I'm doing my first poster soon and was interested in what people did to make their posters stand out more, or more understandable etc.

Thought it would be an useful thread to other people as well!

What kind of layout do people go for? I'm in Sciences but it would be interesting to see what humanities/social people have to say too.

Hi H. Will you be generally describing your PhD, or will you present results as well?

I usually approach (usually?? I've only done 2 posters so far) posters as if they were literally information posters. The kind you see in public places, libraries, supermarkets etc.

-Divide it into sections without being too obvious, and create some sort of narrative. So people can have the option to either follow it left to right - top to bottom etc, but also have a look at random sections but still pick up the idea.

-Key thing is to provide large enough and legible type, and clean space around it. So the information won't be too jammed. The information is no good, if people can't read it.

Thanks 404!

I'm going to talk about the work I did in my first year. However I wrote 28000 words for the first year report so a bit worried about how I will put down all the things I need to.

I think the important thing is to get down my method in a way that is understandable, I sometimes confuse myself when trying to explain it.

I find flow diagrams really useful to explain methods, especially if you can accompany the words with pictures, and helps you not to miss anything out because you are thinking step-by-step.

I find posters a waste of time. Not valuable for the research, not usable for the thesis, not helpful for people walking around and asking stupid (always the same) questions about the research. This is just my opinion, but I hate posters and I try to avoid them where I can..

of course they are valuable for the research. What makes you say that they aren't? They are a good method of communication, they save time, and allow you to network.

good method of communication: not really, depends on the audience and the design of the poster.

they save time: don't think so. In fact, they waste valuable research time and provide no direct advantage for a research project

they allow you to network: completely overrated. If 90% of the audience are in un-related fields, benefits will be close to nil. Plus, networking itself does not help you to complete your PhD faster.

I completely accept other views, these are just mine. IMO, posters became fashionable once, now everybody thinks it's so great but in fact it's a waste of time.

I think I understand what Otto is trying to say but in sciences, posters are very useful, not sure about the non-sciences though...?

-good method of communication: the format pushes you to say as much as possible within so little time and in a set of boundaries. Not only the physical space is limited, but your audience is wider.

-they save time: they don't take too long to prepare, they take so little effort, and you appeal to more people, and they get to see your presentation in their own time, not yours.

-they allow you to network: I've never met anyone who didn't get to meet new people from their industry and other academics from multidisciplinary research areas, after presenting a poster.

You are allowed to your opinion of course, please don't get me wrong.

No problem.

Maybe my design/drawing skills are just very limited as people did not stop for my poster and did not seem very interested.. (not that I care much)

lol otto

To an extend I can see what Otto means with direct reference to conferences. I think it also depends on the value that the conference organisers apply to poster sessions. I've been to some great ones where they have generated good discussion. There have been some crap ones too where the poster session was basically over lunchtime. Everyone concentrated on their food and wandered round the posters as if they were in a museum! And the poor presenters had to squeeze lunch in whenever they could!

From a personal viewpoint I found producing posters invalauable when it came to looking at how my research had developed. I did about 4, all at various stages of the PhD. Effectively they were like a visual "crib sheet" that enabled me to see key stages of how my project had progressed. I made some A4 versions of them and showed them to my external when I was asked if I wanted to add anything at the end of my viva. They went down well.

Hmmm, I don't know where to start!

H, did you find out about the format, size etc? Some places accept posters in one orientation only (portrait only, or landscape only). Once you got these details, create your page and start importing your materials (images, bullet points). Even if you are not sure you'll need it, throw it in anyway, you can always take out later. What program will you use?

if it helps, these are some of the weblinks i looked at prior to making my first poster

http://www.swarthmore.edu/NatSci/cpurrin1/posteradvice.htm
http://keyskills.canterbury.ac.uk/communication/posters/index.htm
http://clinic.cant.ac.uk/key-skills/study/posters/index.asp
http://www.corporate.coventry.ac.uk/cms/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=3168&a=18370

sure there are lots more - there are various bits about layout, font size, how much you should try and include, how to put it together to make it coherent etc which i found useful. Some of them took a bit of wading through (but then, i like procrastinating and it put off having to start the bloomin thing).