This is interesting. I'm struggling a little with how to style an Eastern Red Cedar I have right now. I posted it a few threads back. Adult Eastern Red Cedar simply don't grow into massive old trees with unique character highly different from their younger counterparts. The large ones I tend to see look pretty much like ones that are much younger, they tend to keep a globular shape. They open up a bit when they age but not tremendously and they remain fiercely apically dominant even as they age. How then to interestingly and realistically style a tree that looks pretty much similar at both 10 and 50 years old? How do you make a species look old when the old ones naturally look like the young ones except bigger. We are of course working with small trees so when size is the dominant factor in the aged look of a species it presents a challenge.
Perhaps a naturalistic approach is not as impressive then as a highly stylized approach. It is an opportunity to see what you can create out of the material at hand. I would hesitate to just make it look like a pine or something. The tree as styled doesn't really look like a red cedar, quite the opposite, perhaps that is interesting though as it is completely unexpected.
~MinnesotaKirk
This tree provides a great image of how I might look like after the "4 hours"?
