Filming has begun for Oprah Winfrey's Australian specials, with film crews being spotted in outback north Queensland.
News Ltd says the film crews have been at Mt Mulligan cattle station three hours northwest of Cairns for three weeks, but have signed confidentiality agreements.
It says Winfrey's company Harpo has paid the crews to get some scenes of the outback for the opening scenes of her shows in Australia next month.
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Meanwhile,federal Tourism Minister Martin Ferguson says Winfrey's trip Down Under will be a hard act to follow.
But the talk show star's juggernaut visit to Australia in December is a good sign for the future of the tourism sector, he said.
"The recent coup of getting Oprah Winfrey to Australia ... is a hard act to follow, but (the) potentially huge success (is) a sign of things to come," Mr Ferguson told a tourism conference in Canberra.
The one-day conference is looking at the potential value of the industry by 2020, and coincides with a new snapshot of the local tourism sector.
The State of the Industry report showed international tourist numbers remained stable during the global financial crisis, despite international figures taking a dive of more than four per cent.
