Poster ideas: how to present material that is VISUAL?

What I am looking for in a poster:
A good poster will have:

• A point, a purpose, a takeaway, a thesis, something to teach the class
  
• this is a very important element in terms of grading: all else results from this.
• if you are making a poster about a work we have not read in class: the point should be something that relates the new work to what we read, makes it attractive to read the new work, or maybe makes us see what we read in a different light
  
• A title that conveys the "takeaway," the "message," the "point" of the poster, what a viewer will get out of it.
  
• Think of this as the one-liner on the list of posters that gets put into the program at a conference: it should make someone want to go take a look.
• The title and your name MUST BE very clear on the back of the poster. If you want to, you can put it on the presentation side of the poster too, but that is not necessary.
• if you are making a poster about a work we have not read in class: the title should make clear why someone who has read our class material will be particularly interested in your poster.
  
• Related to that, the poster itself should deliver on its title: the poster should fulfill its title's promise.
• you can have a clever catchy title, but be sure to have a subtitle that says what the poster does
  
• Sensible structure: just as you don't put sentences, words, paragraphs in random order, so things on your poster should be organized and not just in random order.
• but it's not enough to have a structure (see next item)
  
• Lots of help for the viewer to understand that structure:
  
• unlike a paper, where the reader is meant to read from the first word to the next to the next to the next... to the last, in a linear way, a viewer can jump around on a poster.
• YOU have to help your viewer by using arrows, numbers, colors. If it is unusual and eye-catching, all the better.
• Economy: make each word, each line, each picture, each color count
• you have to "boil down" your ideas into quick, eye-catching, but still fully explanatory and fully intellectual and fully informative VISUAL presentation.
• don't just full up every square inch and call it done: blank space can be very important visually: and there is a visual counterpart to "filler" and "fluff"
• but be careful: see the next point
  
• Detail and carefulness
• Although a poster, like a powerpoint, is "boiled down," "spare," "concise" and not just a welter of detail, nonetheless, unlike a powerpoint, it must have ample detail and the right detail
  
• How to incorporate that? Be judicious and very careful and accurate.
  
• This is perhaps the hardest part to get right if you do everything else well. It's a balancing act.
  
• Personality
• Your poster should have a style, pizzazz, a spark, something that says "I'm proud of what I am" "Look at me" "I won't disappoint you!!"
• But that comes with a risk: the "personality" should be backed up with substance to match, and it shouldn't be just random: it should serve the content.

• I will spend no more than 5 minutes per poster to form a preliminary idea, then I will go back and fill in the rubric. If you want to "test" or "proofread" or "rehearse" your poster, think of it that way. If you have more than 5 minutes of reading material to get through the bulk of your poster, it's too much. If it takes 10 minutes for a friend to get through the whole thing, it's too much.
• On the other hand, the counterpart to that is that if it takes 5 minutes to get through it, but it doesn't really say much, that's a big problem too.
  

• After looking at a poster for 5 minutes at most, I want to be able to say:
• I understand easily and well exactly what the poster is trying to tell me, because it was made easy for me to do so: I know what it is trying to teach me.
  
• AND it's an important message, one that makes a difference to how I see the material in the class, one that makes me want to pursue the topic more or shows me something interesting and new.
  
• I agree with the creator: what the poster is trying to tell me is true, because the creator showed me that it is true via good evidence.
• This poster took good advantage of being visual rather than verbal: visual presentation works well for what the poster is trying to say.
  
• The creator really incorporated a lot of material from our readings and learning in this class.
  
• Come to think of it, those 5 bullet points are what I will ask myself when grading, the rubric for grading.
  

The following is what I have come up with in terms of elements you can exploit to convey ideas visually.

• color?
• make color significant somehow? be careful, because no one can read some combinations, such as yellow font or light grey.
• make color of background in particular areas significant?
• make color of other elements significant?
• ...
  
• space
• center versus edge of poster can be significant: central focus versus peripheral elements, main topic versus related topics, etc.
  
• amount of space given to something can suggest its importance
• one side versus the other side: comparisons, contrasts, versions
  
• venn diagrams
• ...
  
• overlays
• simply hinge-ing/folding a piece of paper with one image/word/symbol on top of another that the viewer has to reach out and reveal suggests a connection
• perhaps surface versus underlying significance
• hidden connections?
• time: later things on top or bottom?
• detail: big picture on top, then open it to reveal detail?
• maybe transparency overlays that can be removed to show how something builds gradually?
  
• popup elements
• requires some craftiness, but it's possible
• a poster with a fold can have "shelves" built into it..
  
• shapes or other symbols
• little bullet-points that have different shapes are visual cues
• different themes/ideas can be attached to them
  
• a plus + sign or an equals = sign or an -> arrow or whatever can be used to great effect to show the nature of a connection between elements.
  
• putting an outline/frame around something can separate it off and highlight it in various ways
• distortion of images:
• distortion of an image can suggest relative importance of the parts that are made huge/small or otherwise suggest an interpretation
  
• maps
• always visual and great
• directions
• "START HERE" maybe?
• or have it read from something focal in the center outward
• or maybe from left to right, top to bottom like a printed page
• triptych? diptych?
• take one posterboard, or two, or three, and put them up at an angle to each other, or fold one into two halves or three parts. It will stand up then, which is very nice.
  
• could imply that the contents are reflection of one thing by another or two sides of one phenomenon or comparison or contrast or phenomenon
• timelines
• also always already visual
• graphs/charts
• also inherently visual, but can be dull if not done right.
  
• you could even go 3-d: have to be crafty with glue and stuff, but it could be interesting: boxes? planes that are perpendicular to the poster? holes in poster? maybe just pad something from behind with a layer or two of cardboard so it literally stands out from the plane of the poster?
  
• size
• generally, something LARGE implies important, central, focus, whereas something small implies detail
• style
• different styles ^of _font could be interesting and put to work as a way to suggest various things.
• Background:
• different backgrounds for different spaces? perhaps shapes that are outlined but overlap on different colored backgrounds to show two different things with the same image?
• texture?
  
• flashy prismatic paper could attract attention to something, for instance
• tables are great for quick visual orientation:

• put content here!	corresponding content here
  other content here	and here

  
  

• In other words, every element that you see can be manipulated and possibly made to create meaning or logic or connections.
  
• YOU MAY NEED TO INCLUDE A KEY for viewers to understand these things