  An optical imaging study of recent 30 novae has been undertaken using both
ground-based and space-based observations. Resolved shells have been detected
around 9 objects in the ground-based data, while another four objects have
shells detected by HST observations; for RW UMi, we fail to detect a shell
which was observed five years earlier. Images in H-alpha, and when appropriate
[O III], are shown, and finding charts for novae without shells are given if no
published chart is available. Expansion parallaxes for all systems with shells
are derived, and absolute magnitudes for a total of 28 objects are presented,
along with a discussion of the maximum magnitude-rate of decline relation. We
find that separate linear fits for fast and slow novae may be a better
representation of the data than a single, global fit. At minimum, most novae
have similar magnitudes as those of dwarf novae at maximum and novalike stars.
