Film Bag, IMAX

This black fabric bag was one of many produced by ILC to hold IMAX film before and after exposure on space shuttle missions. Inside the bag, a sealed metal film can containing the film was stored. The fabric handle made it easier to move the bags around the spacecraft and to developing facilities post-flight. Know as "pizza bags" at IMAX and amongst astronauts for their shape and size, they were used on all IMAX filming flights in the 1980s and 1990s.

Astronauts used the camera to capture film footage for five IMAX productions. The first of these, The Dream Is Alive (1985), still ranks as the most popular of all IMAX feature films. Four of the films were co-sponsored by IMAX, NASA, the National Air and Space Museum, and Lockheed Martin. By carefully training the astronauts not only to operate the camera but also to act as cinematographers to capture both the thrilling and ordinary activities in orbit, IMAX produced films that virtually put the audience inside and outside the shuttle.

Gift of the IMAX Corporation in 2011.