There are some things that I would never do with PS... things that I consider EXTREMELY lame. One is faking lume with the magic wand/lasso tool -> color adjustment. That is beyond "cheap". I've seen a lot of that stuff lately in many watch forums (gen and rep).
I've done 2-layer "fakes" myself but at least the lume is real in those... and I've always stated that it's a "composition" and not genuine picture.
All my best photos have come out excellently out of the camera. When I have moved the photos to my HD I've always seen immediately from those pics that "I got lucky". When you get more experienced you don't shoot bad ones so much anymore. When I was starting, maybe 1 out of 100 pics came out good. Now 7 out of 10 shots are good and usable.
There's a big difference between a "ok" picture and a technically good picture. Technically good one brings out ALL the details of the watch. Like bracelet finish, special dial patterns, etc... SIMULTANEOUSLY.
Cool to have more photography talk. We used to have many inspiring discussions with Pugs, Neil and Bazz.
PS: I'm not that interested in the studio pics anymore... there's so much you can do and the rest is Photoshop. But the wrist shots are more fascinating to me now. RobbieG's wrist shots and natural lighting pics are very inspiring. I wish you'd shot more pics of the blue Fish.