Maya / Python script example on Aang
Side view, notice the highlight tangent placement to the eye, close enough to avoid z-fighting and still keep the highlight behind the eyelids.
Eye independence from highlights. Highlights can also be resized on the go. Script was later modified to allow uniform scaling.
This is a small prototype work I did for Avatar: Generations. It's a Python script that generates mesh-based highlights, that would allow individual manipulation during animation for better control of highlights, instead of relying on a shader-based scene light.