Carved my buttonwood

Today, Joey visited and after some discussion we trimmed my buttonwood. I think we ended removing 90% of the foliage. After he left...I reduced it further leaving about 3% foliage from original then proceeded to carve it using my die grinder. All the work was done with one bit and no other tool. It is very rough but I will clean it up later and add more details.

What do you think?

Old picture showing the original wood that I carved.



After 2 hours of carving...

Note that this branch was just one...I made it look like 2




What do you think? Comments (good and bad) welcome. Suggestions for improvement encouraged.

Dario,
I had a great time today! You sure took off more foliage after I left! In the end though, if the branches are where you like them, then those will be the ones worked and it will develop faster. Nice job on the carving. I think it gave some movement to the dead areas where it had very little/none. More refinement with smaller tools and brushing will help to clean the tool marks.. can't wait to see how it turns out. I did a rough virtual of what was left in the end, hope you don't mind!

Joey,

We had a great time and I really wish we can do it again. I am sorry not going with your suggestion and ending with this type of carving which is not true to natural buttonwood. Somehow, both me and Jo preferred this (whimsical) style more . I also had an "accident" that is why the jin ended shorter than we initially discussed. I plan on doing minor cleanup later with my Dremel and leave it out to weather naturally after.

I love the virt and it is much appreciated...I just wish my tree had that base but alas, the real base is deeper under ground and doesn't have that flare. Next summer, I will repot and we should see what I have to work on.

Thanks!

JMcCoy wrote:You sure took off more foliage after I left!

I was looking at the bag full of leaves and I felt taking a few more that will make a better branch placement is the best move. It was further reinforced after I looked at the old pictures and what I could have attained had I chopped it harder then. The brittle branches that refuses to bend w/o cracking while wiring sealed the deal. I do miss the 4 levels or ramification and all those foliage though.

I will guy wire the remaining stubs after the carving is cleaned up a bit this week (by Jo).