On Designing "Eyes" and Daemons of the Shadow Realm
These days, I follow two manga series closely. Today, let’s talk about one of them: Daemons of the Shadow Realm by Hiromu Arakawa, most famous for her fantastic series Fullmetal Alchemist.
The series is about a pair of twins who were thrown into a mysterious and dangerous world beyond their understanding. The story introduced powerful, otherworldly beings known as “daemons,” each mysteriously bound to a human host. As the siblings uncovered the truth about themselves, they also got deeply tangled into a series of danger.
The first time I read Daemons of the Shadow Realm, one of the protagonist’s daemons caught my eyes.
The design of this daemon is like a blend between Naruto’s Jiraiya (that hair!) and Dragon Ball Z’s Android 18 (those diamond-shaped eyes!), and I LOVE it right away!
The shape design of the eyes is an interesting one. Until the first appearances of Android 17 and Android 18, I have never seen eyes designed that particular way. The lines of the entire diamond shape were all solid (as opposed to varied line weight), and that’s really hard to pull off, as it could look very unnatural. (Jiraiya also got those eyes, but his entire design was going for theatrical, not “natural”.)
Of course, Akira Toriyama (creator of Dragon Ball) was a master, so he pulled it off. I thought he might be testing the water there. Even if readers complained the eyes looked unnatural, one could argue that it was because Android 17 and Android 18 were, well, androids. (They look great to me!)
The type of eye design I usually go for is the “Dot Eye”. But occasionally, as I saw fit to the story, I would also try to implement other types of eye design. For example in Monkey King and the World of Myths: The Battle of the Beasts, I’ve varied the eye-design of the fox yokai to push for her personality, and the eye-shape was inspired by Android 17 & Android 18!
The tricky part was to make sure the new sets of “eye design” would go well with the other existing characters. That took a bit of trial-and-error.
And that’s the fun of being a creator. 😉
Monkey King and the World of Myths: The Battle of the Beasts is coming out on August 19, 2025! I am very excited to finally get to share this story with all my readers! You can now pre-order the book on your favorite book purchasing platform!
Bookshop.org
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Target
Powell’s
Books A Million
Walmart
Or, support your local independent bookstore and pre-order from them. ❤️
Thank you for your love and support!
Do you enjoy designing different type of “eyes” for your characters? Where do you find your inspirations? Share in the comments below!
I have a character in my "Starr and Staff" series called Lady Kaida, and I always have the hardest time getting her eyes to look right when drawing her. She's supposed to be one of the video game characters created by Takeyoshi and has those "big anime eyes." I keep saying to myself, "Think of Yuki Nagato! Think of Yuki Nagato!" Someday I'll get it right...
I just ordered your first Monkey King book for my son! We both like your drawing :-)