We are pleased to welcome Xintian Li, a new PhD student, to our lab. Xintian comes to us with experience in a somewhat different research field, and we hope that this background can be combined with the research in our lab to lead to exciting new work. We look forward to working together!

A paper by Ph.D. student Hanada-kun has been published in Color Research & Application. This study suggests that the “rarity” of color distributions in natural scenes is related to color preference for abstract paintings—in other words, that our experience with color distributions may help shape our color preferences. It was a somewhat challenging topic, but I am very glad to see the work published. Congratulations!

• Ikuto Hanada, & Takehiro Nagai: Color distribution rarity in naturalistic scenes as a possible integrative descriptor of preference for abstract paintings. Color Research & Application, 51(5), e70129, 2026. (Published article, Open access)

From September 16 to 18, Ph.D. students Wang-san and Nakajima-kun presented their research at the 2026 Summer Meeting of the Vision Society of Japan, held at the Kitakyushu International Conference Center. Both of them received a variety of comments and feedback from many people. I think it was a valuable opportunity that will help them further develop their research. Also, the food at the banquet was excellent! Great job, both of you! 

• Shiyang Wang, & Takehiro Nagai: Individual differences in the use of color and spatial-structure information in gist perception (in Japanese).

• Kenta Nakajima, & Takehiro Nagai: Expectations about stimulus presentation duration affect affective judgments more than material perception (in Japanese).

From August 14 to 18, we attended the 28th Symposium of the International Colour Vision Society (ICVS 2026), held in Brighton, UK. Ph.D. student Wang-san gave a conference presentation for the first time, and A/Prof Nagai gave an oral presentation. The relatively small size of the meeting provided plenty of opportunities to meet new people, have in-depth discussions, and introduce our research to the colour vision community. We really enjoyed the close-knit atmosphere that is one of the great things about ICVS. Nagai’s former students, Son-san (Chiba University) and Dr. Sato (Kanazawa University), also presented their work. It was great to see everyone doing well!

• Shiyang Wang, & Takehiro Nagai: Individual differences and within-experiment changes in color–structure weighting during rapid scene perception. The 28th symposium of the International Colour Vision Society, Brighton, UK, August 17, 2026. ICVS 2026 Abstract Book, 114, 2026.

• Takehiro Nagai, Suzuha Horiuchi, & Kimitaka Ishiguro: Repeated color discrimination locally distorts color perception around the trained hue. The 28th symposium of the International Colour Vision Society, Brighton, UK, August 16, 2026. ICVS 2026 Abstract Book, 86, 2026.

• Minwoo Son, & Takehiro Nagai: Color perception under abrupt decreases in background luminance. The 28th symposium of the International Colour Vision Society, Brighton, UK, August 17, 2026. ICVS 2026 Abstract Book, 105, 2026.

• Tomoharu Sato, Takehiro Nagai, & Ichiro Kuriki: Dissociating contributions of perceptual and memory processes to the representation of hues in visual working memory. The 28th symposium of the International Colour Vision Society, Brighton, UK, August 17, 2026. ICVS 2026 Abstract Book, 125, 2026.