A wonderful design Tom!
I never saw an indigo render that I didn't like. I admit this.
About the podium render. I still admire how you handled the reflections on windows. Well done.

The big problem with SU is that it can not import huge meshes. Huge? Not really, we're talking about >64k tri meshes. And trees need ~100-300K.
To split into groups isn't a very promising method either. More complicated than helpful.
Blender integrated tree generator is fine. There's also the excellent ngplants open source app.
http://yorik.uncreated.net/greenhouse.html
http://ngplant.sourceforge.net/#downloadanc

@Richard
Of course, but on what topic? It has nothing to do with SU .

BTW for 2d cutout lovers. Have you tried this?
http://arnaud.ile.nc/cantree/generator.php

Brilliant
I feel your pain with these trees.
I tried to model some decent trees in blender but they're rather heavy for SU. Possible though, on your own risk LOL.
Trees have to be real 3d objects, separated leaves included. Let's face it.
Excellent work Tom.

My suggestion? Bring it all to blender, set the scene and render (cycles). Tig's obj exporter is EXCELLENT!!!
The new tree generator of blender is quite impressive.
Grass? Piece of cake - real 3d particles grass I mean.

Daniel, not a halo, an editing again. I wonder if Molotov is a fake.
The scale of these figures is a bit... out of scale. I wonder.
Is there anything true on these photos?

See, on the last photo I posted, Lenin and Molotov. Around Molotov's figure there's a halo too. Very common on old photos. Adopted from oil painting technics.
However, you may think that it's another fake photo and you may be right. We weren't there. Photos aren't real documents, always, they never were. Long time before Ps.

@Dave R
I love these old cameras, I know what you mean but this isn't the case.
There's a halo around the figures. Not an aperture neither a vignette effect. It's definitely a retouching. If it's a hoax, I can't be sure.

Ebbets famous photos.
I know, they may be authentic in some way, some of them.

1. Can you please, explain the halo lighting around some figures? This indicates editing.
2. In some of these photos, watch the DOF, inconsistency? Yeah, the front buildings are in focus, same the figures that are very close to camera.

Anyway retro cool.
My favorites

Lovely tractor
Eric, both photos look like an early Ps work.
The first one, well known photo, it's obviously a montage. See environment around figures.
I won't discuss on the second one. Obviously a montage, once again.

Thank you for replying TIG.
Agreed.

No comments.

Great work indeed. TIG, I thank you so much!
Here a test, downloaded from 3dWH. It's a ~1.5M faces mesh, ~20 mterials.
Imported in blender/cycles. Just playing, nothing serious. (yes, I forgot to add transparency on windows glass material)
A great free solution for rendering BTW. Having the support of blender editor, excellent solution for more organic adds.

A question to TIG. Now we're able to export tri meshes only. Obj supports n-gons as well. Will be possible to export like this? As b-mesh is the new implementation to blender. (the new n-gons editor-support)

I mean, SU UI seems to support flat n-gons. Is this true? I'm not convinced. Braking flatness results to tris (show hidden geometry)

A very nice presentation!
My suggestion is to use a second pass raw render (shadow casting off) with sun coming from the opposite side.
Combine it as screen ~20% layer. This way you'll be able to have better-dark shadows under cars without losing details on shaded parts of buildings

I'm not sure if this is the proper topic but... enjoy, scifi-retro-cult lovers
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=andromeda+nebula&oq=Andromeda+Nebula&aq=0&aqi=g1&aql=&gs_sm=1&gs_upl=2315l2315l0l6960l1l1l0l0l0l0l250l250l2-1l1l0

And this one. A bit out of topic but I could not resist
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXP4r8M3eGc

@unknownuser said:

I think I will eventually purchase CB.

I think so, too.
I didn't notice the shade removal. It eliminates these marked problems.
Here a more difficult test. A coin. A friend posted a scanned image. His scanner has a very narrow angle for lighting. Difficult then.
Another cycles render. Just a low poly cylinder, bumps only, no displacements.
Works for distant camera, complicated scenes.

Here my tests on crazybump.
Rendered in cycles/blender, displacement ~300K (the sphere)
I also used specular and AO maps.
You can test them, use them, I created a fast seamless texture.

Hey, you need a 16 or 32 bit B&W for displacements. Else, expect scaling effect. (commenting Gaieus's idea)
Once again, the freeware solution is blender. Just unwrap it, (easy in this case) and ask for baking a displacement map.

Edit: Crazybump!!!
http://www.crazybump.com/
The perfect solution. A magical application. Try it. It costs just a little but you have some months to use it as trial.

This one from the original photo

Displ from clay render

AO from clay render

If two chairs and two apples, then loneliness could be more obvious.
Three chairs? three apples? We all are Stanley Kubrick's funs, aren't we?
This is a "strong" image. Well done.
It's the Ps work that I don't like much. A fake-volumetric effect could turn the scene to a more dramatical way.

I know. Excellent work.
However, here's the nvidia's real time human skin demo.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2f1ktWzOtE

Alberto Giacometti's work?
Not kidding, this is a masterpiece.