How to see nebulae in colour?

[JOC]

8 hours ago, Ruud said:

The blue snowball looks pale blue in a 4". In a 6" it has an obvious cyan hue. For me it is the only nebula that shows any colour.

I managed to find it in my 8" one on a couple of occasions and in that it does indeed appear to have a blue hue.

[oldfruit]

The Saturn Nebula and the Cats Eye Nebula also show colour when I have observed them through my 12 inch dob.

[kirkster501]

To my eyes, the only deep sky items (other than stars) in the entire Northern Hemisphere that visually display colour are M42 (green) and, from a very dark sky, M31 (a sort of very indistinct yellow).  I think I have also seen a bit of blue colour in Omega Centauri too.

[MKHACHFE]

On 17/11/2019 at 12:27, kirkster501 said:

To my eyes, the only deep sky items (other than stars) in the entire Northern Hemisphere that visually display colour are M42 (green) and, from a very dark sky, M31 (a sort of very indistinct yellow).  I think I have also seen a bit of blue colour in Omega Centauri too.

You should try the Blue Snowball Nebula again, its unmistakably slightly blue in colour. Certainly to my 44 year old eyes and compared to all the other grey DSOs

[Rob Sellent]

To my understanding, seeing colour in DSOs is predominantly a function of the eyes' sensitivity which differs in each individual. While some observers may see hints of colour in brighter emission nebulae, for example, others won't see any colour regardless of how big their scope. The general advice is to use fairly low powers and to observe the brighter regions of nebulae. Other than that, stars are a nice source of colour.