Octarine

You know you’re a serious science fiction writer when you find yourself wondering how to look up just what trace impurities in a gemstone would give it an ultraviolet color—so it’d appear colorless to us but be brilliantly shaded to some other species with a different visible spectrum.

Yes, dudes, I take this stuff seriously.

Granted, this may stem from when I was a kid and I would try my damndest to imagine completely new colors. I don’t think it ever quite worked, but I sure did work at it. But it turns out it’s not for lack of wiring, so there’s still hope!

THE COLORS, DUKE!

In regard to the last post on Martian colors, check this out: pixel39 and biomekanic say that some humans are tetrachromats already! Yes, some people can see more shades of color than the rest of us!

I'm not sure if I qualify—I see a spectacular range of color, and I don't have much to go on. But I've got a couple reasons to suspect I'm not a superpowered color-distinguisher:

Reason #1: My synesthetic senses do perceive colors with such subtle differences that they are difficult to duplicate in reality. I mentioned trying to think up new colors, yes, but I didn't count these because they don't seem like new colors—just odd combinations of normal colors. And I have never actually seen these combinations outside my head—rather like the colorblind* synesthete whose synesthesia perceived "Martian colors" he'd never actually seen. Suggests to me that I never see these colors because I lack the equipment.

Reason #2: Look what I can do I unrepentantly love Lisa Frank. And I'm pretty sure the cover of the notebook I bought yesterday would kill a tetrachromat dead.


*Not sure which kind of colorblind.