Canmake Four Shiny Eyes Review

Canmake is one of my favorite inexpensive Japanese brands. They make pretty nice quality items with a cheap price tag! What more could a girl want right? Right.

I've tried many of their items and I'm particularly fond of their very cute eyeshadow trios. They have a series of different shadow selections that range from trios, duo shadows, and various other shimmery, glittery items for your eyes!

I own a majority of the items they sell under the eyeshadow category and I've always been very pleased with my collection of Canmake goodies. Imagine my delight when I heard that for the Summer they'd be releasing Four Shine Eyes! The palettes come in three shade choices which are 01 which is an off pink selection of shadows with a brown liner, 02 which is a teal blue green variation with brown liner, and 03 which is a brownish, gold, beige combo with a brown liner.















As I mentioned earlier on in my post the brand is cheap so obviously quality isn't fantastic however it is good. The shadows in the general catalog are shimmery and sheer but color can be built up and with a little work you can create a beautiful eye look!

Sadly, as much as I adore Canmake I do have to give the Four Shiny Eyes a big thumbs down. I was shocked, surprised, and disappointed with how bad these were. I've had great experience with the line up till now so it was a bit of a big let down that something brand new to the line would turn out so poorly.

The design on the Four Shine Eyes is similar to Kiss palettes prior to their revamp. Canmake's Four Shiny Eyes are made up of two contrasting shades of shadow, a base/highlighter, and a liner all housed in a cute clear crystal case! I was very excited to get my hands on these as they are different and unique to any prior eyeshadow releases I've seen come up from the line before!

As you can see below the Kiss palettes are similiar in style to these!


The Four Shiny Eye packaging shows how Canmake has evovled! The packaging is unique to any other palette they carry.


However, my excitement quickly died a quick death when I realized how terrible to texture of these were. Like many Japanese brands these sport a particularly chalky almost creamy texture which makes blending very difficult. Although this formula has never really bothered me in the past I felt like these were quite difficult to work with. The shadow kept balling up on me as I spread it on my lid and the end result was a messy, uneven application.

The staying powder was pretty much non existent considering that within 30 minutes of application the shadow was literally flaking off my eyes into tiny balls. I had major fall out to begin with as I applied and it got even worst as the day progressed. By the time my work day ended I was lucky to have a bit of shadow in place. They creased badly even with a nice layer of Urban Decay Primer Potion underneath!

What makes this even more heartbreaking is the fact that the Four Shine Eye palettes are an awesome and cheaper dupe of Visee Jewel Crush Eye Palettes. The color variations in each palette are almost identical to Visee's palettes. Each Four Shiny Eye Palette is 680 yen each where as the Visee palettes are 2,300 yen each. These would have made a fantastic little dupe if you were looking for an inexpensive color selection that was comparable to Visee's popular Jewel Crush Eye Palettes.

Pretty similar to Visee Jewel Crush Eye Palette in E-3!


Colors are a good dupe of E-4!


Almost identical with E-2!


Sadly, even though the colors are similiar the quality is not. The chalky consistency of the formula is made with oily Asian eyelids in mind however they fail dramatically in creating a good shadow and you get a cross between cream and chalk which blends into little balls of shimmer that quickly become fall out on your cheeks and face. In this case Canmake should take a note from Majolica Majorca's Majolook palettes which sport a similar formula of eyeshadow but one that blends evenly, builds up in intensity, and stays put for hours at a time!

Although most of this was a disappointment I was delighted, as always when it comes to Japanese cosmetics, with the packaging. The cases are tiny, compact, really cute, and easy to store plus they come with a good little face chart in the back of the compact! I love how Japanese cosmetics always give the little extra instructions on use! I wish more American brands would take the time out to give us the courtesy of applying small application tips and tricks onto the packaging of products!

Nifty diagrams make for easy, breezy application!


Although the palettes are cute, inexpensive, and appear to be typical Japanese drugstore findings they fall flat in a major way and I can't help but give them a big thumbs down! Actually they were so bad I only got around to trying 02 which is the teal blue variation. The other two remain unopened untried. If anyone is interested in them e-mail me at musings.of.a.muse@gmail.com as I'm willing to sell them off!

Count the Muse disappointed on these! Don't waste your time! Pick up some of the older line up from Canmake or save your pennies for other palettes! Although new and exciting in design they sport nothing inside that redeems them!



Watch some MuseTV featuring a spotlight on Canmake!