Have you spotted us on television yet?

Summer is here, hoards of children will soon be let loose from the nation's classrooms, and we would love for you all to visit us and Discover the Full Story.

That's the name of our Summer campaign, and if you live in Manchester, the Humber, or Yorkshire in you may have already seen our brightly coloured posters featuring some of the classic characters from television, gaming and film, so look out for them.

We'll also be beaming into your living rooms with our new television advert.

It will air for the very first time today (between ITV News and Emmerdale), and run until mid-August on ITV Yorkshire during prime time.

You can also see us on the big screen, because selected Vue and Odeon cinemas across Yorkshire will be showing our advert throughout August.

Visit our website to Discover the Full Story and find out what's on at the Museum over the Summer Holidays - keep checking back because there's more to come.

Photographs from the TV Advert Shoot

Avatar - how we get it on the IMAX screen

It is almost time to "Enter the world"...

It was late Saturday night when, fresh off of the plane from Los Angeles, a large delivery of numerous crates of IMAX film reels were delivered to the National Media Museum. Avatar had arrived! But the work had only just begun.

With an estimated construct time of 23 man-hours, our hard-working projection team started to splice and fuse all the reels into the one complete film. At 165 minutes, Avatar is the largest and longest IMAX film print ever made.

Here you can see some exclusive behind-the-scenes shots of our IMAX manager Dick Vaughan and projectionist Tony Cutts putting the final touches to the final reel of the right eye portion of the film. The aspect ratio for the IMAX version is 1.78:1 giving an image that is proportionally taller than previous DMR releases – these are films that have been digitally re-mastered to be shown on the giant IMAX screen. This format has been chosen by James Cameron personally after extensive consultation.

Guarantee your seats by booking online now for James Cameron's Avatar in IMAX 3D via the National Media Museum website

What's on this week: 31 Aug - 6 Sep 2009

Two new films – the intriguing Fermat's Room, and a digital restoration of Joseph Losey's 1967 classic Accident – start in our cinemas on Friday 4th September. And we've also got a new film up on our colossal IMAX screen: the spectacular Journey To Mecca (above), which follows Ibn Battuta's epic 14th century journey across West Africa, Spain, India, China and the Maldives. Film page

It's the first weekend of the month, which means the must-see This Is Cinerama returns to the Museum on Saturday 5th September. We're one of only three public Cinerama theatres in the whole world, so don't miss the experience that led one recent visitor to say that his "heart exploded". This Is Cinerama page

And our Iranian Life On Film season – part of our Bite The Mango world cinema strand – continues this week with Shirin, Ten and The Apple. Bite The Mango page

Matthew Lewis talks Harry Potter 7, IMAX, and weird fans

Yesterday, we were proud to welcome Leeds-based actor Matthew Lewis to the Museum -- for two reasons.

One: so Matthew -- who plays Neville Longbottom in the Harry Potter films -- could watch Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince on our colossal IMAX screen, and cower in the shadow of his 5 metre-tall screen counterpart.

Two: so a gaggle of starstruck children (and at least three besotted and blushing teenage girls) had their chance to sit and chat with one of the heroes of the wizarding world -- and, incidentally, one of the nicest young men you could ever hope to meet.

Matthew took a seat in our Cubby Broccoli cinema for an exclusive interview with us about all things Harry Potter -- including the hugely-anticipated final two films in the series, due for release in 2010 and 2011 respectively. Click the play button above to watch it.

And if you haven't seen Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince yet, our IMAX page has all the information you need.