All posters will be presented Thursday, June 28 from 4:00-6:30 pm, and again on Friday, June 29 from 4:00-6:30 pm. (See the conference program.)
You should attach your poster to its assigned easel on Thursday morning. The posters will be on display in the wings of the talk halls on Thursday and Friday. Conference volunteers will move them into position for the actual poster sessions on Thursday and Friday afternoon.
You should remove your poster at the end of the Friday poster session, as the easels will be carried away on Friday evening.
By presenting many posters simultaneously, we hope to accommodate a large audience without overcrowding at each poster. The large number of posters in turn requires a long period for poster viewing. With a total of 5 hours spanning two receptions, a conferencegoer can engage with nearly half of the posters for 15 minutes of personalized discussion each. This makes the posters roughly as visible as the talks, which are split into parallel sessions.
People will come by and expect you to tell them about your work. In essence, you'll be giving a series of mini-talks to individuals and small groups. These are more interactive than ordinary talks, and they may turn into real technical discussion.
Regard your poster as a visual aid that will support you in these informal talks, just as overhead slides do in a formal talk. Your poster should also be self-explanatory, as some people will prefer to study the poster themselves and then ask you questions. Finally, it should attract passers-by.
You might wander off at times to get food and attend the other posters. Use your judgment here: few people will come to your poster when no one is there to present it. If you have co-authors, then you can take turns.
There are many tips on the web. For example, this site includes visual design advice and links to some good undergraduate biology posters. Please use large fonts -- for most text, preferably sans-serif fonts of 32 points and greater.
Remember that you have a paper in the proceedings as well. Thus, while you want enough visible detail to help you answer questions, it's not necessary to put every detail on the poster (e.g., don't reproduce your full bibliography). Like a good talk, a good poster conveys the essential ideas and results and convinces people to go read the full paper.
Here is the official information, courtesy of ACL 2007 (consult that link for any updates):
Bring a laser pointer if possible, so that you can point to one part of your poster without obstructing people's view of other parts.
Probably the easiest way is to make a single huge slide in your favorite graphics or presentation program. For example, in Powerpoint, you can use "File / Page Setup..." to set the slide dimensions. Putting everything on one big slide lets you be very flexible in your layout. It also lets you specify fonts and images at their true sizes.
You may have access to a poster printer at your institution. If not, some photocopy shops can print large posters. You can prepare a file in Powerpoint, PDF, or some other format, and either bring it or email it to the shop. You may have a choice of papers; for example, indoor vinyl is attractive, durable and fairly cheap.
Check the printing cost and the maximum dimensions of the poster printer before preparing your poster. For example, many U.S. printers will handle 36" wide but not 38".
