Two stunning phenomena in the form of planetary nebulae have been caught on camera in the depths of space. The first shows an image and a video of the remnants of a dying star known as ESO 378-1.

The photograph was taken by ESO's Chilean telescope and shows a shimmering orb with a diameter of almost four light years. The phenomenon lasts for tens of thousands of years and this specific one is located in the constellation of Hydra.

Planetary nebulae give off such stunning visuals because of the gas which is ejected and subsequently expands when a star dies. The mass of the star must have a diameter of eight times less than our sun to cause such an occurrence.

The second is the last breath of a dying star which is captured later in the nebula's death throes. The once-bright star is known as Herschel 36 and the image was captured by Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope.

NASA planetary nebula
Nasa: 'The death throes of this star may only last mere moments on a cosmological timescale, but this star's demise is still quite lengthy by our standards, lasting tens of thousands of years' NASA

The space agency said that these colours were omitted after a gas cloud ejected from the star left its core exposed. The gas cloud was powered by ultraviolet lights, which produces a variety of different colours. The colours are similar to the display which can be seen in a ring nebula. This dying star is located in the Lagoon Nebula – a blue star that is thought to be the youngest of all observable stars of the Sagittarius constellation.

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NASA