Tex: How to make a LaTeX poster

How to make a LaTeX poster

1. Making the poster file (almost from [1, 2, 3])
1) Download template latex source file UFposter.tex, blank figure ps file blank.ps, and UF logo ps file LetterShape.eps
2) Texify it o UFposter.div, and Divps the div file to Fposter.ps
3) In GSview, File/Convert, select device “jpg” and resolution “300”, and save it as a jpg file.

2. Special hints
1) If we look at the ps file, we can observe that the heights of different columns may be different, which affects the visual quality. One solution is to change the code segment by adding the red text.

\newenvironment{kasten }{%
\begin{lrbox}{\dummybox}%
\begin{minipage}{0.96\linewidth} }%
{\end{minipage}%
\end{lrbox}%
\raisebox{-depth}{\psshadowbox[framesep=1em]{\usebox{\dummybox}}}\\[0.5em]}

\newenvironment{kasten}{%
\begin{lrbox}{\dummybox}%
\begin{minipage}[t][22.6cm]{0.96\linewidth} }%
{\end{minipage}%
\end{lrbox}%
\raisebox{-depth}{\psshadowbox[framesep=1em]{\usebox{\dummybox}}}\\[0.5em]}

2) For convenience, we usually donot set the physical size in the tex file and set the proper size so that it is easy to visually check in the pdf viewer, for instance

%\def\breite{390mm} % Special Format.
%\def\hoehe{319.2mm} % Scaled by 2.82 this gives 110cm x 90cm
%\def\anzspalten{4}

%\def\breite{600mm} % Special Format.
%\def\hoehe{300mm} % Scaled by 2.82 this gives 110cm x 90cm
%\def\anzspalten{4}

\def\breite{420mm} % A3 LANDSCAPE
\def\hoehe{297mm}
\def\anzspalten{4}

% \def\breite{297mm} % A3 PORTRAIT
% \def\hoehe{420mm}
% \def\anzspalten{3}

Hence, it is necessary to resize the ps poster file. The script poster_resize offers a solution. However, the script can only be run in Unix. For windows, we just psresize this ps file to the size that we want.

An example command:
psresize -w118cm -h168cm -W29.7cm -H42cm in.ps out.ps.

Comments: -w -h specify the physical size, -W –H correspond to the size specified in the tex file. Strangely, the width and height specification seems exchanged, maybe for the reason of landscape or portrait view.

[1] Making and printing a poster using latex poster macros
[2] LaTeX Poster
[3] Gordon_2006.zip