Very few styles of film making are more impressive and more grueling than the art of stop-motion. The meticulous and painstaking work requires the patience of ten saints, and not one person had this gift mixture of virtues more so than Henry Selick. Selick is best known for his directorial debut with the Tim Burton produced Halloween (and sometimes Christmas) classic The Nightmare Before Christmas. He also did James and the Giant Peach, and most recently an adaptation of Neil Gaiman‘s book, Coraline.

Selick recently spoke with HitFix (head there to read a lot more with the director) about what he has coming up next, and surprisingly, three projects were revealed. As impressive as stop-motion movies are, we live in a world where animated movies are mostly made using computer technologies, and these movies make insane amounts of money; so why put the money and the effort into something as tedious as stop-motion when it can be so much easier? Well, sillies — because there is a certain charm that comes from stop-motion that is completely unique and impossible to replicate.

Author Neil Gaiman made an appearance on The Today Show this morning, where he announced that Neil Jordan will write and direct the big-screen adaptation of his latest award-winning novel, The Graveyard Book.

Jordan is best known for his work on the 1992 Academy Award-nominated film The Crying Game, which he wrote and directed and won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Jordan also helmed Interview with the Vampire and most recently directed Jodie Foster in The Brave One.

Gaiman will produce the live-action film and Framestore, the UK studio that handled the The Dark Knight Harvey Dent/Two-Face work, will handle the visual effects for film, which has yet to be renamed. The author had said that he hopes the cast will be filled with well-known British actors, similar to the Harry Potter franchise, but the lead role of Nobody Owens — the little boy who’s raised by the inhabitants of a graveyard — will probably be played by several unknown actors at various ages.

Don’t ask me why, but I’ve been working all day under the assumption that today was November 9, 2008. It’s only now in the evening that I realize that it’s actually November 10, hence the reason why this Neil Gaiman feature celebrating the author’s 48th birthday today is coming so late (sorry Neil!).

For those of you who don’t know about Neil Gaiman’s contributions to the geek world, I both pity and envy you — pity because of the deprivation you’ve experienced thus far; envy because if you follow the advice I’m about to give you, a whole new world is going to open up to you — and it’s a truly exhilarating experience.

One thing you’ll learn pretty quickly is that Gaiman is versatile enough to dabble in various literary categories, so there’s something out there for everyone — even the kids. Since Neil’s been writing for a such long time, you might not know where to begin. So, to help you out on your impending magical, eye-opening, life-changing journey, here’s a list of Neil Gaiman writings you need familiarize yourself with immediately (trust me, you’ll be thankful you did).

*The following is a translation in Portuguese of our A Beginner’s Guide To Neil Gaiman feature. Thank you to reader Pati Fimbrethil for the translation!

*Obrigado ao leitor Pati Fimbrethil para traduzir este artigo em Português.

Para aqueles de vocês que não conhecem as contribuições de Neil Gaiman para o mundo geek, eu tanto os invejo como tenho pena de vocês – pena por causa da privação que vocês sofreram até hoje; inveja porque se vocês seguirem o conselho que eu estou prestes a dar, um novo mundo inteiro se abrirá pra vocês – e é uma experiência verdadeiramente arrebatadora.

Uma coisa que você aprenderá bem rápido é que Gaiman é versátil o bastante para escrever em várias categorias literárias, então tem alguma coisa aí fora pra todo mundo – até para as crianças. Uma vez que Neil já está escrevendo há tanto tempo, pode ser que você não saiba por onde começar. Então, para ajudá-lo(a) nessa sua iminente experência mágica, aqui está uma lista dos escritos de Neil Gaiman com os quais você precisa se familiarizar imediatamente (confie em mim, você agradecerá por tê-lo feito).

Being that his writing is highly sought after to adapt into great movies, it’s no surprise that Neil Gaiman‘s latest book, The Graveyard Book, is already moving forward toward becoming its own cinematic offering.

Gaiman explained that though many Hollywood studios were after the property, he’s going with top dog visual effects people in the U.K to bring his book to life. The studio is called Framestore and they apparently handled the Harvey Dent/Two-Face work in The Dark Knight, so they aren’t new to the big show. But, they are new to making movies on their own.

Gaiman explained why he chose Framestore…