Beards! Or At Least the Research!

Alright. As I said in the last hub. Beards are the most important part of this whole shindig. If you don't have a good beard, you don't have a Dwarf; you have something that imitates a Dwarf. You don't even have to have the braids and the fancy stuff to go in the beard, you just need the beard itself. Now, that being said, there are a couple ways you can go about having a beard.

One: you can get a cheesy stick on beard. Pros? It's about $2, and at the most $5. Cons? The cheap adhesive is likely to do two things: fall off, and give you an allergic reaction. The synthetic hair doesn't even try to look real, and anyone could tell from a mile away that it's fake. It doesn't come much bigger than the cheesy Fu Man Chu style. And a lot of the beard material looks like it's cut from felt. What more can I say except cosplayers: this is a message for you. If you ever see anyone wearing a cheap stick on moustache or beard, slap them for me. They give all us cosplayers a really bad name.

Two: you can get a "wig" beard. These are usually strap-on beards that look a little better than the $2 stick-ons. This is usually because the synthetic hairs at least try to make a good showing of looking like human hair, or because they are made of human hair. These usually tend to run anywhere from $5-$30, and of course, the more you pay for it, the better it will be. So, pros? They look better, they probably stay on longer, they're less likely to cause allergic reactions because of cheap adhesive. Cons? They still look fake, they still use less than okay adhesive (if any), they strap-on which is a big fall off factor and they could be the less savory things in the wig world.

Three: You can get a pre-crafted stick-on beard (I'll explain) that you actually use spirit gum to stick to your face. Good ones can run $50 depending on the materials, and how big or small it is. It's probably how Dustin Hoffman got the epic Captain Hook moustache in the movie "Hook". Like most actors can grow that kind of facial hair. /sarcasm. Pros are mainly that it doesn't come with its own adhesive, it looks far more real than any of the previous beards and you can use it over and over again if you take care of it. Cons? It usually doesn't come in epic Dwarf size and texture.

Now, to admit, I'm a little bias because I live my costume designing by the phrase "If it's worth doing, it's worth over-doing". But after a few searches, and a few how-to tutorials myself, I found something called "crepe hair". I know exactly what you're thinking. WTF is crepe hair? How do I use it? or just plain "Huh?" But check this out, it's super cool.

Crepe hair comes in several different colors ranging from white to black and everything in between. You can do your makeup before you put it on, so you don't have to worry so much about having to be careful of all the hair you put on your face. Plus it comes in everything from a foot to a yard, so plenty of epic Dwarf length there.

I definitely like this option because you can pick several different shades of the same color to create a more natural look, since most hair (dyed hair excepted) isn't just one shade. It's a variety of shades, light and dark. And sometimes, there's even different colors in there. And once it's on there, you can do all sorts of things to it. What I like most about this option the more I research it is the fact that you don't have to resort to putting it all on your face an hour before the party you want to go to on Halloween. You can put it on netting, or a variety of surfaces before hand. That way you can make sure that it's there for you to keep, and don't have to rush on the greatest day of the year. And to admit, I like this option so much that I'll probably end up making the wigs from it too, especially since I can get it to come in a yard length.

The first two options are really easy. Usually any costume shop will do, though I highly recommend Spirit Halloween, or Halloween Express. I do this simply because they tend to have better quality here and there. Unfortunately, they're not for well-thought-out costume ideas.

The third option usually calls for a professional wig maker, of which there are very few. But they run way expensive, and as I said before, they don't come in epic Dwarf sizes.

The fourth option is, so far, exclusively web-based. And I hate to tell everyone this, but shipping for good crepe wool, or crepe hair, just sucks unless you're in-state. Buying two yards of crepe hair, I ended up spending about $36 with about half of that being shipping. Considering this is my first Halloween purchase of the year, I'm a little intimidated, but I just know it'll be worth it. I can't wait until I get the crepe hair!! Until next time.