General Guidelines for Poster Production

In contrast to an oral presentation, a “poster” is a visual representation of the research project that must convey the essence of your message. In effect, it “talks” for the researcher. The poster presenter is on hand to answer questions and provide further details.

General Format: While posters are not uniform in format, generally, most of the following will be included.

· Title telling the name of the project, the people involved in the work, and their affiliation. The title should be large, descriptive, and concise.

· Abstracts stating what you set out to do, how you have done it, the key results, and the main findings and conclusions.

· Introduction that includes clear statements about the problem that you are trying to solve, the new ideas or items you are trying to discover or create, or the proofs that you are trying to establish. Note the background work that has led up to the current status of your research of creative work in this area. These should then lead to declaration of your specific project aims and objectives.

· Theory or Methods section that explains the basis of the techniques that you are using or the procedures that you have adopted in your study. You should also state and justify any assumptions, so that your results can be viewed in the proper context.

· Results section to show illustrative examples of the main results of products of your work.

· Conclusions section that discusses the main findings of your investigation and their value.

· Further Plans section that contains recommendations and thoughts about how the work could be continued. What kind of things could be done next? What are some possible long-term goals or outcomes?

· Acknowledgements section that allows you to thank organizations that might have provided financial support or the individuals who donated time to help with the project.

Design:

· Keep the material simple and concise with plenty of white space.

· Use colors sparingly to emphasize, differentiate, and add interest. (In general, it is better to keep the background light as people are used to that.)

· Pictures, graphs, and charts can be helpful in communicating a message quickly. Equations should be kept to a minimum, be large enough to read, and accompanied by definitions to explain significance of each variable. Label any diagrams and drawings. Clipart may be used for interest as long as it’s not distracting.

· Font size should be such that a reader can stand at a distance of 5 feet and read the text. Typically, nothing less than 20 point fonts should be used.

· Use underline text, bold face, italics, or combinations to emphasize words and phrases.

· Spelling counts. (Typographical errors do not reflect well on credibility or the presenter or on the university.)