Poster Printing

[Keith Senkowski]

So I want to print up this bad ass poster I worked up, but dunno where to get this done.  I was thinking something with grommits so that it can be easily hung up at cons and such.  Anyone got any suggestions?

Oh and please include stuff like the size you printed and cost...

Keith

[timfire]

Well, for paper posters you can just go to Kinko's, that's what I did for the poster I used at Dreamation. But it sounds like you want... err, something like the Forge banner? (I'm not sure what that material is called).

[Keith Senkowski]

Tim,

Well maybe a laminated paper poster with grommits might work.  Dunno.

Keith

[Paul Czege]

Hey Keith,

I used Canada Display Graphics for the My Life with Master and Kill Puppies for Satan banners that Vincent and I had for GenCon last year. Their page with U.S. pricing is: http://www.america-banners.com/

The $4.59 price per square foot can't be beat. And I was very very pleased with the quality (grommets, outdoor weight vinyl, stitched nice and square, UV-resistant ink) and service.

The only trick is their minimum order. The Forge booth rules were for banners to be "poster sized." And that's only $25-$35 at the Canada Display Graphics prices. So Vincent and I went in together on a single order consisting of both our banners.

Paul

p.s. They'll do a banner for you from 75dpi artwork. I recommend that you send 150dpi.

[Keith Senkowski]

Paul,

Very cool.  Thanks.

Oh, but Poster Size?  Which Poster size?

Keith

[Paul Czege]

The My Life with Master banner was 28" wide by 34" tall (by quadrupling the dimensions of the book and quartering the dpi, I got 150 dpi for the banner without having to resample the image). I believe the Kill Puppies for Satan banner was an inch or two narrower and an inch or two taller.

Paul

[jdagna]

Poster size is typically 2'x3', though there are other sizes.

If you want paper posters, CafePress.com is not a bad resource, especially if you order them in batches of 15+ for the discount.  My run came to about $10 each and they're very nicely done.

The vinyl banners (with grommets and such) are available through Kinko's and a lot of other copy/promotional shops.  Kinko's charges $6 per square foot, if I remember right, and that's actually cheaper than their rate for paper posters (which is $10 a square foot).  I've found cheaper places than Kinko's, but I can't recall any specific ones off the top of my head.

[Thor]

I don't know about the area around you, but the university here has a center for visual technology where students who are learning to do this sort of thing get to practice. You can get posters printed off at a much lower rate than Kinko's.