virtuals will change the way bonsai is being practiced and taught.

To be able to do bonsai well, is like in any art or sport not only a matter
of know-how and talent. Its first of all a matter of practice. So how many
trees can the average bonsai enthusiast style in a year? Three? Five? That's
about it for most. some professionals, like me have the opportunity to
seriously work on something like one hundred trees or more per year. No
wonder they are usually much better.

Virtuals give everybody the opportunity to try out things and work on more
than one hundred trees per year. Professionals will use this tool to work on
many more trees than they used to. While one cannot try out several quite
different design ideas on one real tree, one can very well with a virtual.

Many people have problems finding the right pot for a tree. This is because
this is a quite complex task and requires know-how, talent and, yes a lot of
training. How often do you have the chance to decide for a new pot in a
year? Once, twice? With virtuals you can try one thousand pots per year and
thus have an enormous amount of training.

Having said all this one has to admit that virtuals are two dimensional only
and have their shortcomings too. But the advantages are obvious.
Oh yes, your question was whether one is detracting form the hard work of
somebody else by doing a virtual. I think the contrary is true. You are
building on this. Of course it is also a matter of courtesy to decide
whether you want to change somebody else's tree. The decision is easy if the
person asks for it. Sometimes one will hurt the pride of an owner who posted
his "masterpiece" which is then torn to pieces by the virtual artists.
Sometimes it is a question of tact whether one demolishes a known
masterpiece, posted by a big name.

I believe that whoever posts a picture on a forum will have to face that
virtuals are made afterwards. I, as matter of routine, mention that virtuals
and critical remarks are always welcome with my postings. That way I have
learned a lot, although it hurts sometimes - a bit.

Making virtuals and having this communication over the net has changed my
way of approaching bonsai. I think I would have gone the same way, but it
would have taken me many more years than it did. This is because I had a lot
more practice. The practice went much further than it would have with real
trees. I had the chance to try wild things with wonderful material.

When I have a valuable tree that I am working on and reach a point where I
have several options, I make a digital photograph, rush to my computer and
try out a few things. That way the designs get better. Now, that the trees
are stored away and there is not much to do, I go through my collection of
pictures and play around with them - new crowns, new pots etc. In spring I
will jump onto many trees and go ahead in a much bolder way than I used to.

best regards
Walter Pall