Cast drawing part 2

So, I vastly underestimated how long it takes to do a proper cast drawing.  I just finished week 3 and I don't think I'm even half done with my ear... and despite my maddeningly slow pace, my shading is still speckled, while most of the other students have somehow gotten theirs smooth as glass.  That's what I'm taking the class for, I guess!

We start with totally flat darks, then model and pull highlights.  Interestingly, though I've always been taught to draw what I see and not what I think is there, I'm now being taught to relate each plane to a place on a sphere (depending on how it's facing) and assign it the appropriate value on a predetermined scale, regardless of how I think it actually looks.

Hey RIT, this should have been freshman drawing. For serious.

Onward and upward!