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Academic Research Poster Design

Show off your research with an accessible, well-designed poster. These tips are useful for poster sessions at conferences, in classes, and other academic settings.

Important Considerations

✓ Size: ideally the image resolution should be at least 300 dpi/ppi at the size you want it printed–always view at actual size!

✓ Usage Rights: make sure you have permission to use the images and icons you find. For more information, see Digital Media Rights & Resources. You can search for creative commons, public domain, and other types of freely re-useable media.

✓ Captions and Attribution: A figure should always be accompanied by a caption that describes the information contained in the figure. If you obtained an image from a source that requires credit, you can include attribution in the caption below the image.

Finding Images

These repositories contain images that are largely labeled for free use and reuse. For more information, visit the Digital Resource Center.

  • Wikimedia Commons: A collection of freely usable media files (images, audio, videos).
  • Images at Macalester College: A-Z list of library databases.
  • Europeana Collections: Once you search, use the filters on the top under “Can I use this?”
  • The Flickr Commons: A good place to start looking at Flickr; keep in mind, several government agencies post to Flickr regularly and DO mark their materials appropriately in terms of copyright.
  • Getty’s Open Content Images: Be sure that “open content” is checked in the upper left.
  • Library of Congress: Double-check image rights. Because it’s an online catalog and not a comprehensive repository, there will be a few holes in online image availability.
  • NASA: NASA content – images, audio, video, and computer files used in the rendition of 3-dimensional models, such as texture maps and polygon data in any format – generally are not copyrighted.
  • New York Public Library Digital Collections: When you click to enter keywords, a box will pop up allowing you to search only public domain materials.
  • The Noun Project: A repository of free icons available under Creative Commons licenses.
  • Pexels: Creative Commons works pulled from a few different locations; more stock imagery than Flickr.
  • Smithsonian Open Access: 2D and 3D digital items from the Smithsonian collections
  • Unsplash.com

Visualizing Data

LOOK OVER THIS WHOLE THING !!!

Visualizing data can help readers understand your research. Some helpful tools for doing so include:

For information about data visualization and mapping tools, see Academic Technology Services.