Billbo-hobbit.com recently had a sit down with the director for the new Hobbit movie, Guillermo Del Toro, and he had some good news about what he wants to do with the movie and when it might actually get filmed.

Q:There any professionals who worked with you on Hellboy II that will be joining you on the Hobbit?
A:Hopefully Mignola, Barlowe, Spectral Motion, Guillermo Navarro and others…

Q:Will there be any cool creatures in Hobbit like Hellboy 2?
A:many many more and we will be pushing the goblin kindgom. we will be pushing smaug, the spiders of mirkwood. we will be pushing them to the edge of technology where we will fuse animatronics and cgi into a seamless new art form in creating creatures, i think.

Q:When does filming for The Hobbit begin?
A:it will begin in 2010 and we will shoot for about 370 days or so…

For people looking for a comparison, the original Peter Jackson trilogy took around 275 days to film.

The first Hobbit movie will be released in December 2011, and the second film will be released the following December in 2012.