Overview
The film follows Opportunity—nicknamed Oppy—a Mars rover launched in 2003 with a planned 90-sol mission that astonishingly stretched nearly 15 years. Blending archival footage, interviews, and cinematic re-creations of the Martian terrain, it traces the rover’s search for water and the human connection it sparked. I was brought on as a VFX compositor and cleanup artist to address flickering artifacts in archival material, helping restore clarity to key moments in the visual narrative.
Approach
This was one of the early exposures to my work in VFX compositing and cleanup! It was also a test of endurance for the plethora of archival shots that required stilling flickering cathode ray tube monitors in archival footage. Duplicating layers, freeze framing, tracking, rotoscoping, and learning how to properly remove and reintroduce grain properly so that composited images appeared not at all out of place. I also cleaned up interview subjects to varying degrees, for example removing a bit of fuzz from a shirt or even replacing portions of body parts that may have had glitched artifacts from other visual effects techniques used to splice shots.
Samples of flickering screen compositing and video degradation for simulating retro video archive footage
Reflection
This was a pretty standard VFX job that provided a new technique for my skillset. I was especially thrilled to have the chance to fabricate the Martian planet in its own standalone shot!
The Mars Shot in Good Night Oppy
