Much of Xianniang's character, on the other hand, was mainly influenced by her animal reference. "Because she's a shapeshifter her animal reference is the hawk," said Kum. "So, the shape of the eye makeup and all the colours in her eye makeup were influenced by her costume, the armour, but also the hawk feathers."
The white mask across Xianniang's eyes, however, was a historic reference to clay figurines Kum found when researching. "I really liked how it was a white mask and, in many cultures, white is revered as something being beautiful. So, it was a bit of a way of a twist on that, layering that over her eyes."