It”s business as usual for UK crew today as three major projects are among those starting principal photography in the UK and further afield.

Spielberg leads the way with his sci-fi feature Ready Player One. It was six months ago that we announced the famous American filmmaker super-director has once again chosen the UK as his production base and we have since updated our PI subscribers with details of key crew, studio and schedule.

The film is an adaptation of Ernest Cline”s dystopian novel set in 2045 and stars Ben Mendelsohn, Olivia Cooke, Simon Pegg and Mark Rylance. Filming runs for 13 weeks.

Cameras also start to roll today on The Replacement, with an eight-week shoot using largely Scottish crew getting underway in Glasgow. Vicky McClure and Morven Christie star in the 3 x 60 for BBC One which comes from Left Bank Pictures.

The dark drama comes from writer/director Joe Ahearne and centres on a successful architect (Christie) who begins to suspect her maternity cover (McClure) has a disturbing agenda. Nicole Cauverien produces.

Elsewhere a major drama telling the story of the birth of Britain from Roman times begins filming today in Prague. Britannia was originally due to film for the most part in Wales, but now will be there for just a couple of weeks in July with the rest of the shoot taking place in the Czech Republic capital.

UK HoDs including the production designer are attached to the project, which comes from Vertigo Films for delivery to Sky 1 as a 10 x 60 series.

We have details on dates, locations and key hires on all these projects on Production Intelligence, which currently has listings for around 130 projects in pre-production. Click here for an online demo.

Vicky McClure photo via Getty Images Ent/David M Benett.