For many years astronomical images from the world's telescopes were reserved for an elite of astronomers and technical people. Now anyone with a desktop computer running Adobe Photoshop software can try their hand at crafting astronomical images as beautiful as those from the Hubble Space Telescope. A free software plug-in, released today, makes a treasure trove of archival astronomical images and spectra from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton X-ray observatory, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and many other famous telescopes accessible to home astronomy enthusiasts.
