*shrugs off post-'star' dejection*
Is there a standing tag for when the pupils/irises of the eyes shrink, often from shock, fear, or despair? If not, would ._. be an appropriate enough emoticon tag? Would it be desirable to have one for that?

I would prefer constricted_pupils, but I'm somewhat biased by the fact that I've never seen that emoticon before, and would probably not associate it with constricted pupils. Is it a common emoticon?

I've seen that emoticon before, but not necessarily in this context.

I haven't seen it much if I have, but it's what came to mind when figuring what would match the pupils. constricted_pupils sounds more sensible, though.

I've said this before and I'll say it again - emoticons don't mean anything, semantically. Their meanings are purely visual. You should tag pictures with emoticons when the face on a character in the picture looks like that emoticon. That's what such tags are for.

Please don't alias emoticons to anything, or vice versa, because judging whether something fits a description, like "constricted pupils" or "fear, shock, etc.", is very different from judging whether it looks like a certain string of symbols in, say, Courier New or some other standard font.

EDIT: (clarity)

I'll second 0xCCBA696 here. When an appropriate English tag exists, it should always trump an emoticon. In this case the emoticon would render as ". ." anyway, which is terrible.

+1 for constricted_pupils.

... how is that "seconding me" at all? I think emoticon tags should coexist with expression-descriptive tags, because their meanings are inherently incompatible. Is that not clear in my previous post? :/

Sorry, you're right. ._. is still a god-awful tag though.

Constricted_pupils is terribly non-intuitive...

beady_eyes?

How about you link some examples?

jjj14 said:
Constricted_pupils is terribly non-intuitive...

First thing I thought of, since it's the opposite of dilated pupils, and everyone knows that. Maybe that's just me, though.

LaC said:
How about you link some examples?

post #383027 is what prompted this thread (Miku's expression), but I can't think of any other specific examples without browsin'.

kumarei said:
First thing I thought of, since it's the opposite of dilated pupils, and everyone knows that. Maybe that's just me, though.

What about small_pupils, or tiny_pupils?