Depending on your choice for a costume, you might need to learn how to make fake bruises for Halloween to complement your scary getup. Making fake bruises is relatively easy if you have the right makeup or cosmetics for doing so. If you want, you can buy Halloween makeup, stage makeup, or just use regular women's cosmetics to make your fake bruising.

1. 1. Don't overdo bruises, or they won't seem realistic.
2. 1. Bruises are darker in the middle and then fade toward the edges.
3. 1. Buying cheap cosmetic wedge sponges can help with application.
4. 1. Translucent powder keeps bruises from wiping off.

Are you a car crash victim? A dead body? Have the goblins and ghosties of the night beaten you black, blue and purple? If so, you're going to have to use makeup to make fake bruises to complement your costume.

It's easy to make fake bruises appear on skin with the right cosmetics. You can use stage makeup, which is relatively hard to find, or you can purchase special Halloween makeup kits that are relatively easy to find at just about any grocery or department store during the Halloween holiday season. If you don't have either, the right shades of women's cosmetics, like reddish lipstick and blushers or black and dark purple cream foundations, eye shadow colors, or lipstick can work in a pinch.

You'll need to decide where you want the bruise located on your body. The best places are the forearms, around the neck, on the face, or on other parts of your body where the bruises can be easily seen while wearing your costume clothing.

Bruises of different ages will be different colors. Reddish and dark purple bruises are relatively fresh, while bruises that are beginning to turn green or yellowish around the edges are older. You'll have to find the age of bruising that best fits your costume and choose the right color to complement that.

The base color for fake Halloween bruises will be determined by the age of the bruise you'd decided upon: older bruises use dark purple for a base while newer bruises can use a redder base color.

Using a makeup application sponge, dab some of the color on clean skin. Use the sponge to lightly spread the color out on the skin, feathering it to the edges and letting it naturally fade out. You don't want too much color, or else the bruise won't look realistic. Also, keep in mind that bruises will be darker at the center (impact area) than at the edges where they bleed, so let it fade naturally to the edge.

If you've used too much color, simply wipe some of it off, and continue to blot and pat with the sponge to feather the bruise out, keeping it uneven and splotchy, like a real bruise would be.

Let this foundation color layer of your bruise dry completely before moving on to the next step. If the foundation layer looks too bright or too colorful, you can use some loose translucent powder to brush over the bruising to tone down the color a bit.

Now that the base color has been applied and dried, you'll want to add the accent colors. For a new, fresh bruise with large surface area, you'll likely want to use some purplish hues on top of the red. For older bruises with a purple foundation, you'll want to add some dark forest green hues and softly apply them around the edges, feathering the color out away from the center of the bruise.

Play with the colors to get them just right, but the bruise should already be looking pretty realistic by this point.

You can then let the makeup dry, and add a coating of translucent powder to tone down the color, cover the oiliness of the cosmetic and help seal the bruise in so it looks very real.