Mark Mangini, sound designer on documentary Good Night Oppy, talks to TVBEurope about creating believable sounds for the Mars Opportunity rover, including when it developed arthritis
By Jenny Priestley
Published: November 24, 2022
Mark Mangini, sound designer on documentary Good Night Oppy, talks to TVBEurope about creating believable sounds for the Mars Opportunity rover, including when it developed arthritis
target=_blank title=Share on LinkedIn class=share-linkedin>
Sound designer Mark Mangini is no stranger to working on major sci-fi movies having won Oscars for his work on Mad Max: Fury Road and Dune. He's also credited with recording and editing a new sound for Leo the Lion, MGM's mascot.
Mangini's latest project takes him literally out of this world. He talks to TVBEurope about creating the sound for a new documentary that charts the story of Opportunity, a NASA exploration rover that was sent to Mars for a 90-day mission but ended up surviving for 15 years.
How did you get involved with Good Night Oppy? The OPPY filmmakers had approached my studio about doing the post production sound work. They had me at the top of their wish list as the sound designer they most wanted but were afraid I wouldn't be interested in anything but feature films. To the contrary, when I saw the teaser and spoke with Ryan White, the director, I knew this was something I had to do. I loved the film, I loved the message and I relished the opportunity to work with and at NASA and JPL to capture authentic sounds.
What exactly was your role on the project and what does that involve? My role was that of sound designer. I am the person responsible for creating everything that the audience hears except the music. The musical score, which is amazing, was written by Blake Neely.
Movies are made up of three major components: dialogue, sound effects and music. My team and I recorded hundreds of authentic sounds at NASA and Jet Propulsion Library like the rovers and the control rooms, designed sounds that have never been heard before like the sound of landing on Mars or Martian wind, edited thousands of incidental sounds like footsteps and computer keyboards and then mixed them together to create the final soundtrack.
Remember that 30 minutes of the film take place on Mars and there were no microphones to capture any of Oppy's journey. ILM created stunning photorealistic VFX for all of Oppy's adventures on Mars but, of course, they are made in a computer and have no sound at all. It was our job to record, create and edit a realistic audio soundscape for everything the audience sees, but from scratch!
How did working on Good Night Oppy differ to working on a project like Dune? Dune is a narrative film in the science-fiction genre. This means that we see many things we've never seen before and, as such, we have licence to invent sound for those things we've never heard before. Oppy is a documentary. In documentaruies we feel a deep and abiding responsibility to present the audience with sound that is authentic, to give them as realistic experience as possible. This made work complex because much of the film utilises archival footage that had no sound with it. Our team had to reconstruct these sounds, sometimes finding modern equivalencies. For example, when NASA was testing the balloons that would cushion Oppy's landing on Mars, the footage had no sound so I re-imagined it by bouncing a beach ball on the dirt in my backyard and slowing it down to give it size and weight.
What technology did you use? I used digital mobile sound recorders to capture new sounds at NASA and JPL. When I designed and edited the voice of Oppy and made the sounds of the rovers, I used digital audio workstations on desktop computers, in this case Avid's Pro Tools and hosts of plugins that allowed me to alter the original sounds into something new. When all the sounds were recorded and designed and edited, I mixed them together in a recording studio using a large frame digital mixing console while watching a digital projection on the screen.
How do you create the sound of both the rover and Mars? The rover was made out of many components but mostly the actual sounds of the rover prototypes of Oppy and Perseverance at JPL. We drove them on a fake Mars landscape built on the campus at JPL in Pasadena that included the same type of terrain that Oppy might encounter. This gave us many of the motors and mechanical sounds we needed as well as the unique sound of Oppy's aluminum wheels rolling on hard rock.
We made the voice of Oppy, the electronic chittering it makes when it communicates with NASA, out of hard disk chatter modulated with my voice speaking what Oppy would have said in English if it could speak.
Mark Mangini The coolest sounds were the ambiences on Mars. When I began the project, I started creating sounds for what I thought Mars would sound like based on my imagination. We knew from NASA footage that there was wind on the planet so I started imagining what those winds might sound like in a sterile and lonely landscape. A couple of months into the work, NASA released to me the first-ever recordings made on another planet! They had put a single microphone on Perseverance and it had captured Martian wind! A very short, monoaural snippet, I might add. I think only 10 seconds long. I took this sound, extended it and weaved it into a fully immersive Dolby Atmos ambience and used it whenever we were on the surface of the planet. In fact, the very first sound you hear in the film are those winds captured on the Martian surface, captured by the rover!
How much collaboration did you have with the director and the film editors? There was a great deal of collaboration with the director, producer and film editors. These are critical relationships on every film. From the first day
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
06/05/2026
Gravity Media Chief RF Communications Engineer Glenn Willems uses Wisycom RF over Fiber and wireless solutions across major cycling events and international mar...
06/05/2026
A Sennheiser Spectera module is now available in Bitfocus Companion and Buttons, enabling direct integration of Spectera with the two software platforms. The mo...
06/05/2026
Ted Turner, the visionary media entrepreneur whose appetite for disruption helpe...
06/05/2026
Peacock is going all-in on the beautiful game - streaming all 104 FIFA World Cup...
06/05/2026
New pricing tiers for vocal/dialogue restoration tool
NoiseWorks Audio's AI-powered vocal and dialogue processing plug-in is now available in three diff...
06/05/2026
Popular mixing & routing software overhauled
Following a recent public beta test, RME have launched the final release version of the powerful mixing and rou...
06/05/2026
New SOS Video Feature
Focusrites ISA C8X is a milestone product that brings together the companys analogue heritage and their expertise in digital audio. Yo...
06/05/2026
Polands Miecznik-class frigates are part of the largest contract in Polish shipbuilding history. (Image Credit: PGZ Stocznia Wojenna)...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Riedel Communications today announced the expansion of its leadership structure as part of a strategic initiative to strengthen both its operational management ...
06/05/2026
For nearly three decades, Veteran Production Sound Mixer and Five-time Emmy Award Winner Dirk Sciarrotta has helped define the sonic identity of the long-runnin...
06/05/2026
ZEISS CinCraft LensCore: Cinema Lens Looks for Compositing
Brie Clayton May 6, 2026
0 Comments
ZEISS announces the launch of CinCraft LensCore, a nove...
06/05/2026
Wisycom Solves Extreme RF Challenges Across Miles of Live Action for Gravity Med...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Narrative Entertainment has partnered with Encompass to deliver high-quality subtitling of its Great! network content using the Altitude Intelligence AI assiste...
06/05/2026
SipRadius, widely recognized for making content processing and connectivity secure and seamless, is proud to launch a dramatic new approach to AI content creati...
06/05/2026
When the broadband and media industry gathers at ANGA COM in Cologne from May 19 to 21, Big Blue Marble will be at the forefront. The international broadcast an...
06/05/2026
Cinegy GmbH, a leading developer of software-defined television technology, is proud to exhibit at MPTS for the first time. Visitors to the stand will discover ...
06/05/2026
Val Jeanty Receives 2026 Doris Duke Artist Award Jeanty, a composer, percussionist, and turntablist, is the fourth Berklee recipient of the prestigious award ...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/05/2026
When live cycling races and international marathons stretch for miles across cities and countryside, there is no margin for RF failure in live broadcast. As Chi...
06/05/2026
Oberkochen/Germany, May 5, 2026
ZEISS announces the launch of CinCraft LensCore, a novel solution for creating physically based cinematic lens looks for visual...
06/05/2026
06 May 2026
VEON's Kyivstar Authorized to Resell Starlink for Businesses & ...
06/05/2026
UKTV has secured the exclusive rights to the early back catalogue of iconic Australian drama series Neighbours, following a landmark content deal with Fremantle...
06/05/2026
Wednesday 6 May 2026
Sky commissions feature documentary to mark 10th anniversa...
06/05/2026
Wednesday 6 May 2026
Sky and Formula 1 agree long-term partnership across UK, Ireland and Italy
Sky in the UK & Ireland to remain the home of Formula 1 until ...
06/05/2026
Sky Zero Footprint Fund-backed TV campaign launches nationwide, supported by new...
06/05/2026
Wuppertal May 6, 2026
Riedel Expands Leadership Structure, Appoints Marc Engro...
06/05/2026
SAN JOSE, Calif. - May 6, 2026 - Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today announced its latest broadband innovations for ANGA COM 2026, highlighting its vision for a new e...
06/05/2026
Statement from Rupert Murdoch, Chairman Emeritus, Fox Corporation on Ted Turner&...
06/05/2026
Friday 8 May on RT One and RT Player
Meet the NSPCA team caring for and protecting animals in need in this six-part series
Fly on the wall, six-part series...
06/05/2026
The race to build the world's most powerful AI factories demands networking ...
06/05/2026
How changes to proteins can alter drug interactions for new precision therapies Scripps Research team maps how chemical modifications to proteins affect drug bi...
05/05/2026
Experts from the world of academia, tech, business, politics and media convened for a Thomson Talks at the Cambridge Disinformation Summit in April. It's th...
05/05/2026
Three phones were hardwired for power and transmission to the truck; camera feat...
05/05/2026
The creative studio behind campaigns for the NBA, Fanatics Sportsbook & Casino, ...
05/05/2026
Nielsen has announced results from a co-viewing pilot program covering February&...
05/05/2026
viztrick AiDi, an on-device AI solution developed by Nippon TV, delivered global...
05/05/2026
ARRI has announced Omnibar, a battery-powered, IP65-rated multi-color LED linear...
05/05/2026
Imagine Communications has announced that France T l visions is the first broadc...
05/05/2026
The Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) and Bell Media today announced a multiyear agreement to broadcast and stream WNBA games in Canada beginni...
Mark Mangini, sound designer on documentary Good Night Oppy, talks to TVBEurope about creating believable sounds for the Mars Opportunity rover, including when it developed arthritis
