pretty awesome lukas
love how this is coming along. a few things:
i think you should keep the guy, he adds a nice personal touch to the chop and hes been brushed pretty nicely
to improve his realism, follow what sven said and also try not to use TOO many gradients. sharp shadows help a lot for realism too
secondly: the hose in the foreground, make it fatter as it comes towards the camera with perspective and also blur it where the ground is blurred, these 2 things will make it look 10x better. The whole style you've got going on is pretty damn sexy
love how it's looking. Hit me up on msn if you need some more help