Three dark pillars of gas and dust rising from below into a blue nebula with golden edges and stars.
Pillars of Creation (M 16) · © Martin Hudec

Nebulae

Pillars of Creation (M 16)

The famous pillars of the Eagle Nebula – from a home observatory, not a space telescope.

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About the object

The Pillars of Creation are columns of cold gas and dust in the Eagle Nebula (M16) in Serpens, about 6,500–7,000 light years away. They became world-famous through a 1995 Hubble Space Telescope image. Stars are forming inside the pillars while radiation from nearby stars evaporates their surfaces.

How the image was made

Processing
Adobe Lightroom 9.5.1 (Windows)

Data from the original file’s metadata or from the author.