Answer these three questions:
PowerPoint: A popular, easy-to-use option. (Advice for creating a poster with PowerPoint).
Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign: Professional software including lots of high-resolution images, but are more complex and expensive.
Open Source Alternatives: OpenOffice - free alternative to MS Office (Impress is its PowerPoint alternative). Inkscape & Gimp Adobe product alternatives. For charts and diagrams, Gliffy or Lovely Charts. A complete list of free graphics software.
This worksheet will help you plan your academic poster. Planning might not be exciting, but with a project this big and with all your awesome research to share planning is a must. This guide will help you map out your ideas and plan your design, and also has a handy final checklist to make sure your academic poster is ready to share with the world.
Download the planning worksheet here: https://guides.lib.unc.edu/ld.php?content_id=34720574