Not tone mapping/shader graph is probably the least of the sins, these kinds of one-shots tend to produce hundreds of THREE.Geometry, massive matrix walks, etc. that explode once you move beyond a screen saver.
The models _can_ do it, but you need to ask for the right things. Most people don't, they'll usually blame the browser for being slow or ugly when they can't break through the THREE demo page wall.
Can you elaborate on this? how would you work on a larger THREE project? would you create models independently?