The next in the latest wave of 3D motion capture films is heading our way for October 2011, and it has some pretty major names attached to it.

Directed by Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg with a script from Joe Cornish, Steven Moffat and Edgar Wright, The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn is an adaptation of the world famous comic by Herge, about a young reporter (the titular Tintin) and his faithful dog, Snowy.

Now, the announcement of these films was a HUGE deal in basically, oh, every country in the world minus the US, so it stands to reason that Empire Magazine (the UK’s greatest movie mag, period) received the exclusive on these images.

The cover, seen at the top of the post, is the first look at Tintin, “played” by Jamie Bell.  Tintin, as with every character in the film, is a 3D CGI character created via motion performance capture, similar to what you saw with The Polar Express or Avatar.  It’s this same technology that is why the film, which wrapped filming a year ago, will take two years to release, the CG is of that amazing of quality.

The other two stills, above, feature Tintin, Snowy, and both a behind view and close up of Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis), a trusted ally to Tintin.

All and all, given the talent and technology involved, I’m very interested to see how the film turns out, but I can’t help but feel many in the US are like me when it comes to the source material.  I know enough to know that the books are incredibly popular all around the world, but I cannot say I’ve read a single volume.  Given my level of all around nerddom, I do worry that they will struggle to sell the film to John Q. Public.

Either way, I have a year to get caught up, and they have a year to sell the world on this adaptation. This could be an interesting one!

Source: Empire.