obm890, has very good points. It is worth studying his mesh. He has the greatest mesh effiency combine with perfect realism that I can think of... truely briliant work. My favorite modeler.

I have not looked at your mesh RetroDevil but I can say I think the mesh detail is justified for things like the modeling of the paper in your piece above but that there is no reason to have excess where it is not contributing. I  still have not made an open newspaper on the floor prop with the right balance of mesh  economy and detail.

I have always wanted to know who uses all that mesh on the back of figures heads, or eyeballs for that matter! I do find I often use lower resolution figures than I would like because the props in a scene are not memory economical.