Simple steps to better icons

I am not an icon expert. But I do have some basic knowledge of a few simple things you can do to make your icons look better, especially when working with screencaps. Some of this advice is specific to photographs, as opposed to illustrations. But some is applicable to any icon.

This is a compilation of things I learned from other icon tutorials, from noodling around, and from the designers I work with.

I am using Photoshop CE, but these techniques are very basic and so should work pretty much the same back several versions.

( many images and a lot of text under the cut )

I welcome your input and/or corrections. :)

Mrrrrr

It's probably very, very wrong how turned on I am by this screencap: Merry, TTT.