Resources
Poster PrintingContact Person: Rodney McPhail
494-8119
rmcphail@bilbo.bio.purdue.edu
Rules
1) Please let us know which operating system and software you are using because it will help us determine which platform we use to print your poster, giving you the best quality and least amount of trouble. The width of paper our printer can handle is 36". Please keep that in mind when designing your poster. A standard poster size would be 36"in height by 48" in length. We can print longer than 48" if needed.
2) Please spell check and proofread your poster before you ask us to print it. Reprinting the poster is expensive.
3) Please submit your poster for printing as soon as you possibly can. Plan for at least a minimum 2-day turn-around time. Scientific Illustration will attempt to print your poster as soon as possible, and get it back to you in a timely fashion. Posters brought in after 3:00 p.m. will generally be printed the following day. Posters will be printed during the workweek and not over weekends.
4) Posters can be sent as e-mail attachments if the file size is 7 megabytes or less. They can be e-mailed to posters@bilbo.bio.purdue.edu. If you e-mail your poster, please cc' your message to rmcphail@bilbo.bio.purdue.edu to let Scientific Illustration know that a poster is ready for printing. You can submit posters larger than 7 megabytes on a CD or USB memory stick.
5.) All posters printed through the Illustration department must have at least one member of the biology department credited for the research along with a Purdue University logo.
Suggestions and Hints- Put your poster together using PowerPoint, Photoshop, InDesign, or Illustrator. Adobe PDF format is also acceptable.
- Scientific Illustration developed poster templates and will be developing more. You do not have to use one of these templates, but they can be a guide to get you started and they provide tested and successful formats that include university and departmental logos. You may modify a template as much as you like. The templates are for posters size 36" by 48" in landscape mode. Leave at least 0.5" margin around your poster (the printer cannot print to the extreme edge, and usually you will need somewhere to put in pins when displaying the poster). These templates can be downloaded from: here in our department's website; web page will have small screen-shots of each template.
- Use white as the background for your poster, and use color sparingly to highlight areas of text and for images. The reason for this request is that a solid color background saturates the paper and warps it, and consumes a lot of ink. White is also a good contrasting color for text, which will improve readability. Keeping presentations simple and clean will help convey the material better.
- Warning! One out of 10 submitted posters has a design problem caused by missing fonts, unsupported graphics types, or other assembly issues that prevents them from printing correctly. Scientific Illustration has the resources and knowledge to fix most problems and will do what they can to solve problem issues. If you have questions or problems when putting your poster together, please contact Rodney McPhail 494-8119 and he will try to help. Again please give yourself and Scientific Illustration ample time for printing and possible problems. Submitting a poster for printing the day before you have to leave town makes it very difficult to correct problems in time.
- Faculty who have students in their classes print posters for poster sessions, presentation, or special campus events are asked to please contact Scientific Illustration well in advance and let us know when the upcoming event will take place, and how many students are participating, . This will ensure that so that we can make sure we have the proper amount of supplies on hand needed to take care of your class.
- Faculty who supply their own glossy roll of paper can have it loaded for their posters. Scientific Illustration will also store the paper if you wish. If you have any questions on the type of paper you would need or want and where to order it, please contact Rodney McPhail 494-8119 or rmcphail@bilbo.bio.purdue.edu and he will help you with the order.
- If you cannot get your poster submitted on time, you can have your poster printed by driving out to Kinko's on State Road 26 E. and have it printed there. Kinko's can also laminate posters up to 36" wide as well for $3 per square foot.
