History’s proven that Jackson’s a dab hand at shooting back-to-back. But how about the new challenge of 3D?

“3D is easy,” breezes the director. “I’ve always tried to move the camera around a lot because it gives you a 3D effect in a 2D movie. So I’m not doing anything different, I’m shooting the movie as I normally would.”

Turning Tolkien’s vision into cinema has only become easier since the original trilogy, says Jackson. “The technology gets better. Everything that we were pioneering on LOTR has now become a well-organised pipeline.”

For one thing, digital acting – synthesping – has stepped up a gear. “We showed people Martin’s CGI double and they thought they were looking at the actual Martin,” smiles Jackson. “I think he was bit freaked out by it…”