I’m sure that Manfre posted this up last week in the trailers thread on the Smorg, but I wanted to make a little post about this because I can’t wait to see this when it comes out. It’s directed by Henry Selick of The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach, and is based on Neil Gaiman’s short book by the same name. It follows the story of a girl who stumbles apon a small door in her new apartment which leads to an alternate world where things are certainly off-kilter. It sounds like a cross between Being John Malkovich and Alice in Wonderland which sounds like a recipe for success to me.

Visually, it looks stunning. Its clearly being done by puppets and sets and not pixels which I find refreshing. I like the fact that I am reminded that an actual human hand is what’s making all that stuff move around on the screen. There is an enormous attention to detail here, and the characters move with expert fluidity in this trailer. Myself, I was terrible at doing stop motion animation while in school so I am always really impressed by anyone who can do it convincingly and on the level that Coraline is on.

All that said, clearly computers play a huge role in today’s stop motion productions. A computer allows the animator to instantly review his work which allows them the chance to nail an action down. However, this doesn’t mean the computer is doing all the work. For example, if an animator makes a mistake or doesn’t like how a particular action comes out, he must do the whole thing from the beginning (salvaging what footage they can of course). Its great seeing new technology put to use this way as the results really bring the medium to a new level.

Its being produced at Laika Studios which was once known as Will Vinton Studios. You know, they did those California Raisens commercials among a ton of other very well done stop motion shorts, spots, and series like the short lived stop motion series, The PJs.