With Shazam! finally in pre-production and director David F. Sandberg is hard at work developing special effects for the superhero movie.

The update comes from Sandberg's wife Lotta Losten's Instagram account where she posted a video of Sandberg using a stack of Shazam! books, a toy and his cell phone to make "special effects." Losten wrote that "there's a lot of work going into making the special effects on a superhero movie like Shazam!”

There's a lot of work going into making the special effects on a superhero movie like Shazam! ⚡️🤓👍 Ps: see David's video of this in his story @ponysmasher A post shared by Lotta Losten (@lottalosten) on Sep 1, 2017 at 3:43pm PDT

Sandberg has been sharing humorous Instagram photos documenting the progress of Shazam! since the film entered pre-production last week when he started posted empty Coke Zero cans on a work surface in his Warner Bros Studios office.

Lighthearted approaches to effects aside there's a lot of pre-production work that has to go into Shazam! before shooting begins, one of the largest being casting the film. With Shazam! being the story of a young boy, Billy Batson, who is chosen to become the fully-grown superhero Shazam! Sandberg is looking for two actors, one for Billy and one for the superhero. A recent rumor says that Sandberg is currently conducting screen tests for the Billy Batson role.

Shazam! was originally slated for an April 5, 2019 release date. No additional update about release date has been provided.