Quite frankly, I've never used the pen tool before. Do you guys just use it to define borders of layers by hand? Whenever I do that, I use paths to create a selection.
The shapes it creates are good for those can be resized without losing detail, since it's vector-based. And you can adjust them any time. And using paths for selection is handy since it applies an AA on the edges even with 0 feather.
Pen is great, you can create some neat paths with it whether by hand or anchors. You can also create selections on the paths and make shapes. It's arguably the most useful tool in Photoshop.
I have the original on my pc, only thing you've seem to have done is mess with the lighting a bit. Looks decent regardless, but mostly due to the original.