This article gives a wide perspective on the use and potential of brain atlases for surgery of movement disorders, ranging from the stereotactic printed brain atlases to self-organized neurosurgical community services. An electronic brain atlas database with complementary atlases was constructed, atlas-assisted applications developed, and a procedure for atlas-assisted surgery of movement disorders proposed. The discussed atlas-assisted operations include three groups: atlas-related (interactive 3-D atlas-to-data warping, global and local registrations, multiple labeling, two-way anatomical indexing); atlas-data exploration-related (display and manipulation of cerebral structures presented as orthogonal planes, triplanar and 3-D models, continuous exploration of the data-atlas space); neurosurgery-related (targeting in multiple orientations, targeting with multiple atlases, stereotactic trajectory planning in 2-D and 3-D, calculation of the structures along the trajectory; movement tracking or simulating insertion of the microelectrode, mensuration). All these operations are real-time. The developed electronic brain atlas database along with applications and methodology allow for rapid surgery planning and for more sophisticated trajectories. Additionally, this might result in increased accuracy of targeting, as well as reduced duration, cost of surgery, and surgical complications.