For some reason, the bonsai standard is to treat the foliage in a way that makes niwaki/topiary puffs, but it isn't the way it grows naturally, which is the point that was being argued, IIRC.
I had a golden sekkan sugi that got too big for the space. I opted to
chop it and see what happens as I had read that they could be chopped like a deciduous tree. I still have an 'Elegans' growing in my yard. It is close to 15 feet tall now and turns a very nice shade of red during the winter, but has foliage and a growth habit very much like sekkan sugi. Cryptomeria is also known as '
Japanese cedar' even though it is not a true cedar but, like Eastern red cedar, gets its common name from the similarity of their wood to that of true cedars.
New growth on 'sekkan sugi' looks just like this
My elegans is similar in spring, though having a darker green and reddish coloration.
The Montreal Botanic Garden has a bonsai with natural style foliage. Notice how different it is from your friends' in LA.
There are a number of varieties, with such unique foliage that it is hard to believe they are the same species. Even delicate little minature puffballs that look much like heather. There are dwarf forms like Black dragon
which I note
@grouper52 made an interesting bonsai of
and the wierdly affected foliage of 'crysta'
that is a world unto itself, but whose foliage as well looks nothing like that normally seen in Japanese niwaki/bonsai.