Using templates for poster printing is a double-edged sword. They can save you time and maybe some money, but it can also limit you creatively and make the design boring. So using a poster template should be thought of carefully. Depending on your purposes in designing posters and your budget for poster printing, using templates may be beneficial or detrimental to your project.

So here we have the advantages and disadvantages of using poster templates. Take note of these facts so that you can decide if you will use a template or hire a professional graphics designer.

Advantages

First and foremost, poster templates save you time. By using a template you don't have to think of a specific layout or design for your color poster. All the layout decisions and design elements are already laid out for use. All you really need to do is input a few specific images and text to make the poster useful for your goal. Because of this, a poster design can be complete within a few moments. This saves you the grueling process of having to hire a professional and converse with him/her about the design.

Of course speaking of hiring a professional graphics designer, they will cost you. Designing posters digitally is no easy task. It requires training, patience and imagination. So a lot of graphic artists out there charge a significant "talent fee" for their services. The better an artist is at this, the higher the fee. Poster templates let you eliminate all this extra cost. Since most of the design elements have been thought out before no extra funds are necessary. You can either pay a small fee for the use of the template, or there are some templates out there that are free to use.

Added to this, if you are in a business that prints several kinds of posters every year or every month then a standard poster template is an economical investment since you can use the poster templates throughout the year. You do not have to create a new design over and over for each poster that needs to be printed. This saves you more money since you do not have to repeatedly hire design professionals.

Lastly, a good advantage of using a poster template is the ability to choose from a variety of designs. There are a lot of poster designs available for you to choose from. You are not limited to only one or two artists and their perspectives. When you use templates, there are a wide variety of design styles that a lot of artists have thought of that you can choose. All you have to know is what you really want to see in your poster.

Disadvantages

Now with that, there are of course also some significant disadvantages to using a poster template. One of them is the limits to creativity. When you use templates, you are stuck with the templates that are available to you. If you do not have access to a lot of color poster templates, then your choices will be considerably lacking. Also this means that you do not have much of a creative leeway in the look of your poster. If you do not have the expertise in editing a template then you will not be able to change the design elements of a poster template if you need to.

Also, this means that your posters will be boring. Using the same old layout and design for your posters will probably bore your audience. Most of them will say they have seen that already. Others may even ignore it altogether since the design would look commonplace and not unique. If people are ignoring your poster then it would not be that effective.

Lastly, a poster template is only beneficial if you use it several times a year or a month. If you are in a business which prints only a spare amount of posters per year, or you have a project that is a one time job, then a poster template is not economical. You may have been better of letting someone design it.

So those are the advantages and disadvantages of poster templates. Keep this in mind as you decide on your own poster printing tasks. Think if you want to prioritize on the savings with the cost of printing or the quality of the design of your poster.