IC 3568 "Lemon Slice" (2013)

Do perfection and simplicity belong together in a harmonious marriage? IC 3568 is the planetary nebula representation of this idea. The simplicity of its form begets the perfection of its spherical shape.

I’m not sure when it gained the name Lemon Slice Nebula but the most common image of this nebula is processed to look fluorescent lime green so that may have had something to do with it. Mine is blue to more closely match the processing I’ve done with the others. Keeping the OIII emissions (which this one shines so brightly in) solely in the blue channel leaves it a bit dark though so I let it spread to the green channel a little as well to brighten the image.

Red: hst_06119_50_wfpc2_f814w_pc_sci + hst_08390_15_wfpc2_f658n_pc_sci
Green: hst_08390_15_wfpc2_f555w_pc_sci
Blue: hst_08390_15_wfpc2_f502n_pc_sci

North is up.

Copyright information:
Hubble data is public domain, but I put a lot of work into combining it into beautiful color images. The minimal credit line should read: NASA / ESA / J. Schmidt

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.