NGC 7822 is a very large nebula and stellar nursery located in the constellation Cepheus approximately 3000 light-years distant. Many new stars have formed, and are in the process of forming, in this massive collection of gas and dust. Numerous columns and pillars abound throughout the nebula. The image above is centered on two of these star forming columns. They are very similar in appearance and structure to the famous Hubble image of the "Pillars of Creation" in the Eagle Nebula.
The image above is known as a mapped, or false, color image and was acquired using narrowband filters. It was assembled using the standard Hubble palette with SII mapped to Red, Ha mapped to Green and OIII mapped to Blue. The stars were overlaid with color data from a separate RGB image.