Movie posters are used to advertise upcoming shows, but they’re also incredible works of art and collector’s items. If you want to learn how to make a good movie poster from a film template, then the first thing you need to do is study movie posters.
How to Create a Movie Poster: 1st Step
Try to identify the qualities you think make the poster successful and the qualities that don’t work. Study the poster from back to front. What kind of images does the designer use? What do they tell you about the genre of the movie being advertised? What mood do they create in the poster? Great movie posters start with great images.
Next, look at the colours used. Are they bright and cheerful or dark and foreboding? What impact do they have on you?
If graphic elements like lines or shapes are used, what’s their purpose? What do they add to the meaning of the poster or to its mood?
Finally, look at the style and size of the fonts used in the text. What information is emphasised by the font, and what information is minimised by small fonts or excluded altogether?
Movie Poster Design Template: 2nd Step
In movie posters, all these elements—images, colours, graphic elements, and fonts—tell you everything you need to know about the movie and help to build anticipation and desire to see the movie, or cause you to lose interest altogether. And if you want to learn how to make a movie poster yourself—a successful one, that is—you’re going to have to be aware of how all these elements combine to tell a visual story about the movie and drive potential audience interest.
If this sounds daunting, don’t worry. We have just the right tool to help you create awesome posters. Poster Maker is an incredible movie poster generator from Placeit that shows you how to make a movie poster online without any specially designed software like Photoshop.
With several movie design template ideas to choose from, all you need to do is select your favourite design, enter your chosen text into the movie poster template, customise your design with available fonts, colours, graphics, etc., and Placeit will generate a great movie poster for you.
If you have no idea even where to start, the Poster Maker also offers a number of movie design template presets in your chosen design that you can either use as is or customise to suit your tastes.
As you create your poster, you can make use of Placeit’s state-of-the-art mockup tool at the bottom of the page, which shows your poster in a range of real-life scenarios.
If you don’t see a template for the movie you have in mind, no problem. You can easily adapt the available movie poster templates to create posters in other genres.
15 Top Film Poster Design Templates From Envato Elements
With an Envato Elements subscription, you’ll find hundreds of movie poster design templates you can customize. Here are 15 of the best you should try.
1. Fashionist Movie Poster Template (PSD)
Keep your stars at the centre of attention with the Fashionist movie poster template. Add in your hero shots and edit the text that sits over them. It’s a unique layout that can work as a teaser poster design.
2. Double Exposure Movie Poster Credits Template (PSD, AI)
Double exposures look stunning in the world of art and photography. This movie design template adopts the technique for its layout. It features bold text and plenty of space to add credits. Try it if you’ve been hunting a drama poster design template.
3. Rainy Desert Movie Poster Template (PSD)
Rainy Desert is a cool movie poster template PSD that gives you the chance to experiment. The text and graphics are completely customizable, so they can fit your film project. Its organized layers also help you make edits without affecting the overall design. If you’re stuck along the way, just check out the included help file.
4. Last Soldier Photoshop Movie Poster Template (PSD)
Last Soldier is ideal for an action or drama poster design template. It has a gritty and textured feel that adds a layer of intrigue to the layout. Like other film design poster templates on this list, Last Soldier can be customized. All it takes is a few clicks to take on this look.
5. Sci-Fi Movie Teaser Poster Design Template 3 (PSD)
Have you been thinking about going the vintage sci-fi movie poster route while looking for a template? Then here is one of your best choices. It adds its own modern twists to the classic layouts from movies like Alien. Your thriller movie poster design will look amazing when applied to this template.
6. The End Movie Poster Template (PSD)
The End is just the beginning with this Photoshop movie poster template. It’s perfect for an action film and it’s really easy to customize. You can change the image, colours, and text in this movie poster template Photoshop download.
7. The Island Poster Film Template (PSD, AI)
There’s something in the water… and it looks like a thriller movie poster design. The Island is another Illustrator and Photoshop movie poster template from Envato Elements. It features resizable vector graphics and editable text and colours. It’s a cool option for a movie cover template.
8. Sci-Fi Movie Poster Design Template 2 (PSD)
We return to the sci-fi world with this movie poster template for Photoshop. Here you’ll get a well-organized PSD file in A4 size. Editing is easy, but if you have trouble, you can check the included help file. Most free movie poster templates can’t offer the same level of detail and care as this choice.
9. The Storm Photoshop Movie Poster Template (PSD)
Whether it’s for a gritty action movie or a suspenseful thriller film, The Storm is a top movie poster design. All the included text and graphics can be edited, so you have plenty of room to experiment. Customization is easy too, and the help document makes that process even easier.
10. Bloody Battle Movie Poster Template Photoshop Download (PSD)
The action-packed Bloody Battle movie poster credits template is worth checking out. It offers some nice image composites found on many big-budget action movie posters. This movie design template uses free fonts, editable text boxes, and an organized PSD.
11. Sci-Fi Movie Poster Credits Template 4 (PSD)
This sci-fi movie cover template has a futuristic vibe, but it still pays homage to classic posters. Its vibrant colours line up with the space theme, but the final result can be customized by you. Try it if you want a movie poster template in Photoshop that you can leave your creative mark on.
12. On The Edge Of The Earth Movie Cover Poster Template (PSD)
Here’s a Photoshop movie poster template that feels adventurous. The well-organized PSD file lets you drop in your hero image front and centre in the layout. You can also change the colours in this design in just a few clicks.
13. Road To City Movie Poster Template Photoshop Download (PSD)
Create a fresh teaser poster design with this download. It features a well-organized movie poster template PSD that you can customize without a headache. Road to City is also print-ready, so you can get your new design out into the world with no fuss. It’s hard finding a free movie poster template that can say all of that.
14. Movie Cover Poster Template (AI, EPS)
This is a subdued movie cover template that’s perfect for a movie night. You can customize the text, image, and colour here. If you want a minimal poster film template, don’t count this Illustrator option out.
15. Movie Festival Flyer (PSD, AI)
Are you hosting a movie festival? Promote it well with this movie festival cover template. It’s a simple design that’s all about clear communication while looking good. Not a bad way to round out our film poster design templates from Envato Elements, is it?
6 Best Movie Poster Templates
As mentioned earlier, you can find film poster design templates from Placeit and customize them without software like Photoshop. Do you want to see what’s available on the site? Then let’s check out some poster film templates you can edit online with Placeit.
1. Western Movie Poster Template
Westerns are such a perennial favourite. Who can forget contemporary classics like Django, The Revenant, and No Country for Old Men? Instead of using an image, as the posters for those movies do, the Old Western Movie Poster Design Template uses illustration instead. In doing so, it presents a simple and easily identifiable image of the gunslinger as lone wolf.
The text reinforces this clean, minimalist approach by just naming the main actor, the movie title, and the director. If this wester movie poster template just a bit too pared back for your needs, you can always upload your own photograph. But if you need more text, you’re better off adapting one of the other poster film templates covered here.
2. Science Fiction Thriller Movie Poster Design
If you’re wondering how to create a movie poster for a science fiction (sci-fi) movie, the Horror Film/Thriller Movie Poster Design Template is an excellent choice. To adapt it, all you need to do is upload an image which screams sci-fi, add your movie information, and select a font and font colour that work best with your theme. Now you’ve got yourself a science fiction movie poster.
3. Action/Adventure Movie Poster
I really loved the Horror Movie Theater Poster Design Template for an action adventure movie poster, primarily because of the template’s very minimalist style. I used the teaser post design template to create a big, bold, bright title and added a silhouetted image of a special forces officer, abseiling down the side of a building with his weapon drawn. The eye bounces back and forth between the title and the stark image and then goes to the smaller text, which identifies the producer of the film secondarily.
4. Theatre Classic Movie Poster
There are a few different ways you could approach creating a movie poster for a theatre classic like Macbeth, Waiting for Godot, or any other renowned play. The drama and the minimalism of Suspenseful Movie Theater Poster Design Template work perfectly for this genre. The theme uses illustrations rather than photos, and there are only three places for adding text. It all contributes to the drama poster design template’s stark power. Try it—you may like it too.
5. Documentary Movie Poster
Adapt the Cool Theater Poster Design Maker for your documentary movie poster. Simply upload your own photograph, change the text, select the colours that work best for your project, and voila—your job is done. It’s one of the best film poster design templates to capture your subjects.
6. Fantasy Movie Poster
Fantasy is very popular today, making a resurgence as a result of movies like Lord of the Rings. Create your own fantasy movie with the Frankenstein Movie Poster Design Maker template. To adapt it, I uploaded a fantastical image, added some fictional text to support my image, changed the colour of the text, and created my own fantasy movie poster. It makes for an excellent teaser poster design.
More Movie Poster Design Templates From GraphicRiver
I’m not done showing you the best film poster design templates! Here are five more from Envato Market’s GraphicRiver.
1. Prodigal Movie Poster Template (PSD)
Prodigal is a simple teaser poster design that can fit many different genres. This 12 x 18 Photoshop movie poster template comes with six distinct colour options that can be changed in a single click. If you like this design, you’ll find links for the assets used. Or you can customize this poster film template to better fit your project.
2. Photoshop Movie Poster Template (PSD)
This movie poster template PSD is like a striking black and white portrait. Put your film’s star front and centre along with the film credits. All objects and text boxes are editable so making this layout your own is easy. It’s a great alternative to a free movie poster template.
3. Back To The Eighties Vintage Movie Poster Template (PSD)
If you’re a film buff, it won’t be hard to see where this vintage movie poster template got its inspiration from. With that being said, the well-organized PSD lets you use this classic style to make a poster that’s completely your own. Easy to edit and instantly recognizable, this vintage movie poster template is one to keep your eye on.
4. Crime Or Horror Movie Poster Photoshop Template (PSD, JPG)
The best horror and thriller movie poster design Photoshop templates do a great job of setting the tone. That’s where this option succeeds, unlike free movie poster templates. It uses a textured background and darker colours to add to the aura of mystery. Try this grungy movie design template for your true crime documentary or suspense film.
5. Passion: Movie Poster Template (PSD)
It’s time to round out our list of the top film poster design templates. But before we wrap up, check out Passion. It’s a modern movie cover template that has a dynamic feel. One of my favourite touches here is using image masks to reveal more about the film. Try it out if you want a drama poster design template that’s sure to turn heads.
Which Movie Poster Design Template Works Best for Your Project?
So now that I’ve shared a selection of the best movie poster templates, I want you to have a play with them and create a movie poster in your favourite genre. Make sure that the background image, font choice and colour scheme you choose all convey the theme of your movie and the genre you’ve chosen. Use the mockup tool to place your poster in a real-life situation. I can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Oh, and if looking at these film poster design templates has you interested in more design, check out these awesome resources.
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