AusBonsai

While you have put great movement into the branches they don't match the trunk - which has far less. If you look at eucalypti they usually have branches that make a tight v as they divide. so they divide from the trunk and then usually divide again the further you progress up the tree. This gives the tree a more natural look

Cheers Tony, what would you do with this one? Relax the movement to better match the trunk, or at some stage cut the trunk back harder?

While I tend to agree with Bougy...... it is funny as I read this to pass some time waiting for my son to finish a weekend sport I spotted this in the car park. Relatively straight trunk and more movement in the upper branches... Even bending down.
I'm not saying either is right or wrong or that the picture represents the best example. Just that there are all sorts in nature.

It is early days for your tree and I'm sure the design will change or be refined over time.
Good work with the grow box too.

It depends what looks good to your eye. You can leave them where they are and cut them back hard later. I would relax the wire a little myself. To my eye the photo is what I would try to follow.

River Reds come in a variety of shapes, but the ones near me that I admire often have thick stately trunks and large branches that come out at a shallow angle but then head off in all directions:
That wired branch will mellow out as it thickens so keep that in mind. Best bet is to settle on the image you want to evoke and then wire and prune accordingly.

Matt.

Cheers all, I'll leave it as is for now and will wait to see what shoots where and will come up with a design from there.

The first meeting of the SA Bonsai Society of 2021 is on right now and I'm stuck at home working and parenting - better sneak in a post here to make me feel better. I ended up removing all but the top branch of this - the other two were far too low for the "design" I now have in mind. I also slipped this into a plastic container and have had it sitting in water through summer. It's put on a fair bit of growth. I'll continue leaving it to grow for a while before doing some hard chops once things have thickened more - probably at a workshop rather than on my own.

Was wondering where you had got to. Hard chopped one of my own Eucalypts just recently, so happy to lend a hand.

Thanks Terry, I'll take you up on that! My wife's been having daily migraines for a few months (good fun) so I'm trying to juggle mostly-full time parenting and full time work which doesn't leave a lot of time for bonsai meetings but I could be the one having migraines so it could be worse.