This is the final version of the shot I sent in for the Rock, Paper, Scissors challenge, that in retrospect I should never have submitted. First major rule: always compare the image you're working on to other images in your gallery. Especially late at night, the eye will perceive an image as much better than it is without something to compare it with. The funny thing is, I had an alternate shot that was somewhat similar to one of the final winning shots in that contest, and decided not to use it because it was too ordinary. Second major rule: at DPChallenge, technically sound beats interesting every single time.

This was my original crop and postprocess that did not get submitted because I discovered that Photokit Sharpener violated the rules of Basic Editing by using an additional layer. I went on to redo it completely with a tighter crop and used just unsharp mask.

The challenge shot I should have submitted, for Rock, Paper, Scissors.

I wrote a post-mortem of the challenge describing this further.