LYRA, the heroine from Oxford author Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, has taken her latest fantastic journey by going online.

The New Line Cinema production of Northern Lights, which is called The Golden Compass, will hit cinema screens in a year's time.

Filming is well under way, and the company has set up www.goldencompassmovie.com to keep movie fans up to date with the latest from behind the scenes.

The website features 12 stills of the actors on location, including Nicole Kidman, who plays Mrs Coulter, and 12-year-old unknown Dakota Blue Richards, who plays Lyra.

The Golden Compass follows Lyra, who lives in Jordan College, in an alternative Oxford, as she uncovers a plot against her uncle, Lord Asriel, centring on a mysterious substance called Dust.

Soon she is in over her head as she discovers a whole new world of possibilities, at the centre of which is the glamorous Mrs Coulter.

Mr Pullman, who lives in Cumnor, has attended the filming of some scenes set in Oxford, and further shooting has taken place at Shepperton Studios near London.

In March, open auditions in Oxford for the lead role attracted more than 3,000 local girls. Auditions were also held in the Lake District and in Cambridge, where Dakota Blue Richards was discovered.

Mr Pullman's final instalment of the trilogy, The Amber Spyglass, was the first children's book to win the Whitbread Prize. The trilogy has sold nine million copies worldwide. The writer has pledged to write a fourth book, a prequel to the trilogy, featuring the same characters.