May Photo Challenge 3

May Photo Challenge 3
Originally uploaded by schauba

This is the third photo for the May Photo Challenge. The theme is still beverage. I'm starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel. I'm a big fan of beverages in general and have a lot of those pictures already. Maybe this is an opportunity to take a second shot at some of those photos to see if my experience and skill has improved.

When I tackled this shot at first I was completely at a loss for what to do. Then I remembered all the bar stuff I had and that bar tools might be a legitimate way to twist the "beverage" theme this week.

I was not very happy with my initial color versions so I changed to gray scale in Lightroom. The shot improved considerably. The next step was to fool around with Contrast, Fill Light, and Curves. It was almost there but I needed a little extra somethin-somethin...then I saw the Vignette option. I flipped things around a little though. This time I have a light vignette instead of a dark one. This turned the contrast of the entire shot from being balanced to high-key. High-key was what the shot needed. The light background and the dark foreground framed the shot nicely.