Software for designing posters?

Hi everyone,

My partner runs a dance class and would like some posters drafted up to promote the evening and future events. I have a copy of Photoshop CS and Illustrator CS and would like to know which one would be the best to do this on. I'm not a graphic designer so it will be a matter of reading through tutorials etc and a bit of trial and error. If anybody has any links to good tutorial sites and advice it would be appreciated.

Also if there is any other software out there that you'd recommend using (that isn't going to break the bank!), then you could you also let me know.

Thank you for your help!

I would always choose Illustrator for this type of work. Photoshop is for what it says in the name, manipulating photographs. Although it can be used successfully for originating the type of job you want, it is not the best solution.

I guess that future events material will need regular updating and reprinting. This is a lot easier in Illustrator as is any work involving blocks of text, logos and similar solid colour items. Also Illustrator is not size dependent (apart from any bitmap, e.g. photographic, images that may be included in the design) so something originally designed and sized as a handbill could easily be printed as a large poster.

If this is a simple DIY project using whatever software you are more familiar with may be the best answer. You could waste a lot of time learning how to use Illustrator when you could have done the job quickly and successfully in Photoshop and would never use Illustrator again.

Finally, unless you are going to print the material on your own printer check with your printing company that they can handle the file type you will be using - and the release. It's no good making a great job in Illustrator CS4 and finding your print house can't read the files or the obscure typeface you have used.

Thanks for your reply, I think I'll spend a bit of time on Illustrator and see what I can come up with.

I'd also suggest (because bevo141080 already suggested Illustrator) that you check out iWork ($79US from Apple). It includes Pages, a rather masterful WP/DTP program that comes with some nice pre-designed poster/flyer templates (don't know how big we're talking here).

You can either start from a pre-designed one, or throw out those elements and start with a blank page. Documents can be (for all practical purposes) any size. I think Pages compares very favourably to Pagemaker from years back, for 1/10th the price. Obviously InDesign et al are better, but they are also $700 packages.

iWork also includes Keynote, which blows the doors off PowerPoint, and Numbers, which ... um ... doesn't blow the doors off Excel but is kinda cool in its own way.