Do you find the "false color" photographs of the Universe as less insipiring than the others?

Question

For you consideration:

Exhibit A:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/image/0709/CFHQS_coop_36.jpg

Exhibit B:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/image/0709/rhooph_noao.jpg

Answer 1

Yes. But your two exhibits are not pictures of the same part of the sky. I was expecting them to be false and true color versions of the same area.

Here are two views of Saturn.
True color: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap030817.html
False color: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990724.html

Answer 2

Neither of your pictures appear to be false color views. Exhibit B shows a mixture of emission and reflection nebulosity in the Milky Way. Exhibit A shows a star field with distant galaxies, and is naturally less colorful. In both cases the color balance attempts a reasonably "natural" appearance. what constitutes natural color in an astrophoto is more subject to interpretation than a terrestrial scene because these photos bring out colors too faint to be seen by the human eye. But while the colors in exhibit B are more saturated than what you could see, they are natural insofar as they correspond to the colors the camera detected.

False color photos most often involve images taken in wavelengths outside human vision. Though they lack naturalistic beauty, they can show you the otherwise invisible. I find that to be pretty inspiring also, though in a more intellectual way.