Accessible Poster Presentations

Creating accessible posters provides all session participants with greater access to poster information. Designing posters to provide greater access minimizes the exclusion of participants from the benefits of poster sessions. It is also important to have a safe environment for all attendees.  Here are some alternatives to consider:

• Keep push pins off the floor as they can puncture wheelchair and scooter tires.
• Bring a CD version of your poster in text or PowerPoint format for attendees with low-vision.
• Offer to describe your poster to an attendee with low vision.

Below are guidelines to making posters legible for attendees with low vision. The following guidelines will cover:

Using Accessible Text
Images and Graphics
Organizing Information

Using Accessible Text

Font Size
Sizes may vary depending on the viewing distance and amount of text to be included.

• Title Size: Ideal is 158-point font but titles should be at least 72-point font or larger. Title should be viewable from 10 to 15 feet away to catch the attention of the reader.
• Section Title: Ideal is 56-point font but should be at least 46 to 56-point.
• Block Text/Body: Ideal is 36-point font but should be at least 24-36 point

Font Type
Typefaces are often described as being serif or sans serif (without serifs). Use non-serif (san-serif) fonts. Serif fonts can be more difficult to read, particularly the more decorative, hand written, and italicized fonts.

• Serif fonts include a small decorative line added as embellishment to the basic form or main strokes of an alphabetical letter. The most common serif typeface is Times Roman.
• Sans serif fonts have no embellishments. Common sans serif typefaces are Helvetica and Veranda.

Font Color

• Black text with white back ground is the most legible with printed material.
• If it is important to have many colors for aesthetic or other reasons it is better to use combinations different from black text on white background only for larger or highlighted text, such as headlines and titles.

Line spacing

• Leading refers to the amount of added vertical spacing between lines of type. 
• Using between 1.2 and 2.0 line-spacing allows the reader greater ease in moving from line to line.
• Tracking is the space between characters. If your processor allows for letter-spacing
  adjustments +3 is adequate.
• You can increase tracking for headlines but you should not use less than +3 for tracking anywhere.

Images and Graphics

• Include captions for images and graphics to allow the audience to understand more precisely what the image is intended to communicate.
• Place images/graphics in sequence with the text
• Do not place text over images
• Include titles for images/graphics
• Be sure that the resolution of the image is correct for large printing. As a general rule use 300 dots per inch (dpi) when saving images. Avoid copying and pasting images from the web that are below 250Kb.

Organizing Information

• Be wary of crowding a poster. Take advantage of white space
• Location of Title should generally be across the top of the page and displayed prominently.
  Headings and sub headings should be displayed in relationship to the body/block
  text they lead.
• An introduction to the poster should be clear, engage the audience, and inform them of the power message to take from the poster.
• Readers should be logically led in the correct direction from heading to heading by a
  clear narrative and attractive while logical design of the poster