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Academic and Internship Posters: Software Resources

Graphic design resources to create high-quality posters.

Microsoft Powerpoint

Microsoft PowerPoint is a natural starting point for researchers designing a poster for the first time. PowerPoint has been a staple of the Microsoft Office Suite and has contributed to its success and ubiquity over the last 30 years. Anyone with experience using Microsoft Word will find a familiar layout and tools that are easy to use to edit images and text.

Canva

Canva is a browser-based online graphic design editor that has become a popular choice for those who want to create a beautiful design but do it quickly. They have built-in hundreds of templates, layouts, fonts, and graphics that can be quickly found and added to your design. Canva is similar to Google Slides in that it allows team members to share and edit designs together.

Canva even offers courses on creating beautiful designs using its platform, which they call Design School.

Adobe Express

Adobe Express is a user-friendly design tool for quickly creating graphics, social media posts, flyers, videos, and more using templates and drag-and-drop features. It’s great for beginners or anyone needing fast, polished designs without the steep learning curve of Adobe’s pro tools.

Adobe Creative Cloud

Adobe Illustrator is primarily used for creating vector graphics like logos, icons, and illustrations that can be scaled without losing quality.

Adobe InDesign is ideal for designing multi-page layouts such as magazines, brochures, and posters, with strong tools for typography and page organization.

Adobe Photoshop is best for editing and manipulating raster images, including photo retouching, digital painting, and graphic design elements.

These programs are part of the Adobe Creative Cloud, which HPU students have access to via the iMacs and PCs in the Media Services are of Smith Library!

Setting Up Poster in Powerpoint

Set up your poster

  1. Create a new PowerPoint presentation
  2. Clear the layout: Home > Layout > Blank
  3. Set the poster size: Design > Slide Size > Page Setup
    • Size slide for: Custom
    • Enter the dimensions of your poster. Common sizes include 40in x 36in and 56in x 36in.

Prepare your work environment

  1. Display ruler and guides: View > Ruler and Guides
  2. Customize grid line options and automatic alignment: View > Guides > Snap to grid

Create a visual theme

  1. Customize the theme colors: Design > Variants (drop down menu) > Colors
    • Colorzilla: Browser add-on. Hover over any color to get RGB values
    • Design Seeds: Get color schemes and use with Colorzilla
    • DeGraeve: Color palette generator based on an image
  2. Customize the fonts: Design > Variants (drop down menu) > Fonts

Insert text, images, and data

  1. Use the Insert ribbon to add elements to your poster. The ones you will use most often are:
    • Text box: Use to create headers and short sections of text
    • Shapes: Use to create discrete sections. Place text boxes over the shapes with enough white space
    • SmartArt: Use to visually illustrate a process, cycle, hierarchy, or relationship

Setting Up Poster in Canva

  1. Go to www.canva.com and log into or create your account
  2. Select "Custom Size," enter your poster measurements, make sure the units are set to "inches," and create your poster
  3. You can browse templates, but make sure that if you do use one, it conforms to your specifications or you can adjust it
  4. Start designing!

Setting Up Poster in Google Slides

  1. Open Google Drive 
  2. New Google Slides
  3. Change the size of the slide to create a poster (see screenshot below):
    • Go to the File tab, select Page Setup > In the drop-down menu, choose custom, enter the numbers, and click apply.
  4. Create a header and columns:
    • Go to the Insert tab > Shape > Shapes > choose a shape
    • To see and manage box sizes, use the blue grab handles on the shape OR go to Format Options > Size & Rotation