Off with it's head

As the title suggests, today's post is about reducing the height of a Slant Style California Juniper. Before the work begins, the tree is 48" tall. It's just too tall - I think it'll be a much better tree if its a foot shorter and not nearly as full. The amount of green foliage seems out of line with how much of the tree is deadwood. The live part is the dark vein running up the trunk; all the white area is completely dead. This tree was collected in the Palmdale, CA area in 1993 and first styled in 1998.
Here are a couple of images before work started:

Front

Back

After a few minutes of consideration I made my decision.

Now it's time to thin out the foliage and remove what is unnecessary. Also, we will bend the new apex into position.

It is now a matter of continuing to remove unnecessary branches and foliage as well as wiring.

Here it is at the end of this phase of the work.

Now the height is 36" and the tree is much better for it.

I'm really pleased with the results and think that this is a major improvement of this tree.
Please feel free to leave any comments or make suggestions for future posts.