A classical head bust in the Greco-Roman tradition — the kind of plaster cast after the antique that sits in every drawing atelier — presented alone on a pedestal under studio light. This is a pure sculpting test: no costume, no scene, no story to hide behind. The face is the whole assignment.

The head. An idealized classical head in the manner of the great antique casts (a David, an Apollo, a Doryphoros — the specific reference is free, the idiom is not): calm, symmetric, youthful-heroic features with the canonical structure that atelier casts exist to teach. The planes of the face must be right — brow ridge stepping to the nose, clear cheekbone structure, the philtrum and the strong classical mouth, eyes with sculpted (not textured) iris-and-pupil suggestion or the blank antique eye — choose one convention and hold it. Hair in sculpted classical curls or waves with real clumped mass, not a smooth cap and not noise. The head sits on a neck cut off in the traditional bust termination — a clean geometric truncation into a small integral socle, or shoulders ending in the classic broken-edge cut.

Anatomy is judged mercilessly here. A slightly stylized but structurally correct head beats an uncanny near-likeness. Asymmetry from sculpting is human and fine; collapsed eye sockets, pasted-on ears, or a rubber jawline are not.

Material — plaster or marble, committed. Either: matte white atelier plaster with the subtlest subsurface scattering, faint seam lines from the casting mold, small chips at the socle edge, and a whisper of dust-grey in the recesses; or white statuary marble with soft SSS depth and delicate grey veining that follows the form. Pick one and make it convincing at close range. No pure-white shadeless material — the render must prove the material has depth.

Pedestal & setting. A simple column pedestal or plinth, a neutral studio backdrop, nothing else. One soft key light placed to rake the facial planes the way a drawing instructor would set it — form shadow down one side of the nose and cheek, a clear terminator, gentle bounce fill so the shadow side keeps its planes. The classic atelier lighting is part of the brief.

Composition. Camera at the bust's eye level, three-quarter view, head filling most of the frame. The final image should look like a photograph from a cast collection catalogue.

Deliverable. Final render plus a clay/matcap render — the facial planes will be judged in clay as an art student's cast drawing would be.