one of my favorite parts of the semantics of a lexicon is how they make sense of visual stimuli e.g. colors and visual textures, so i'm always curious about conlangs' takes! this is not a very well thought-out premise, but it would be neat to see examples, whether they be from your own conlangs or languages you know!
i would share my own examples, but unfortunately i haven't gotten to that point with my own current language(s) lol
Tokuwin, my IAL used to have 6 words for hues based on RGB, red, yellow, green, cyan, blue, magenta. After I learned more about visual color spaces, I decided to model my colors after the OkLAB color space, in which cyan is just a lighter/brighter version of blue.
akuma - red, limon - yellow, mito - green, tosan - blue, and unu - magenta. Along with makite - black and walo - white. Like toki pona, you can mix colors by having multiple modifiers, which is why there aren't words for "gray" or "brown."
i have a clong where all sequences of six of 0123456789abcdef preceeded by a /#/ (which is a phoneme) are words for the color represented by that hex code (an idea graciously stolen from caqxir)
actually now that i think about it harder smth like this might actually be a fun idea for a ro-style lang, like you have a word /fish/ meaning black and you can add /qwe/ in any order to add red for q, green for w, and blue for e (feel free to steal this idea if i'm actually onto smth for once)
for my main lang i kinda was just planning to loan a few words out of toki pona or whatever meaning "red", "white/yellow", "green", "blue", and "purple/black" a) because i really do not like how big the semantic space of toki pona laso is, b) because these five colors show up together a good bit, and c) because my hyperfixated face naturally gravitates toward anything resembling the magic the gathering color pie
When I finally get done with the lexicon, Kedetha will have native color words that roughly correspond to "Blackish~blueish" "Whitish~Yellowish" and "reddish", and loaned terms coming from Malay and/or Hokkien.
So the Ner language has a few different color terms, some of which are specifically for different materials. I generally followed the old color typology that a lot of conlangers have, but wanted to add a few twists.
For basic colors we have:
Then there's a couple within the neutral color area for different lustres and materials:
And lastly different words for fur coloring. These especially are used for cattle, but can refer to any mammals:
New Ithkuil has eight basic color roots. They evenly divide the color wheel and are roughly equivalent to red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, violet, and magenta. Each color root has three stems that represent hue variation, with stem 2 being 15 degrees redshifted and stem 3 being 15 degrees blueshifted (e.g. cyan's stems are cyan, teal, azure). To derive more colors, one can use the Color Dimensions affix, which allows you to specify saturation and lightness in a 3×3 grid. There are also roots for black, white, and gray that don't follow this pattern. In total, this system creates 249 possible elementary color words using the affix and counting the roots for black, white, and gray.
The species that uses these two languages, among other ones, did not natively possess the ability to see wavelengths above 625nm (Red and above), but in turn are able to see wavelengths as low as 100nm (Ultraviolet).
Now follows a list of basic color terms for this species's two surviving languages.
| English | Vordynian | vo IPA | San | sp IPA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ultraviolet | Ullōgaıb | ʏɭoːɢɐi̯b | Khöčʼolwyr | kʰøt͡ʂʼoɫwɨr |
| Violet/Purple | Renmïrgaıb | rɜnmirɢɐi̯b | Sülaapʼ | suɫɑːpʼ |
| Pink | Ūlaŋgaıb | yːlɑ̃ɢɐʲb | K’ïnïïč’ | kʼiniːt͡ʂʼ |
| Blue | Olorjaıb | ʌlorɟ͡ʝɐʲb | Kalaaub | kɑlɑːu̯ɓ |
| Cyan | Külljaıb | kuɭʝɐʲb | Xaakʼăwph | xɑːkʼɐwpʰ |
| Green | Jōkorıb | ɟ͡ʝoːkʌrɪb | Wïkkülrac | wiquɻɑc |
| Lime | Kïlunıb | kilʏnɪb | Hakxʼĕlwŏt | ħɑk͡xʼɜɫwʌt |
| Yellow | Amrānjïab | ɐmrɑːnɟ͡ʝiɐ̯b | Raanğïupʼ | rɑːnʀiʉ̯pʼ |
| Orange | Allōŋŋwab | ɐɭɔ̃ːŋʷɐb | Taltzʼaaug | tɑlt͡sʼɑːu̯ʛ |
| Black | X̄ollorjab | χɔɭʌrɟ͡ʝɐb | Ĕĕkülr | ɜːkuɻ |
| White | Ïrındaıbb | irɪⁿdɐɪ̯b | Šagöölhod | ʂɑɢøːlħoɾ |
| Brown | Duhambaıb | dʏħɐmbɑɪ̯b | Rŭŭakʼalhʼ | rʊːɑ̯kʼɑlʕ |
| Grey | Örgömbıb | ørɢømbɪb | Ïndaaüp | iⁿɾɑːup |
| Gold | Awrïaıbb | ɑwriɐ̯ʲb | Ülh’ŏŏrčʼag | ulʕʌːrt͡ʂɑʛ |
| Silver | Āržendıb | ɑːrʐɜⁿdɪb | Rakkx̄tïb | rɑq͡χtiɓ |
Eventually, the species evolved the ability to see past the 625nm wavelength, into infrared. Two new words entered their speeches:
| English | Vordynian | vo IPA | San | sp IPA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Red | Rāaudaıbb | rɑːːu̯dɐi̯b | Hʼïïsï | ʕiːsi |
| Infrared | Nanrāaudaıb | nɐnrɑːːu̯dɐɪ̯b | Kahʼïïs | kɑʕiːs |