Urban Decay Cannonball Ultra Waterproof Mascara Review

I hate to start off a review so negatively, but it's not ultra waterproof at all, sadly. When I saw this on Sephora's website, I couldn't wait to try it. I purchased it from the Urban Decay website because it was sold out on Sephora's.

Cannonball comes in a thick black tube with a teal cap; the brush inside is slender and long. This is marketed as a godsend for mermaids, gym rats ("rigorously field-tested in the ocean as well as sweat-drenched gym conditions"), high maintenance types (i.e the Kardashian klan), or anyone with a tendency to weep. It claims to be sweatproof, waterproof, and cryproof, while at the same time thickening, lengthening, and preserving the natural softness of lashes. The secret to Cannonball is supposedly the exclusive Japanese formula with microcrystalline wax. After reading the label, I thought it would be a lot like Shu Uemura's Mascara Basic -also a gel based waterproof formula- and it is, except Mascara Basic was better for me. 

Cannonball did an amazing job at lengthening and darkening my lashes- one coat instantly made them stand out. The formula is very lightweight, just as I expected. When I went to apply it to my other eye, I could have sworn I saw all these tiny fibers all over the brush and around the neck of the tube out of the corner of my eye. So I wiped a bit of the mascara on the back of my hand and smudged with my finger a bit, and sure enough I could see these tiny clear fibers! As a contact lens wearer, this worries me. Maybe I'm being paranoid, but still. I've never worn a mascara with this characteristic. I read the ingredients list and saw rayon as one of them- could that be it? And I didn't see anywhere on my box "opthalmologist tested".  Tsk, tsk.

As for Cannonball's performance, it should be known that I don't have oily skin or eyelids at all, so what I experienced with it can't be blamed on that. It smudged under my eyes after about five hours. So much so that I looked as if I took a grey shadow and completely smudged it under my lashline. While it wasn't the full on black-ish raccoon eyes that someone can get with regular mascara that smudges, it was still beyond noticeable. Everyone who saw me noticed. When I explained that I was test driving a waterproof mascara, a guy friend said, "Well, this one's a FAIL..." No kidding. For $20 and all of UD's hype, I thought I was going to get the best waterproof mascara of all time. In my experience, any drugstore waterproof mascara is better: they may have a slightly heavier feel than this one, but they don't smudge!    

Chanel Le Vernis in Péridot and Graphite

Peridot is my birthstone (August baby here). As a kid, I disliked it (my two best friends had aquamarine and amethyst as theirs), but I changed my opinion of it as I got older and now I think it looks really cool. When found out Chanel was doing a polish with this name for Fall 2011, I had to check it out....would it be straight up limey?

Chanel's Péridot is a bit different than the stone. In the bottle it looks like a duochrome, murky metallic green-gold shade that almost looks like a shade you'd see in a mood ring- and I swear I'm seeing strong hints of blue in my bottle. On my nails, it's actually less metallic/ chrome and very shimmery olivey green-gold color. In direct sunlight, it dazzles and sparkles. In darker/ low/ indoor lighting, it actually just looks like a straight-up metallic... much less dimensional. It can almost look like two different colors at times. While I'm not exactly disappointed, I got spoiled by seeing it in bright sunlight first, in all it's shimmering glory:

 
And here's a lower lighting comparison:

I think Péridot looks quite good on my medium skin :)

The other polish Chanel released is Graphite, a rich gunmetal with silver glitter (Chanel released a third polish for Fall 2011, Quartz, that I am craving but it's sold out at a few local counters and I'm waiting on a phone call when they get more). Usually, greys aren't my favorite since the coolness seems to clash with my warmer skin, but Graphite is magically neutral enough for me to fall head over heels in love with:

Isn't it cool? What I love about Graphite is that it shimmers and sparkles indoors as well as outdoors, unlike Péridot. Indoors or in darker lighting, people can tell I'm wearing a glittery polish- probably partly due to the shimmer in this being chunkier than the shimmer in Péridot, and also because of the contrast between the lighter silver glitter over the darker gunmetal. Many compliments on this one; lots of oohs and aahs. And I think it'll look even better in the fall and winter months.

Apologies for being on hiatus; I had so many things going on in real life. Upcoming reviews and pics include Urban Decay's new 24/7 liquid liner (awesome product, I just had to say it now!), Bobbi Brown's Tortoiseshell Bronze palette, Sephora for OPI's Make The First Mauve, and L'Oreal Le Gloss lipgloss