Hayao Miyazaki (Howl's Moving Castle, Spirited Away) has started production on his latest as-yet-untitled animated feature, that will take about 20 months to produce, with a planned release date of summer 2008, according to Production Weekly.

The storyboards have been completed and have been distributed to the main production staff, who in July scouted locations in Kobe, a port on Japan's Inland Sea. Among areas that Miyazaki's team visited as part of pre-production were the view of a city from high in the mountains and a mysterious old café run by an elderly couple.

The storyboards for this project are notable because they were created in watercolor and the copies distributed in color as opposed to black and white. Color storyboards are a rarity and it is the first time for Studio Ghibli.