Looks like a very decent piece of raw material. Have fun!

if its not too late wait a little while, atleast 1 month before you start wiring. This will allow the new needles time to harden, otherwise they are very tender and are likely to break very easily

thanks..and no its not to late..havent done it yet...and i dont know how i should go about styling it...ima just keep lookin at it until i see somethin...

first of all what is your end design goal with this tree. Style? Height? Trunk size? What time frame do you expect to achieve this in? Ask yourself these questions, come back here with an answer and together we can help you achieve your goal.

thanks

So you asked Boon on Facebook to help style the tree? Come on Man, join the club.

well, i checked the trunk out and i put a string around to measure it and it's 3" all the way around and 1/2" wide...i want to work on thicking up the trunk...i was reading something about trunk chopping to get a natural look in the trunk and to thicken it up...but im not sure on how to do that and i know it will take longer to do it...i want it to be about 22" tall, its at 18" right now..and i think i'm going to do an Informal Upright because the lower part of the trunk is at a little slant right now.....and as far as the time frame..not really sure...i want this to be a really nice tree at the end. so if it take me a couple of years to do, then oh well....lol...but i want to work on the trunk and get it to back bud more....

Trunk chopping will not thicken the trunk directly it will only help with the taper, indirectly it can cause back budding that you can let grow freely as sacrifice branches that will help fatten the lower portion of the trunk. Can you give us a more specific ideal trunk diameter that you hope to have on this 22" tall informal upright.

If you want your trunk to be thicker, chopping now is the wrong thing to do.

THere are basically 2 ways to get a thicker trunk:
  1. let the tree grow very tall.
  2. Grow sacrifice branches from the base.

Your lowest branches might be low enough to work as sacrifice branches, but I think your best bet for this tree is to let the top grow.  REALLY grow - no pruning at all - let it get 6 - 8 feet tall.  That will give you a decent base.  At that point, you do a trunk chop above one of the low branches which will become your new leader.  Then you let that one grow tall, until it's width is just a little less than the base and you chop that branch back to a side branch that becomes the new leader again.  That is how you get width, taper and movement into a trunk.

Brent Walston has a good article on this technique:  http://evergreengardenworks.com/trunks.htm

And here's a video of one of his hundreds of JBP he has used these techniques on:  

I drew a little diagram on your pic.  The yellow line is your "sacrifice trunk" that you should let grow without pruning till it's 6-8 feet tall or more, depending on how thick you want the trunk to be.  The red lines are low branches which should all be kept - one of them will eventually be your new leader, the rest will be sacrifice branches.  The blue lines show small branches you can remove, to help keep the lower branches from being shaded out.

Good luck!

- bob

Justin,
i have been busy teaching classes, take care of private collections.  as time allowed, i will post some pictures of my students and my own trees.

this tree frankly will not make a good bonsai.  it lacks  nebari,  trunk line, and taper.  this is the problem.  there are not many good materials.  there are not many who know how to grow Japanese black pine for bonsai.

the best way to get good tree is to to grow from seed.  strictly follow instruction from bonsai today #20. 

the time that you spend fixing the problem on this tree will be longer and the result will not be as good.

enjoy watching the trees growing and be patient.

take care,

thanks boon,...i just got some seeds and plan on growing them in March..i have some JBP JBP(sanshu, and Mikawa) and JWP...im waiting for my Red Pines to come in the mail...i cant wait until i grow them,...its going to be really fun....and i have the Bonsai Today master series Pine book...and have been reading it a lot...but thanks boon...