Animation in Bob Marley’s ‘Three Little Birds’ music video

Animation in London in the 1980s was still more of a cottage industry.  There were some established studios, mostly doing work on commercials – Richard Williams Animation chief amongst them.  Many people freelanced, and were busy as work came up.  Often, work came up through ‘networking’ in the Soho pubs.  The Star & Garter was one of the favoured pubs. Unfortunately, it is soon to be closed.

 

Back in the day, London animators were a close-knit group, with close friendships.  If some special project came up – it was ‘all hands on deck’ to help out.  An opportunity came up for some incidental animation on the Bob Marley music video for ‘Three Little Birds.’  Roger and Claude Chiasson, Dino Athanassiou, and Mike Smith got together for a weekend and pounded it out.  The music video is below.  There was not much direction about what should be included in the incidental animation, so the animators took the liberty of including caricatures of themselves in the graffiti on the walls towards the end of the video.  At the 3:07 mark, there is a 4 frame photo of Claude Chiasson in an animated cap.  Between 3:09 and 3:10, there are caricatures (in order) of Dino Athanassiou, Roger Chiasson, and Mike Smith.

 

See YouTube for video.   https://youtu.be/WKucWGb7tvg