Plainspoken Orion Teal

English compound plain + spoken — past-participle of speak. As a color modifier, plainspoken implies a clear-and-direct-and-straightforward quality where the hue carries the visual register of unembellished-honest declaration. Sits at the crisp-and-honest end of the grid, parallel to candid and direct in usage.

Greek Ὠρίων, hunter-of-the-myth. As a color modifier, orion implies a winter-hunter-and-belt-and-shoulder quality, the visual register of winter-Orion-and-Belt-of-Orion hand-winter-hunter-and-belt-and-shoulder winter-Orion-and-Belt-of-Orion-and-Bortle-1-sky orion-and-winter-hunter-and-belt-and-shoulder surfaces under winter-Orion-and-Belt-of-Orion-and-Bortle-1-sky January-and-February-winter-zenith winter-constellation-light. Sits at the modifier-and-cosmic end of the grid, parallel to rigel and cygnus in usage.

Anas crecca, the small dabbling duck whose male in breeding plumage sports a chestnut head crossed by a glossy green-blue stripe. The color refers to that stripe — the iridescent panel just behind the eye: a saturated, slightly muted blue-green with the optical depth of structural color rather than pigment. Cooler than cypress, warmer than cerulean, with the ornithological specificity of a color named for one feather of one bird.