Not every film needs a lengthy period of pre-production, but for a piece like this I have to ask: if at the beginning of June they had not yet started "thinking practicalities", when did they approach &/or sign production designers & artists to start the process of conceptualizing this visual world of a film which they would begin filming in February of the following year?
When did concept art for this great "masterpiece" of an "epic" start getting made?