Not a ton of news here, but Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson sat down for the official Tintin website in celebration of the 80th anniversary of the red-haired comic character. The two appeared complete with their own umbrellas and bowlers hats.

In the video they explain that principal photography/motion capture work will begin finally in three days and the two joked about how instead of the young Tintin we’re used to, they’ll be using the current 80-year old Tintin… long, white beard and all.

Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn is the first film in the planned trilogy, and it’s directed by Spielberg. Peter Jackson will handle the second movie and it’s expected that the pair will tag-team the final movie. The movie stars Jamie Bell as Tintin, along with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as Thompson and Thomson, as well as Andy Serkis and Daniel Craig.

Recently it was announced that Simon Pegg and Nick Frost had officially joined the cast as Thompson & Thomson in Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson‘s proposed Tintin trilogy of movies, the first of which is now officially titled The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn.

Now comes word of two more castings, Jamie Bell and Daniel Craig. Bell has been cast in the lead role of Tintin; he is best known for his work in Billy Elliot and was recently in Jumper. He also worked on Peter Jackson’s King Kong, so that probably helped out a bit. Daniel Craig is best known as the latest and greatest James Bond and his character in Tintin will be Red Rackham.

After it was rumored for so long, it has now been officially announced that the unfailing team of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (Hot Fuzz) will play Thomson & Thompson in the three-movie Tintin project from Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson.

The casting is interesting, as the twin characters are only identifiable by their mustaches. This is something hard to imagine with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, who couldn’t look more different than one another; it’s part of their appeal… a modern day, British Laurel and Hardy, if you will. Maybe Frost lost a lot of weight for the role? Who knows! I’m sure they have some great, comical ideas in mind to make it all work.

The trilogy will be in full stylistic 3D motion-capture form, a la The Polar Express and Beowulf. Spielberg will handle the first movie’s directing duties, Jackson will do the second, and one or the other or both will do the final film. Also starring is Jackson’s favorite motion-capture workhorse Andy Serkis, who will be playing Captain Haddock.

Last May, it was announced that Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson were to direct and produce three performance-capture films based on Georges Remi’s 1929 comic strip, Tintin.

Since then, rumors surfaced that Spielberg would no longer be directing the first movie in the planned film trilogy and that Jackson would be moving up from directing the second film to the first.

Now, there’s news that both Jackson’s and Spielberg’s people have confirmed that nothing has changed and that Spielberg would still do the first and Jackson would do the second.

Given my disposition towards adaptations from books to movies, and my loathing for Peter Jackson as a result, this latest news isn’t necessarily sending me off the high diving board of happiness. Nevertheless, it has been announced that executive producer Jackson and director Guillermo del Toro have announced that they will be writing The Hobbit.

Jackson was part of the writing team for The Lord of the Rings trilogy, along with his wife Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, both of whom have also signed on to write the two planned prequels (The Hobbit and a sequel) to Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movies.

The Jackson and del Toro have just concluded an eight-month search for a writer, finally picking themselves for three reasons. First off, they suddenly saw their busy schedules open up; two, they realized that they both loved the book; and three, they realized that in order to achieve the release dates set for the movies, the process would require people intimate with Tolkien’s world of Middle Earth.