---
title: "RGB, LRGB & The Hubble Palette"
canonical: https://stackingstarlight.com/advanced/hubble-palette
description: "Assembling color: true-color RGB, LRGB (luminance for detail), and the SHO Hubble palette (SII→R, Hα→G, OIII→B) false color."
---

# RGB, LRGB & The Hubble Palette

> Assembling color: true-color RGB, LRGB (luminance for detail), and the SHO Hubble palette (SII→R, Hα→G, OIII→B) false color.

Color is built from channels. **RGB** maps red/green/blue filters to their natural colors for true color. **LRGB** adds a high-SNR **luminance** layer for detail while RGB supplies color — efficient and sharp. The **Hubble (SHO) palette** is *false color*: it maps the **SII**, **Hα**, and **OIII** narrowband channels to **red, green, blue** respectively, revealing the chemical structure of nebulae as the gold-and-teal look the Hubble Space Telescope made famous. Palettes are creative and scientific choices, not fixed truths.

---

Source: [https://stackingstarlight.com/advanced/hubble-palette](https://stackingstarlight.com/advanced/hubble-palette) · Part of [Stacking Starlight](https://stackingstarlight.com) by Michael Kalika.

LLM resources: [LLM index (llms.txt)](https://stackingstarlight.com/llms.txt) · [Complete LLM text (llms-full.txt)](https://stackingstarlight.com/llms-full.txt) · [Markdown homepage (index.md)](https://stackingstarlight.com/index.md)