portrait
or landscape orientation.

A1

You can save your PowerPoint file then on to a CD or a memory stick so you can take
it to someone who can print it on to the size and weight of paper you want. Try and

Pat Maier
get an A3 (twice as big as A4) draft copy of your poster to check out layout and
colour scheme before printing on to a A1 size.

NOTE
If you have had no experience of PowerPoint, check with your institution as there are
very often ICT sessions or paper tutorials to get you started.

Displaying your poster.

There are several ways of displaying your poster:
• on a display board
• hanging from nylon thread (need heavier weight paper for this or mounted on
card)
• sticky tape on a lecture room wall

NOTE
If you are going to present your paper outside of your institution, you may need to
have it laminated (your institution should have facilities for this) and a cardboard roll
to transport it to your venue.

Checklist for your poster

There is nothing worse than hanging your poster only to

find you have an obvious spelling mistake for all to see.
Poster language must be correct. You (or better someone
else) need to:

1. Check your message for clarity.

2. Reduce the number of words and still keep it clear.
3. Check for spelling mistakes.
4. Check your images support your text.
5. Check the order of information for cohesion.
6. Get a draft A3 copy to check layout and colour.

Talking about your poster

Although your poster sits there for all to read, you will probably be close by and be
asked some questions. You should practice explaining in a simple way what your
work was about, why you did it, any problems you had to overcome on the way, the
outcomes and conclusions. If your poster is an ‘ideas poster’ on a topic you need to
be able to explain the central message and issues of the topic presented in your
poster. Your poster may be the visual aid for an oral presentation in preference to
slides.

Reference: Price, G. & Maier P. (2007) Effective Study Skills: unlock your potential,
Pearson, London.

Pat Maier
Pat Maier