Rho Oph/Sco nebulosity

Although this region is conventionally referred to as the "Rho Oph complex", the Rho Oph nebula itself is, arguably, just IC4604, glowing near the top (N) of the frame in the reflected light of its blue central star. Orange-red reflection nebulae, like the centre-frame region north of Antares, are not commonly encountered, in part because red stars sufficiently luminous to power such nebulae are relatively old, and so are rarely associated with dust. Elsewhere in this rich field, ionized gas glows a deeper red in H-alpha emission. Faint background stars can easily be seen through this ionized gas (as towards the bottom of the frame), but the dusty regions are quite opaque at optical wavelengths.

This curated dataset was centred on the star 22 Sco, rather than Rho Oph, using the (now defunct) Nikon 200/f2 setup, and processed using spectrophotometric colour calibration in an attempt to achieve a well-composed, wide-field, true-colour rendition.