The Sun is a star; the stars are suns, far away. They might all look the same on a clear, dark night, but they are not. Some are red; others blue, yellow or orange. Some are as small compared to our Sun as a bacterium is to a cat, or an ant to the tallest skyscraper, while others are hundreds of times the diameter of our humble Sun. The range of sizes, colours and temperatures is truly mind-boggling. And like living organisms, the stars favour companionship - more than half of them reside in binary or multiple systems. Nebulae - from the Latin for 'clouds' - are where stars are born. And when stars die, their remains are blown back out into space to create new nebulae, that will one day form new stars. Stars and nebulae are among my favourite objects to depict artistically.