So you want to be a Professional?

Bill S

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"I thought that was FUNNY! Gave me a good laugh! Nick being a man who can appreciate whimsy surely would appreciate the whimsicality of the Silverberry"

Take it with the humor Mike, spend time with Nick and you find that he is a funny SOB and there is no personal attack unless he said it is. I have seen him with rank beginners and some with good bonsai talent, and Nick is going to be Nick he is straight up with you, and tells you his thoughts.

You may not like some of the "junk" he uses in a bonsai presentation, but next time you see a piece of work of his you don't like, look again at just the tree, it will be good. He know his stuff.
 

Smoke

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I'll say the same thing I have always said to you, stop playing forum games, the AoB Awards are starting this week, man up.

Oh yeah, almost forgot, I have nothing to prove to you.
Will

yea right....

PS you forgot I have already been in your silly picture contests at AoB...I have grown weary of them as has the rest of the community by your latest entry count. Oh yea I remember I had a few trees that placed in the top thirty there also but were excluded in your galleries for trees from others of lessor quality. Envy is such a dirty word....as is dirty politics.
 
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yea right....

PS you forgot I have already been in your silly picture contests at AoB...I have grown weary of them as has the rest of the community by your latest entry count.
Really Al, remember people can check out these things for themselves.....

AoB's last contest (The 2008 AoB Awards) had 231 entries from 25 different countries. The largest and most successful bonsai contest ever on the web. How's that for silly? :rolleyes:

If you were referring to the WBC Olympics, AoB and KoB only hosted this contest for the WBC, it was not one of ours, but I'll pass your opinion along.

By the way, the 2009 AoB Awards are starting soon, keep an eye out, it'll be bigger and better than last years!

Oh yea I remember I had a few trees that placed in the top thirty there also but were excluded in your galleries for trees from others of lessor quality. Envy is such a dirty word....as is dirty politics.

Great work Al! Maybe this year you can win!

Sorry, but the lessor quality statement is subjective, but I understand your being a little biased in this case.



Will
 

Smoke

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Sorry, but the lessor quality statement is subjective, but I understand your being a little biased in this case.
Will

oh...I know where the bias is....

also remember that the worth of your contest is as subjective to me as my trees are to you, but I understand your being a little biased in this case. Pushing contests is all you have.
 
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Smoke

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I'll say the same thing I have always said to you, stop playing forum games, the AoB Awards are starting this week, man up.


Will

Tell you what Will, I'll match you tree for tree in the contest. You enter four I'll enter four. You enter 12 I'll enter 12.

I know that your next move will be that since you own the joint, you can't participate. Well I have an alternative. Post them here. Tree for tree. However many you wish to post. I'll even post them style for style since my collection is quite wide except for literati style trees. I don't have much material that has beem deemed only good for literati....
 

mcpesq817

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I have been hesitating in posting anything on this, but the last few weeks on BN have seen the level of discussion really degrade to the point where it's no longer as fun to come here.

I've grown to really like this board, but lately, I've been hoping that BonsaiTalk comes back online. Not that BT didn't have it's fair share of problems, but in removing one particular member from the discussion boards, BT has cut down significantly the amount of squabbles cluttering up the boards.
 
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oh...I know where the bias is....

also remember that the worth of your contest is as subjective to me as my trees are to you, but I understand your being a little biased in this case. Pushing contests is all you have.

Well, besides creating and running the best bonsai contests ever on the web, I also was instrumental in the development and management of AoB and KoB, I have quite a few articles published.....I could go on..... ;)

Oh yes, I am so biased that I convinced the whole editorial staff at AoB not to select one of your bonsai for some gallery and yet, I somehow put all this imagined biased behind me for this http://artofbonsai.org/galleries/keppler.php and this http://artofbonsai.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=630 ARE YOU INSANE?

Really Al, I have better things to do than follow you around clearing up your misconceptions, no one believes this bull.

I know that you believe that if you throw anough crap at the wall, something will stick, but certainly you have something better to do?



Tell you what Will, I'll match you tree for tree in the contest. You enter four I'll enter four. You enter 12 I'll enter 12.

I know that your next move will be that since you own the joint, you can't participate. Well I have an alternative. Post them here. Tree for tree. However many you wish to post. I'll even post them style for style since my collection is quite wide except for literati style trees. I don't have much material that has beem deemed only good for literati....

Another misconception, more lies, more misdirections.

Like you, I have entered trees, accents, and articles in the KoB and AoB contests and I will continue to do so. Since we use some of the best artists in the world as judges and since the contest is blind, there never has been conflict of interest.

Let's see, you have decades in bonsai, I have five years. You by pre-bonsai quite a bit, I style from only raw material, you have a year long growing season, I have 5 months at best. Wow, that's a even and thoughtful challenge.....what's wrong Al, feeling threatened? :rolleyes:

Again, I don't have to prove anything to you, but thanks for the offer.



Will
 
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ovation22

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I try not to get involved in the food fights here, but looks like Al's suggestion is a good one. I think we've all seen your resume enough. Let's see some trees from both of you. Good or bad. Surely there's something to learn just by viewing some good work.

Or, you both can continue to deflect and misdirect. ;)
 

Vance Wood

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I try not to get involved in the food fights here, but looks like Al's suggestion is a good one. I think we've all seen your resume enough. Let's see some trees from both of you. Good or bad. Surely there's something to learn just by viewing some good work.

Or, you both can continue to deflect and misdirect. ;)

With all due respect Ovation; You cannot compare five years experience with thirty. You cannot compare collected and purchased pre bonsai with raw material from where ever. Neither can you compare a 300 day growing season with, if lucky, a 150 day growing season. Get real people, if you went after your bonsai with the same enthusiasm you go after Will Heath you would be showing masterpieces. Just my observation.
 

ghues

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Al vs. Will - A Tree Showdown

Vance I think that we understand your points and I'm not going after Will at all.
BUT I too second the motion/idea..............let the games begin.
I also agree that much can be learned by this process especially for members like me (the less experienced of us) here at BN.
So let them have a dual and start posting on a new thread, we can vote on who's tree we like the best?!! We might be surprised by the outcome.
If Al doesn't have any Literati then lets start it off with a formal upright.
Cheers
G
 
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ovation22

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Fine Vance, deflect away. For the record, I wasn't going after Will at all. I'm not necessarily concerned with comparing quality per se. I just think with the frequency we see resumes around here maybe we could see some trees, too. Is there nothing to learn from posting trees from different regions? Make it educational.

Or, don't.
 
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Strange that Al challenges me when he failed to meet my own challenge here http://bonsainut.com/forums/showpost.php?p=20537&postcount=1 for a great cause, but he'll challenge me for no other cause than his overinflated ego.

Al has a deep psychological need to be better than me at something, at any expense, yet I have never, nowhere claimed that I was better than him at bonsai, in fact I have never claimed to be anything but a beginner. I think Al just suffers from pinus envy and struts around challenging anyone to a big trunk contest whenever possible.

Challenging me repeatedly while knowing full well he is decades ahead of me time wise, is like challenging a kid in a wheelchair to a fist fight, lol.

Al, I have repeatedly, knowing my disadvantages, challenged you to enter the AoB or KoB contests, where our entries can be judged outside of a popularity vote and where you can put up against real bonsaist with as much or more time in as you have.

Since you like disadvantages, enter against me in the KoB Progressive styling contest this year, the weapons being Larch Forest progressions. If that doesn't suit you, then Jack Pine informal upright. Surely the fact that you can't grow these species won't slow down a master like yourself.....



Meanwhile, I fully expect Al to continue attacking anything and everything I am involved with, he feels more important doing this and I have come to expect it of him, not that his opinion carries any weight what-so-ever with me or the way I practice bonsai. But I do know one thing, if he worried about his own bonsai as much as he does mine, hell, he could be challenging Walter, Nick, Boon, even Kimura, instead of people with five years experience.



Will
 
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Vance Wood

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Vance I think that we understand your points and I'm not going after Will at all.
BUT I too second the motion/idea..............let the games begin.
I also agree that much can be learned by this process especially for members like me (the less experienced of us) here at BN.
So let them have a dual and start posting on a new thread, we can vote on who's tree we like the best?!! We might be surprised by the outcome.
If Al doesn't have any Literati then lets start it off with a formal upright.
Cheers
G

You still cannot compare material that has been worked on for ten, twenty, or thirty years with something that has been worked on for five or less. Let's put this into a little different perspective. A raw nursery stock styling contest was suggested with similar material selected from a source like Brent Walston's nursery a year or so ago and it was poo-pooed by some of the same people active here. On a personal note would you feel comfortable in a "you show me yours and I'll show you mine" with my trees versus your trees? I mean no offense but unless you open the doors to purchased finished bonsai instead of developed from raw material I think you might have a bit of a problem. Let us also be realistic; this challenge, if that's what you want to call it, were really about bonsai and not just another attempt to humiliate Will Heath I might think it a good idea----but it's not. We have been down this road before and it usually ends up with the bridge out.
 

Mike Page

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"

-------spend time with Nick and you find that he is a funny SOB and there is no personal attack unless he said it is. I have seen him with rank beginners and some with good bonsai talent, and Nick is going to be Nick he is straight up with you, and tells you his thoughts.
QUOTE]

I wish I could spend some time with Nick. Probably be great fun. We might have a fine old time ranting over why a tree should be some way or another. Then have a beer or 2. But, he's on one side of the country and I'm on the other. Inconvenient.

Mike
 

TheSteve

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Will it's when you put your name on articles like this that make people want to see if you know what you're talking about:

http://www.knowledgeofbonsai.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=2930

I know it was co authored but still. You publish an article like this people take it more seriously from a guy with great work. Doesn't quite mean as much when the guys trees look like an internal organ. Not saying your's do just trying to get my point across about perspective.
 
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Okay Al, even though you dodged out of or ignored every challenge I ever threw at you, I'll accept yours under the follwoing simple conditions.

1) You pick the style, any style is fine with me

2) You post it here, right in this thread where you started all this crap

3) You post your tree first, one tree and only one, then I'll post one and only one.

4) No need for judges, the membership here will see the truth for what it is.

5) This ends these stupid gun fights from you once and for all.


If you agree to these few conditions, then you're on.




Will
 
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Smoke

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Vance, you and Will seem to be throwing around this pre bonsai word quite a bit.

I don't think I have shown a tree in the last year or two that has been from pre bonsai stock. Most of what I have shown in the last five years has been collected.

California junipers dug from the desert, pyracantha's salvaged from a parking lot, common myrtle salvaged from a burnt out home, trident maples cut down from five gallon trees

Just what are you referring to when you say pre bonsai?

Yea I bought a trident maple stump once, grafted 9 branches on to it, cut off offending roots up to 1.5 inches in diameter, completely grew a new branch canopy on the tree, and the tree hardly looks like a hint of it's former self, but I get your drift. I guess making trees from better material and purchasing good material from Korea and China and Japan is really not doing bonsai. Maybe one of you two last remaining bonsai artists on earth (Will and Vance) should write a story about how all those that buy pre bonsai material are hacks.

That should last as long as a fart in a wind storm.. Rave on dudes your makin me look better with every reply.

I see that now growing season has become an issue too. Why can't you two just admitt that there are better people out there and stop being so cranky. In fact there are better people than you two right here on this forum.

There has always been one common denominator when it comes to a pissing match on a forum. It is always Will Heath. Gods gift to bonsai. Sometimes I am involved. Sometimes not. Sometimes someone else complete different is involved. Sometimes it is not even Will's usual trio or four that he fights with. It happens on AoB it happens at knob, it happend at BT, they cut the head off. It happened at others, they cut the head off. Bonsaichat, banned. Whats the deal? Does he have a social problem?

Whats a matter with being a little humble? Will doesn't know everything about bonsai, and it shows in what he does. If I have to listen to someone talk down to me then they darn well better have earned it. Will has not earned it. He may never earn it. You Vance, you have earned it, but you are humble. If you don't know something you don't say anything. You don't say anything cause you won't risk being called on being wrong. You don't want to be wrong. Will is wrong a lot and still thinks he is the bonsai king.

If you let your pictures do your talking for you then you will always stand naked to the world. I stand naked everyday because I post my work on a regular basis. Will posts nothing, and when he does it's amatuer and if it gets criticised too much he just pulls it down from the worlds view.

Yet the next day he is telling someone how bad they are doing or how a branch should be tweaked or the scroll should be moved 2 cm to the right. If you tell him he is wrong or, what grounds in display have you made that judgement, it becomes a personal attack or straw man is set up or lookie at my resume. Articles about chop sticks and mushrooms do nothing for me or the community at large. These were just filler articles in a dying magazine.

Now that I have said all that, here is what I would like to see happen. Go away Will, come back in five years with 5 or 10 trees that blow us away. If that is not possible, then just shut the F$3@ up already.


These are all collected trees. No pre bonsai here. This is also where they are in less than 6 years. The procumbens did come from a nursery can, but wasn't pre bonsai. In fact it was nearly dead when I bought it, though I felt the line of the trunk and the dead branch on the left and the thickness of the trunk warrented trying to save it. True, with my growing season I can pack in two years to one for Will. Of course thats all the more reason he should be a little more humble when it comes to his talent level. Where he thinks he is and what he has to show for it are two different things. Just being square here. Once again proving to me and this so called bonsai community that he brags about constantly is entitled to a little Will photo show on just where he is today.

He has been working on bonsai since 2004. Thats 5 years, cut that in half for climate and thats 2.5 years. Plenty enough time for a self professed master to really have something to show us by now. I've seen a couple retusa's, a scrawny bar branched mugo pine, and a stick in a pot windswept tunuki branch. If this is it, why are you even defending this guy, further if your training him then it might be time to pay for a little better help...



Further, remember I work with people in California that travel all around the nation and so I know this whole climate difference is a crock of crap also. Boon, Kathy Shaner, Kenji Miyata and Ted Matson are getting mervelous results in short periods of time. Or... is working with someone better than you verboten as in "but look I made it myself". Yea and it looks like it too.


BTW if you need the before pictures on any of these pieces I have them, of course you have probably seen them before, cause I post work, and I'm proud of what I accomplish in a short time. Just think what these might look like when they do get that twenty years on them?
 

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Smoke

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Sorry Will I already posted five while I was making my long winded post. Have at those.


These are collected trees, just so you won't be throwing that stupid "I bought them thing again".

Except the procumbens that was a nursery tree.

Here's a picture of it as bought just so you don't get the wrong idea.
 

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There has always been one common denominator when it comes to a pissing match on a forum. It is always Will Heath. Gods gift to bonsai. Sometimes I am involved. Sometimes not. Sometimes someone else complete different is involved. Sometimes it is not even Will's usual trio or four that he fights with. It happens on AoB it happens at knob, it happend at BT, they cut the head off. It happened at others, they cut the head off. Bonsaichat, banned. Whats the deal? Does he have a social problem?
I have never seen anyone twist the truth as much as you do. Remember Vance Wood, John Chown, and others besides myself were mass banned from Bchat. We all outlasted that forum.

I was banned from BT for abusing a rep point system that everyone, including yourself abused. My crime was giving neg rep points to a person who constantly gave them to me, but I used a friends computer to do it, a friend who also gave him neg points on the same day. Strangely they remained a member. My attitude had nothing to do with it, but the fact that Carl Bergstrom and myself held the top spot for rep points since its beginning pissed a few people off, like yourself, who thought I was undeserving. Sound fa miler? No big deal, I went and focused on AoB and later, KoB, best thing I ever did, besides the rep system was a crock anyhow and I spoke out against it when it was started.

Whats a matter with being a little humble?
Nothing, you should try it.

Will doesn't know everything about bonsai, and it shows in what he does. If I have to listen to someone talk down to me then they darn well better have earned it. Will has not earned it. He may never earn it. You Vance, you have earned it, but you are humble. If you don't know something you don't say anything. You don't say anything cause you won't risk being called on being wrong. You don't want to be wrong. Will is wrong a lot and still thinks he is the bonsai king.
Never claimed I knew everything, what I have said is please go to any article I have wrote, published or not and point out where I am wrong. You have failed to do this, ever. When you do attempt it, you turn in personal, away from the subject. What's the matter Al, can't even have an intelligent conversation without making it personal? Bottom line, point out when I am wrong, then we can take it from there, until then, your just a loud mouth with bad breath.


Yet the next day he is telling someone how bad they are doing or how a branch should be tweaked or the scroll should be moved 2 cm to the right.
Again, point out when I am wrong and I'll be more than pleased to have an intelligent debate on the subject where we can all learn. However, you seem incapable of this, instead you would much rather debate me, instead of the subject, as you have in this very thread.

Articles about chop sticks and mushrooms do nothing for me or the community at large. These were just filler articles in a dying magazine.
How about articles on design, bonsai history, bonsai design, art theory, etc? Looks like you have only read two articles of mine......

Bonsai Focus, ABS Journal, Unione Bonsaisti Italiani, BCI Magazine are all dying? I think you are referring to the three or four articles I had in Bonsai Today, which was the largest and most popular English bonsai magazine at the time, who merged with Bonsai Europe to form Bonsai Focus, hardly dying, by any means. Nice try at an insult though.

Now that I have said all that, here is what I would like to see happen. Go away Will, come back in five years with 5 or 10 trees that blow us away. If that is not possible, then just shut the F$3@ up already.
And this is what I would like to see....stop worrying about me, you do not impress me in the least, your own bonsai are ahead of my own, as they should be with decades more time, but they are far from being master level. You also do not know everything, although you think so and you hate being told you may have did something wrong. You are incapable of having an intelligent debate and I seriously doubt if you have a single thing to offer as far as knowledge goes that isn't readily available on the web.

I owe you nothing, I do not answer to you, and I certainly do not need to explain myself to you. In short, you're a damn good stand maker, that got you on AoB, but you offer little else to brag about. I have no respect for you and to be honest, if not for replying to your lies, misinformation, and general envy filled rants, I'd have nothing at all to say to you. Isn't it strange that you blame me, but you start this crap every time. Do you think all the members are idiots?


Once again proving to me and this so called bonsai community that he brags about constantly is entitled to a little Will photo show on just where he is today.
You really are dense.

He has been working on bonsai since 2004. Thats 5 years, cut that in half for climate and thats 2.5 years. Plenty enough time for a self professed master to really have something to show us by now.
Another lie. Tell you what Al, you show me where I professed to be a master and I'll shut the frack up, fail to do so, you shut up. Put you balls where your mouth is.

I've seen a couple retusa's, a scrawny bar branched mugo pine, and a stick in a pot windswept tunuki branch. If this is it, why are you even defending this guy, further if your training him then it might be time to pay for a little better help...

Oh look, an insult at Vance now as well? Vance doesn't train me, we're simply friends. leave your insults for me Al, they don't really bother me, considering the source.



Cheers,



Will
 
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