A Hobbit’s tale of location scouting

The crew of upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel The Hobbit have released a new video blog showing their progress in filming the epic blockbuster, reports Coming Soon.

The video opens with the crew explaining how they are filming the huge movie – with 254 days of shooting in total – in blocks, with time off between each round of filming. This gives the actors a break and allows post-production work to begin on the parts that are finished.

The blog picks up at the end of the second round of shooting and shows director Peter Jackson using the break to do some location scouting for the remaining scenes. 

The film will be released in two parts. The first, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, is due out December 14, 2012, with the second part, The Hobbit: There and Back Again, following on December 13, 2013.

Many stars from the Lord of the Rings trilogy have returned to reprise their roles, including Ian McKellen (Gandalf), Elijah Wood (Frodo Baggins), Cate Blanchett (Galadriel), Orlando Bloom (Legolas), Andy Serkis (Gollum), Christopher Lee (Saruman) and Hugo Weaving (Elrond).

Newcomer Martin Freeman stars as the young Bilbo Baggins with Ian Holm returning to play older Bilbo.