this is old stuff, but i still find it interesting. photos from the hubble telescope, the ones that i've been seeing everywhere for the past several weeks are hand colored to make more of an impact to the viewing public. they had me fooled...

"some of the early treatment on the cone nebula was garish. we looked at it and said, 'oh my god, i want to puke, it's green, yellow and red.' and so then my image person began to massage it. at first we had a green background. then we changed it to blue -- that was too ethereal. the red seemed to be the punchiest."